The Little Phatty is the next great thing to emerge from the revitalized Moog Music synthesizer company. It is sort of a notch below the Voyager, but should not really be categorized as such because the Little Phatty is a powerful synth with a layout and design that looks less into the past and more towards the future.

The Little Phatty boasts a 100 percent analog signal path, 100 user editable presets and a 37-note keyboard. It is a monophonic synth with two oscillators (the Voyager has three osc). Waveform selector is continuously variable between waveforms (tri, saw, square, pulse) and there is oscillator-sync. The filter is the classic Moog ladder design. Two ADSR envelope generators are available for the volume and the filter. And finally a nice LFO with six waveshapes, four destinations and rate/depth controls helps to get things moving. The 'Master' section of the keyboard has controls for Tuning, +/-2 Octave Transpose, Glide, Pitch/Mod wheels and some data entry controls. There are no on-board sequencers or effects, however.

The interface couldn't be simpler and despite the minimized number of buttons and knobs, there are no hidden pages or sub-layers of button functions - all controls are still very hands-on and provide excellent visual feedback via two-tone back-lit buttons, dials and pitch bend / mod wheels. Beautiful, hand-built, simple, effective, powerful - classic Moog design. The Little Phatty is designed to offer a 21st century analog Moog synthesizer in a compact portable package and at a price every musician can afford.

The standard edition is the Stage model (pictured top). Moog initially released a special, limited edition run of 1,200 individually numbered Bob Moog Tribute Edition synths. The limited run, Tribute Edition of the Little Phatty (pictured above) has special Moog wood side panels, a Bob Moog signature plate across the front and rear, comes with a CD-ROM featuring highlights of the Bob Moog Memorial Celebration Service and a special Bob Moog poster.

OK so they aren't that cheap. And they aren't very feature-rich compared with some of its competitors. But it is a genuine Moog. Its sound engine was designed by the late and great Bob Moog himself. It's the final synth he built for us. And it simply sounds amazing! It's analog but with such ultra-stability and such a modern and expressive interface, using the Little Phatty is an absolute joy - for experimenting, learning, jamming and having fun - it's one of the best 21st century synths for analog basses, leads, effects, noises and more.

Liquidyzer

December 13, 2011 @ 7:07 am

Fancied some of that Moog sound to go along with my mostly roland stuff. Got a tribute version very cheap but basically all the pots on the front are shot,working but skippy. Have to say i do like the moog muffled creamy sound mixed with my other gear. Adds another dimension. BTW this made in america is a load of BS opened the LP to replace pots. Cheap Tiwanese pots and all boards made in Taiwan. Build quality is bad, god knows but my 30 year old Juno 60 will still be going when this the Little Phatty has long died. Come on synth producers, stop cutting corners and make some quality kit!

kenny

December 11, 2011 @ 2:41 pm

All these people saying mean things about Mr. Phatty are making me sad. I have a collection of synthesizers, all of them analog, and most of them vintage. The little Phatty is my absolute favorite above all of them, and it has such a rich character that I feel like it has a soul of its own. Please don't share your opinion until you have tried it!

adam

November 24, 2011 @ 10:38 pm

d-moog, it's true. Some presets are intentionally "detuned" @ OSC 2, but this is not the "out of tune" issue that is the problem. The issue is both the Little Phatty and the Slim Phatty have a circuit that requires a specific temperature before the oscillators will be in tune (A440). It seems the Slim Phatty needs a longer time to "warm up" whereas the Little Phatty takes only a couple of minutes. Next time, try this out. After a night being off, turn it on and test it with a tuner. I'll bet ya its out, even a couple of cents and after a short amout of time, it will be in tune.

D-Moog

November 20, 2011 @ 5:24 pm

I thought it was out of tune too..but it's not. The reason why some voices sound out of tune is because oscilater 2 is a detune osc. All you have to do is adjust osc 2 so that the knob is ina 12 oclock osition (also try turning the volume level of osc 2 down). Recalibration and all that other stuff is unnecessary and if you want the voice to stay in tune (that is with osc 2 turned down or off) just overwrite the preset by hitting the "store" button. It doesnt "go out of tune"..some voices are just set with a detune feature..go figure.hahahaaa!

youknowjuno

October 30, 2011 @ 7:57 am

'you might be happy with it until you hear it, side-by-side with a Minimoog'
Doh! I mistakenly purchased a Slim Phatty instead of a similarly-priced, equally commonly available Minimoog!
Ridiculous statement. But I'm guessing you've been sold a fake 'Chinese piece of crap' because these are made in the US. And if somebody can direct me to a better non-Chinese manufactured Analogue synth for the same £600 I paid for the SP I'd appreciate it - 'cos apparently there're loads out there.

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