Audio Blast V10F: the Kawai 100F reimagined as a plugin

Developer Audio Blast launched V10F on October 8, a monophonic synth plugin inspired by the Kawai 100F. That 1977 Japanese synth, first sold under the Teisco name, was built around a single oscillator; it was part of Vince Clarke’s early Depeche Mode setup, as the developer’s announcement notes. V10F takes its architecture and control layout, then adds a sequencer, distortion and an effects chain, detailed on the product page.

Who it is for

• Bass music producers (jungle, UK garage, dubstep), the audience Audio Blast explicitly targets: a monosynth is first a bass and lead machine.
• Vintage synth fans who want the sound and layout of an uncommon 1977 instrument, without the cost or upkeep of vintage hardware.
• Anyone learning subtractive synthesis: one oscillator, one filter, two envelopes and an interface that shows the signal path. Our article on the ADSR envelope helps make sense of the envelope modes on offer.

What it costs

Prices as listed in the Audio Blast web shop; the developer gives no end date for the launch price. The plugin is sold directly by the developer.

What V10F does

Synthesis

• Oscillator: sawtooth or square waveforms, plus a noise generator.
• Sub-oscillator (SUB) with octave setting, placed either before the filter (shaped with the rest of the sound) or after it (keeping all its low end).
• Filter with four modes: 24 dB low-pass, 12 dB low-pass, band-pass and high-pass, plus an independent high-pass to tidy the low end. Modulation from envelope, LFO and at audio rate, which yields more metallic tones.
• Two envelopes in ADR, AD or AR modes, triggered by the keyboard or by the LFO.
• LFO with three waveforms (sawtooth, triangle, square), delayed vibrato and portamento.

Sequencer and effects

• ARP sequencer synced to the host tempo: up to 64 steps and 8 patterns saved with the preset.
• Randomisation of notes, scale or pattern length, with root note, note range and rest probability controls.
• Distortion followed by three effect slots chosen from delay, phaser, reverb, chorus and flanger.
• 512 factory presets, resizable interface and on-screen keyboard.

Formats

Windows 8 or later in VST2, VST3 and AAX; macOS 10.15 or later in VST2, VST3, Audio Unit and AAX. The product page does not list CLAP or Linux for V10F. Our guide to VST3, AU, AAX and CLAP plugin formats explains which one your host needs.

What it competes with

• u-he Repro bundles two emulations, including Repro-1, modelled on the Sequential Pro-One, another late-1970s monosynth with a sequencer: better known and deeper in modulation, but based on a far more common original than the Kawai.
• TAL Software’s TAL-BassLine-101 emulates the Roland SH-101, the go-to monosynth for bass and arpeggios, built-in sequencer included.
• Among emulations of rare instruments, Cherry Audio’s Pentaphonic takes the opposite route: an obscure polysynth rather than a monosynth.

V10F’s appeal lies in its source, rarely emulated so far, and in the composition tools it adds (pattern sequencer, guided randomisation). Audio Blast calls it “inspired by” the 100F, not a circuit-level model: the additions (multimode filter, SUB, effects) deliberately move it away from the original. Since we have not heard it ourselves, here is the official demo:

Sources: V10F product page and launch announcement at Audio Blast. More vintage synth emulations live in our Vintage Emulations section.