Haunting soft synth has a visualizer that stares back

Love Hultén’s fondness for strange synthesizers has taken a new, more modern-looking turn. The artist has unveiled Synth#boi, a hybrid soft synth and “interactive visualizer” built with help from the designer Lirona. The blocky, austere art project translates input from a MIDI keyboard to an Intel NUC PC with an S-Engine MKII sound module, a circular display and an eerie humanoid visualizer. The more you play, the more the ‘person’ in the visualizer lights up — it’s as if the device is staring back at you and judging your performance.

And unlike many of Hultén’s projects, this is something you can buy. The creator is selling 10 examples of Synth#boi as “physical NFTs” through Dissrup starting on November 22nd at 10AM Eastern. While there’s no mention of pricing, we’d expect the limited run and novelty to carry a premium. It might be worthwhile, though, if you’re determined to have a conversation piece that also satisfies your music-making impulses.