Mono Two by Monomono: Walkthrough & Jam

A full walkthrough of Mono Two, the MS20-inspired Max for Live synthesiser from Monomono — covering oscillators, filters, envelopes, patchbay, and a 15-minute live jam.

Mono Two is a monophonic Max for Live synthesiser from Monomono, built on the architecture of the Korg MS20 — one of the most influential synthesisers in electronic music history. This walkthrough covers the full signal path, every modulation source, the visual patchbay, and closes with a 15-minute jam showing what the instrument can do once you start connecting things up.

What It Does

Mono Two gives you two oscillators with distinct character. Oscillator one offers triangle, pulse (with adjustable duty cycle), and a filtered white noise source useful for percussive textures and effects. Oscillator two adds sawtooth and pulse waves with two selectable duty cycles, plus a pitch dial spanning minus 12 to plus 12 semitones. Blending the two through the mixer — and deliberately overdriving the input level — is where the tone starts to get interesting.

The filter section follows the original MS20 signal flow: high-pass into low-pass. Overdriving the high-pass, pushing its resonance, and then sending that saturated signal into the low-pass produces the aggressive, harmonically rich character the MS20 is known for. Both filters carry an animated arc around the cutoff knob showing real-time modulation depth at a glance. Two distinct filter topologies are included — one based on the early Korg 35 circuit and one based on the later OTA design — and switching between them produces a noticeably different character from the same patch.

Envelope Two introduces a bipolar mode not commonly found on other synthesisers. In bipolar mode, the sustain level becomes the zero point: the attack phase travels into positive territory while the release phase after key-off travels into negative territory. When routed to multiple destinations simultaneously, a single sustain knob movement reshapes the behaviour of the entire instrument at once — a particularly powerful tool during a live set.

How to Use It

• Set your oscillator blend first: Use the mixer level going into the filters to shape the base tone. Higher input levels overdrive the high-pass filter, adding saturation before the signal even reaches the low-pass stage.
• Choose your filter topology: Switch between the Korg 35 and OTA circuits early in your sound design — they respond differently to resonance and overdrive, so the right choice shapes everything downstream.
• Use the modulation arc as a guide: The animated arc around each cutoff knob shows you the combined modulation in real time. Watch it while adjusting envelope and LFO amounts rather than relying on ear alone — especially useful when the patchbay is active.
• Open the patchbay panel: Click the Monomono logo in the top-right corner to reveal the back panel. Outputs are shown with filled labels; inputs have clear labels. Drag from any output socket to a compatible input — compatible jacks highlight as you drag.
• Try modulating peak (resonance): Peak has no default modulation source, but the patchbay exposes it as a destination for any output — including the LFO, Envelope One, noise, or the VCA multiplier. Routing the triangle LFO to peak is a quick way to add movement without touching the cutoff.
• Use the VCA multiplier for compound modulation: The VCA block lets you multiply two signals together before sending the result to a destination. Combining the triangle LFO with Envelope One output, for example, produces a modulation depth that opens and closes with the envelope’s attack.
• Patch sample and hold for random variation: By default, sample and hold takes noise as its input and the keyboard gate as its clock, so each new note press samples a random voltage and sends it to whatever destination you choose. Routing this to filter cutoff gives a different tonal starting point on every note.
• Explore paraphonic mode via the presets: One included preset uses sample and hold to route a held note’s pitch to Oscillator Two only, creating a paraphonic effect where a sustained bass note plays underneath a melody line — all from a single monophonic voice.
• Use Envelope Two’s hold stage for short sequences: When notes in a sequence are shorter than the desired sustain length, increasing the hold stage keeps the gate open after key-off, effectively lengthening notes without editing the MIDI clip.
• Run it on Push 3 standalone: Mono Two runs fully in Push 3 standalone mode, including patchbay editing directly from the hardware — no computer required once the device is loaded.

Why It Matters

The MS20’s combination of aggressive filter saturation, flexible signal routing, and expressive envelope behaviour has defined sounds across techno, industrial, acid, and experimental electronic music for decades. Mono Two brings that architecture inside Ableton Live and Push 3 with additions the original never had: visual modulation feedback on every parameter, a patchbay that exposes peak modulation as a destination, a bipolar envelope mode, and the ability to multiply modulation signals together before routing them. It is a synthesiser that rewards experimentation — patching things together at random produces results, and understanding the signal flow produces results that are far more deliberate. The patchbay turns what could be a straightforward MS20 emulation into a modular-adjacent instrument that lives entirely within your existing setup.