The True Genetics of the Behringer DeepMind
Or: How a Forgotten Italian "Calculator" Gave Birth to the Modern "People's Analog" Synth
Most musicians and bedroom producers religiously believe in a beautiful marketing fairy tale: “The Behringer DeepMind is a modern clone of the legendary Japanese Roland Juno-106.” And this notion — painfully obvious in its stupidity — travels from review to review, hardening into an absolute truth. People look at the abundance of faders, see the familiar subtractive synthesis layout, and parrot a “Brand of Origin” mantra that has absolutely nothing to do with reality.
The truth is, ergonomics can be incredibly deceptive. The control panel layout of most classic polyphonic synthesizers is more or less identical. So to truly look under the hood of the DeepMind, you have to arm yourself with a mountain of technical documentation — both current and historical. And then the veil of myth drops: the DeepMind has ab-so-lute-ly NOTH-ING in common with the Roland Juno!
In fact, inside the body of the Behringer DeepMind, beneath that Italian temperament, beats a cold, calculated American engineering heart!
This conclusion, reached after a detailed investigation, was preceded by a chance discovery on the internet (yeah… I’m writing “StarLord” on purpose ;)): an ultra-rare keyboard synthesizer from 1986 called the Elka EK-22, which surprised me, puzzled me, and left me desperately trying to remember: “What modern machine does this thing remind me of?!”
[Forgive me, brothers, but the absurd copyright chaos surrounding photos has finally done me in, so there will be no images here or below. If you’re curious — seek and you shall find on the web.]
However, I didn’t have to rack my brain for long, because around the same time, on July 14, 2023, shortly before my discovery, I recorded a video titled “
deepmind
behringer
ek-22
синтезатор
roland

