KVR Audio

dmbaer · Post by **dmbaer** » Tue May 21, 2013 10:28 pm

Stephen is apparently too modest to toot his own horn, so I'll do it for him. You can find an extensive interview with Stephen here:

http://soundbytesmagazine.com

Click on the Points of Kontakt link on the home page to get to the first of three parts of the interview.

SoundBytes is a brand new free on-line magazine about computer sound, and it was my very great pleasure to be the interviewer on this one.

Enjoy!

paulbreeze · Post by **paulbreeze** » Tue May 21, 2013 10:35 pm

Interesting story. Thanks,

Xenobt · Post by **Xenobt** » Wed May 22, 2013 12:16 am

Thanks, dmbaer, I'm always interested in the interesting! Great interview, too. Keep it up!

KVR/eSoundz: Xenobt

DaveElson · Post by **DaveElson** » Wed May 22, 2013 1:41 pm

Enjoyed the interview.

hollowsun · Post by **hollowsun** » Wed May 22, 2013 2:16 pm

dmbaer wrote:Stephen is apparently too modest to toot his own horn

I don't have any brass samples!

I suppose I could have knocked up a synth brass patch here on the Dotcom!

Great mag, David, and a great honour for me to the first to be featured in the 'Points of Kontakt' pages (great name for the feature).

Good luck with the mag. I am sure it will do very well.

Cheers,

Stephen

don1thedon · Post by **don1thedon** » Wed May 22, 2013 2:41 pm

Enjoyable read - Thanks for the insight!

The_Hidden_Goose · Post by **The_Hidden_Goose** » Wed May 22, 2013 3:12 pm

Nice!

The world can't talk Hollow Sun up enough!

Magazine seems to be worth a bookmark too

toine6 · Post by **toine6** » Wed May 22, 2013 3:14 pm

Nice interview.

Stephen,

I just bought me an Akai AX80 2 weeks ago. Any tips? What do you like about it? What are your favorite uses for it? Pads, bass, synth piano? Did you ever solder in a replacement ribbon for the substandardly designed membrane connection?

You call it analogue, which it is in part, but only the filter section. Quite different sounding synth than my AX73 which has VCO's, but it's also a whole different synth architecture, so it's expected they should sound different. The AX80 does have it's own character, I've been enjoying it, but I'm tempted to sell it since I got a good deal on it and worry I may not use it enough to justify having it. I'm trying to decide if it's going to fill a gap that my other kazillion VSTi's and hardware synths don't. Other than it having it's own subtle character, sound, and ease of use, I'm not sure I really need it. Convince me otherwise?

hollowsun · Post by **hollowsun** » Wed May 22, 2013 6:44 pm

toine6 wrote:I just bought me an Akai AX80 2 weeks ago. Any tips? What do you like about it? What are your favorite uses for it? Pads, bass, synth piano?

I found it a fairly decent all-rounder, to be honest - nice strings, synth brass and polysynth, Prophety smooth pads, basses and leadlines (although I prefer single triggered monosynths for the latter two categories). The X-Mod functions took it into slightly odd territory.

It sounded nice through a chorus pedal.

I liked the sound of it and the UI was ingenious.

toine6 wrote:Did you ever solder in a replacement ribbon for the substandardly designed membrane connection?

I never found the need but it was brand new. It's almost 30 years on so don't know how they have stood the test of time.

toine6 wrote:Convince me otherwise?

Well, not my job to sell old gear but I liked it and it's all down to personal taste in the end. I really enjoyed my time with the AX80 until in went the inevitable way of all things to fund something else, in this case, a Ensoniq ESQ1. But despite all the delights of the ESQ1, I missed the beefier sound of the AX80.

But it's your call, obviously.

Cheers,

Stephen

Hollow Sun Head Honcho Speaks ;-)