Akai's answer to the Juno. The AX60 is a six-voice analog polysynth from 1986, built around the same Curtis CEM3394 voice chip you will find in a clutch of classic Sequential machines, wrapped in a hands-on slider-and-button panel that makes it a joy to program. One VCO per voice and no sub oscillator, but the raw sound is so bass-heavy and thick you will not miss it, especially in Unison mode with all six voices stacked and drifting. The headline trick is a savagely resonant 4-pole lowpass filter that you can modulate with the VCO itself, taking it from a growl to gritty, almost-FM metallic textures. And through Akai's sampler interface it becomes a front-end for an S612 or S900, running your samples through real analog filters.

FEATURES & PROS:

• Six-Voice Analog: 6 voices of Curtis CEM3394 synthesis, the same chip as the Sequential Six-Trak and Multi-Trak.
• Insanely Resonant Filter: 4-pole 24dB/oct lowpass that screams and self-oscillates, with keyboard tracking.
• VCO to Filter Mod: route the oscillator into the filter for growling, metallic, FM-like timbres rare on an analog poly.
• Unison and Split: stack all six voices for huge leads, or split the keyboard into two zones for bi-timbral play.
• Sampler Front-End: 13-pin interface for Akai S612, S700, X7000, S900 and S950, so samples run through the analog signal path.
• Hands-On and Deep: dedicated sliders and buttons, LFO with four shapes, arpeggiator, chorus, digital delay, auto-tune and 64 memories.

GENRE / USE:

• Synthwave and cinematic scoring: bright, sharp, John Carpenter-leaning tones
• Fat single-oscillator bass and thick six-voice unison leads
• Gritty resonant sweeps and VCO-to-filter grit for texture and movement
• A characterful, affordable Juno-era alternative, and an analog filter bank for your sampler

THE WORD: Vintage Synth Explorer rates the AX60 among the last true analog polysynths of the mid-eighties, Akai's answer to the Juno series, praising its powerful VCO sound, wildly resonant filter and thick unison as a worthy Juno-106 alternative. Read more at Vintage Synth Explorer.

SPECIFICATIONS

• Released: 1986 (original price 899 USD)
• Type: 6-voice analog polyphonic synthesizer
• Keyboard: 61 keys (5 octaves, C to C), unweighted, not velocity-sensitive
• Voice: one VCO per voice (Curtis CEM3394), PWM on all waveforms, noise generator
• Filter: 4-pole 24dB/oct resonant lowpass, VCO-to-VCF modulation, keyboard tracking
• Modulation: LFO with triangle, square, sawtooth and random shapes, routable to VCF, VCO or VCA, with delay; ADSR envelope
• Effects: chorus and digital delay
• Performance: arpeggiator with external sync, portamento, unison, auto-tune, keyboard split
• Memory: 64 patches; cassette data storage
• Sampler interface: 13-pin input for Akai S612, S700, X7000, S900 and S950
• Connections: MIDI in, out and thru; stereo outputs; headphone out; sustain and program-change pedal inputs; arpeggiator trigger input
• Condition: used