Classic Dub Chords.
From one magic module.
Chords turns a single gate, a single note or a single knob into the deep, drifting minor stabs of dub techno. Harmony engine, analog-style voice and ten dub presets in one panel.
A chord machine with its own voice.
Most chord modules stop at the notes. Chords goes all the way to the sound: it builds the chord, voices it, and plays it through up to fifteen voices with a dark ladder filter and long, overlapping releases. Send a gate from your sequencer and you hear a finished dub stab. Patch a keyboard and the lowest key becomes the root of every chord you play.
Stays in the dub vocabulary, by design.
Pick a root and one of seven modes. Then choose how chords are formed, and Chords keeps them sounding right as they move.
One shape, moved
A fixed chord shape follows the scale degrees, the way classic chain stabs do. Sixteen shapes, from a bare fifth to m11, rootless m9 and quartal stacks.
Chords from the key
Each degree stacks thirds from the scale, so a single finger plays in-key triads, sevenths, ninths, elevenths or thirteenths.
Voice leading
Every new chord picks the inversion and octave closest to the last one, so progressions glide instead of jump.
No muddy tensions
A perfect fourth above the root becomes a ninth, a minor sixth is dropped. Triads and sevenths stay untouched.
Close, drop-2, open
Spread the chord across the keyboard and choose its inversion by hand or by CV.
Your own chords
Switch to Thru and the notes you play pass straight into the voice, unchanged.
From a sequencer or from the keys.
Gate and degree
A gate triggers the chord, a CV picks the scale degree at one volt per step. Leave the gate unpatched and the chord plays as a drone.
Polyphonic V/Oct
Patch a keyboard and Chords switches over on its own. In parallel mode any key moves the shape chromatically; in diatonic mode the key snaps to the scale.
Retrigger or legato
Restart the envelopes on every chord change, or let voices slide to the nearest new note while the sound keeps ringing.
Dark on purpose.
Two detuned, band-limited oscillators per voice, a sub that sits only under the lowest note, and a ladder filter that gets darker as you play higher.
Shape, sub, drift
Blend from saw to square, add a square sub one octave below the bass note, and let each voice drift slightly on its own.
Ladder, 12 or 24 dB
Drive in front, resonance kept below self-oscillation, negative keytracking by default and a decay-only envelope for that plucked stab.
Attack and length
One LENGTH knob sets decay, sustain and release together: short stabs on the left, endless washes on the right.
Fifteen voices
Old chords keep fading while new ones start. When the pool fills up, the quietest release is reused first.
Ten starting points.
The PRESET knob sets every sound and playing parameter at once, and the knobs on the panel turn with it. Your key, degree and patching stay as they are. Move anything afterwards and the display marks the preset as edited.
- P1
Chain Stab
The classic minor-seventh stab, moved in parallel. The reference sound of the genre.
- P2
Deep Stab
Rootless m9, lower and softer. For slow, dark tracks.
- P3
Wash
Long, voice-led chords that melt into each other.
- P4
Fog Pad
A very dark, very wide sus2 bed that sits under everything.
- P5
Echo Fodder
A short, slightly brighter stab built to be sent into a delay.
- P6
Diatonic Walk
In-key seventh chords across the degrees, one finger on the keyboard.
- P7
Bett
Root and fifth only. A drone that leaves the third open.
- P8
Tape Chord
Lots of drift and drive. Worn, warm and slightly broken.
- P9
Knock
Almost percussive: very short, strong filter envelope.
- P10
Quartal Mist
Stacked fourths, deliberately ambiguous.
Always know what is sounding.
The chord name, its function in the key, scale, mode and preset at a glance. Click the display for a keyboard view where releasing voices fade out. Turn a knob and it shows the exact value.
Thirteen jacks, no menus.
| Jack | What it does |
|---|---|
| GATE · DEGREE | Sequencer input: trigger the chord and choose the scale degree (1 V per step). |
| V/OCT · P.GATE | Keyboard input, polyphonic. The lowest held key is the chord root. |
| CHORD · INV · ROOT | CV for chord shape, inversion and root (1 V/oct). |
| CUTOFF | Filter cutoff CV, 1 V/oct. |
| L · R | Stereo mix, voices spread across the field by WIDTH. |
| POLY | Every voice on its own channel for further processing. |
| V/OCT · GATE out | The chord as polyphonic pitch and gate, to drive any other oscillator. |
The short version.
- Format
- VCV Rack 2 plugin
- Width
- 24 HP
- Voices
- 15, with overlapping releases
- Chord shapes
- 16 parallel · 8 diatonic
- Scales
- 7 modes, 12 roots
- Presets
- 10
- Outputs
- Stereo, poly audio, chord CV
- CPU
- About 3 % of one core at 15 voices
Be the first to patch it.
Chords is the first module of our Dub Techno Suite for VCV Rack. Leave your email and we'll write once, when it's out.