This is the very source of cheap Moog bass! It is a lot like the strap-on Moog Liberation in its design and architecture and also looks and sounds very much like the Moog Rogue. The MG-1 was built by Moog for Realistic (Radio Shack), and was designed specifically for the home market. Very basic and easy to use, this is a nice cheap way to get your hands on Moog sounds!

The MG-1 is a 2-VCO monophonic/polyphonic analog synth with a genuine 24dB/oct Moog filter, however the overall sound is thin. On the MG-1, the VCOs are referred to as 'Tone Generators'. It can produce sawtooth, square and pulse waveforms, and the oscillators are detunable and syncable. A simple ASR (attack, sustain, release) envelope called 'Contour' can be applied to both the amp and the filter. The LFO section provides triangle or square wave patterns as well as Sample-and-Hold. Additionally there is a simple Ring-Mod effect called 'Bell'.

Unique to the MG-1 is a slider on the far right side of the keyboard which controls the volume of a simple divide-down polyphonic organ sound. This feature makes it at least a little more versatile than the Rogue. There are RCA inputs and outputs (the input is routed straight to the output for playing along with music from your stereo system) but no external speakers as in most other home marketed synthesizers. There is also no sign of Midi or patch memory on the MG-1. It is used by Peter Gabriel, 808 State, Remy Shand, and KMFDM.

Here is a table highlighting some of the differences pointed out by a user between the MG-1 and Rogue.

keith mitchell

September 1, 2008 @ 5:52 pm

I bought one of these little monsters about 6 months ago, and have had nothing but fun with it.....great value for the money, but some may find the lack of programming and no pitch bend a little frustrating. A great source of cheap, old school Moog sounds nonetheless, and with a bit of imagination (and fiddling) you can make most sounds that a rogue or liberation can, along with some extras they can't with the poly section. All in all, a great find if you can get one on e-bay....snap 'em up, they go fast. Also, if you get one (or a Liberation or Opus-3), take the time to clean up the foam underneath (lots of info available on this). There are replacement slider kits all over e-bay.

Octopede

August 15, 2008 @ 12:54 pm

I paid probably too much for my MG-1, but I don't really regret it. This machine, while so simple and hobby-esque, is capable of plenty of that cool, ladder-filtered Moog love, especially in bass and lead sounds. This is a great machine for someone who needs wallet-friendly proof that digital samples and emulation can't always capture the subtleties of analog. And, also, I kind of like the cheesy little chip-generated poly organ feature on this, I only wish it were routed thru the amp 'countour' as well.

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