KVR Audio

She Changed Her Mind · Mon Mar 23, 2015 10:33 am

werp wrote:
She Changed Her Mind wrote:Thriller.
I thought it was "beat it"

Of course. I meant the album.
However, it's interesting what wiki says about it:

'Michael Jackson: particularly on his 1982 album Thriller, programming by Steve Porcaro, Brian Banks, and Anthony Marinelli. The gong sound at the beginning of "Beat It" comes courtesy of the Synclavier.'

I don't know where it is used on the Thriller album except of 'Beat It'.
If I am correct Quincy Jones didn't want to use the sound because it's a preset of the Synclavier. Michael loved the sound though.

Ed A. · Post by **Ed A.** » Mon Mar 23, 2015 8:40 pm

Funny how a Moog 55 from 1974 that sold for about $10,000 then, is worth $30,000+ now, yet you can't give away a Synclavier that cost $200,000 in the 1980s.

Numanoid · Post by **Numanoid** » Mon Mar 23, 2015 8:46 pm

$4000 for a Synclavier system, not bad.

To get attention the seller need to be more up front that Zappa secured a Grammy with this setup in '86

Hardware prices are only going one way, up.

You get no interest money putting money in the bank. Buy this instead, put it in storage, and sell it for $8000 in 5 years

ChamomileShark · Post by **ChamomileShark** » Wed Mar 25, 2015 11:15 pm

She Changed Her Mind wrote:
werp wrote:
She Changed Her Mind wrote:Thriller.
I thought it was "beat it"
Of course. I meant the album.
However, it's interesting what wiki says about it:

'Michael Jackson: particularly on his 1982 album Thriller, programming by Steve Porcaro, Brian Banks, and Anthony Marinelli. The gong sound at the beginning of "Beat It" comes courtesy of the Synclavier.'

I don't know where it is used on the Thriller album except of 'Beat It'.
If I am correct Quincy Jones didn't want to use the sound because it's a preset of the Synclavier. Michael loved the sound though.

My understanding is tha the gong sound was taken off the Synclavier demo album. I think TD also used it for the start of Kiev Mission from Exit.

While I think people are right saying that the sequencing side of has been superceeded by the modern DAWs it still sounds great to me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5__G8PO9Ag

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikHtUq48rWE

She Changed Her Mind · Thu Mar 26, 2015 8:56 am

Hehe I've always wondered where that sound came from:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bl4dEAtxo0M

t3toooo · Post by **t3toooo** » Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:38 am

Don't let this thread go boring.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Synclavier-D ... 1515648760?

She Changed Her Mind · Thu Mar 26, 2015 10:44 am

Lol, where do I put it and how do I keep it in condition? Then we still have to discuss its workflow

werp · Post by **werp** » Thu Mar 26, 2015 12:26 pm

I'd buy it but I'm on the waiting list for a fully voiced Ambika kit and I reckon I'll need several thousands of dollars worth of booze to get me through the build...

fluffy_little_something · Thu Mar 26, 2015 1:04 pm

It will probably end up in a museum...
I mean, why should people still use such a device? Unlike with classic analog hardware the Synclavier was famous for other types of sounds, which however can be made with modern computer-based gear as well. I don't think Synclavier was famous for its filters and other aspects that are very difficult to emulate in software.

It's a bit like with the Korg Legacy stuff. I have read repeatedly that the M1 emulation sounds exactly like the hardware, whereas there are differences between the analog hardware synths and their respective emulations, because the analog characteristics are much more difficult to emulate.

So people still pay thousands of dollars for a Jupiter or Memorymoog because they would actually use it.

blacktomcat666 · Post by **blacktomcat666** » Fri Mar 27, 2015 10:22 am

fluffy_little_something wrote:It will probably end up in a museum...
I mean, why should people still use such a device? Unlike with classic analog hardware the Synclavier was famous for other types of sounds, which however can be made with modern computer-based gear as well. I don't think Synclavier was famous for its filters and other aspects that are very difficult to emulate in software.

The Synclavier uses variable sample rate, which is difficult to emulate on a fixed sampe rate system (VST). This is espacially important as you can play sounds with a high FM Index and a vast range of pitch modulation without aliasing. Heavy oversampling may help, but this costs much cpu (remember that a single sound can consist of up to 32 operator pairs with an additive carrier + wavesquencing, which also have to be calculated).

I tried another approach (scaling based on pitch, FM ratio and carrier content) for this. It seems to be a good compromise between sound and efficiency:

https://dl.dropbox.com/s/ntt2o5fpuxfkze ... sounds.mp3

But indeed those type of sounds are a bit outdated, it's all about filters and 'analog emulation' today...

fluffy_little_something · Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:26 am

I am not sure, but judging from your audio demo there (you have a Synclavier?!) the Synclavier might have been used a lot on MJ's Another part of me. If I remember correctly the bass on Anita Baker's Good love was from the Synclavier, and it has a similar sound as the one on MJ's song, rather low and solid, dry as a bone.

blacktomcat666 · Post by **blacktomcat666** » Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:42 am

fluffy_little_something wrote:[...] you have a Synclavier?![...]

Unfortunately not, it's still a bit too expensive for me.

The demo sounds are from a VSTi. But I like the synclavier fm sound and tried to come close.

fluffy_little_something · Fri Mar 27, 2015 12:04 pm

blacktomcat666 wrote:
fluffy_little_something wrote:[...] you have a Synclavier?![...]
Unfortunately not, it's still a bit too expensive for me. The demo sounds are from a VSTi. But I like the synclavier fm sound and tried to come close.

Which VST's come close to what a Synclavier sounded like?

werp · Post by **werp** » Fri Mar 27, 2015 12:39 pm

fluffy_little_something wrote:
blacktomcat666 wrote:
fluffy_little_something wrote:[...] you have a Synclavier?![...]
Unfortunately not, it's still a bit too expensive for me. The demo sounds are from a VSTi. But I like the synclavier fm sound and tried to come close.

Which VST's come close to what a Synclavier sounded like?

UVIs The Beast is based on the Synclavier..there's a demo available.
The history and The Beast review is here
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ls4hEHiMqg0

blacktomcat666 · Post by **blacktomcat666** » Fri Mar 27, 2015 12:45 pm

This is a VST I'm working on (and my very first) but far from being finished. The idea is to put this on a special computer and run it as 'hardware' synth. The control software is quite complex and separated from the sound engine, so one can load the latter into a DAW. At the moment there's only an oscillator block and some envelopes, so the results are a bit similar to each other.

The osc block has 4 layers (can be doubled individually with chorus). Each layer consists of an additive carrier with up to 128 Partials + sine modulator and a wavesequencer with 64 slots (at the moment) for resynthesis playback. The whole block can also be doubled by a global chorus. This needs ~ 4 % CPU on my Athlon II X2 250 per note and has 12 voices when all 32 osc pairs + wavesequencers are running.

I've never seen a synclavier in real life, so I can't judge how close the software comes.

Synclavier for sale in Australia