Serum from Xfer Records is an advanced wavetable synthesizer that goes beyond the limits of traditional synthesis by featuring powerful wave shaping tools. Perhaps because of the potential for complexity, it’s a synthesis type well-suited to the graphical world of VST-land, hence the many examples that exist, trumping the older hardware in fidelity and in the number of wavetables.
Movement and tonal complexity are introduced by scanning the table, either manually or by modulators such as LFOs and envelopes.
The distinctive sound is derived from groups of digital waveforms, known collectively as wavetables. Wavetables were first developed by Wolfgang Palm of PPG, the concept later taken up by Waldorf and Access (amongst others). Its aims are simple: to be a ‘dream synth’, which in this case translates to a wavetable synthesizer producing high-quality sound from a ‘workflow-oriented’ interface. Serum is the first synthesizer from Xfer Records, creators of the enduringly useful LFO Tool.
