Venus Theory has released auras:tephra, available as a FREE download.
The latest evolution in the AURAS project, Tephra was forged from none other than the Genki Katla – an exotic and wildly pricey Icelandic synthesizer born from and inspired by its namesake volcano.
The sound of Katla is a bit hard to describe since it’s not really any one specific thing. It exists somewhere between classic synth tones and unstable rippling distortion that folds back into itself backed by a unique voice architecture and meta-parameters that evolve the sound in complex motions.
Tephra is my attempt to capture this volatile design and bring it to the studios of everyone, providing a collection of jagged textures, crunchy basses and leads, drifting pads, and tension filled soundscapes.
The foundation of Tephra is the familiar AURAS dual-layer engine that allows you to fuse two distinct sonic states. Because the Katla thrives on unpredictable pitch drift and ‘controlled chaos’ it meant that traditional sampling wasn’t enough to do it justice.
Every sound source was captured as an individual ‘performance’ of sorts to preserve the organic wobble, harmonic saturation, and gritty wavefolding that give the hardware its overall vibe. Using the ‘Source Select’ knobs, you can mix and match these recorded layers to design your own shifting landscapes on the fly.
To further lean into the stark and oblique character of the synth, I’ve curated a set of custom impulse responses. These IRs act as tonal shapers as well as more standard reverbs, placing the Katla’s raw signals into vast sonic caverns, resonant metallic spaces, and surreal acoustic voids.
Tephra ships with 20 handmade presets (plus an ‘init’ patch) designed to showcase everything I love from delicate, frozen flutters with an almost orchestral character to massive tectonic droning basses. It features the signature AURAS engine, giving you immediate control over expression, dynamics, and filtering.
As with every release in the AURAS project, Tephra is available for absolutely free and is highly optimized to deliver expansive cinematic power in a compact footprint of under 250MB.
auras:tephra requires Decent Sampler (desktop or iOS version).
For more information and to download auras:tephra, click here:
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