Arturia V Collection 10. Predictions.

[vurt]

Jan Hammer's entire performance identity was him playing synthesizer like a guitar! Just google any image of him and he's there with a keyboard around his neck! Literally everyone had Escape From Television in their CD collection. But that's all in the past of course.

but a lot of people used keytars and never sounded even slightly like a guitar. i think there's more to the technique than strapping the synthesiser on

[zerocrossing]

Jan Hammer's entire performance identity was him playing synthesizer like a guitar! Just google any image of him and he's there with a keyboard around his neck! Literally everyone had Escape From Television in their CD collection. But that's all in the past of course.

I’ve never even heard of that album.

[onerob]

Recently I used Arturia's clav, on a whim, in something I was working on and found it can be used quite effectively in the places where you might want some clean rhythm guitar playing. In no way does it sound "just bad", certainly better than the stock clav instrument in my DAW.

[noiseboyuk]

Recently I used Arturia's clav, on a whim, in something I was working on and found it can be used quite effectively in the places where you might want some clean rhythm guitar playing. In no way does it sound "just bad", certainly better than the stock clav instrument in my DAW.

INXS’ New Sensation has a deeply terrible sampled banjo in it - you can find the multitrack WAVs online. But in the mix it sounds great jostling for position with the guitar. In fact that goes for a ton of hits - people here are obsessed about stupidly tiny details, whereas if you hear it raw it’s often naff. In other words - it’s not what you got its how you use it. If you can’t make stuff in V Collection 9 sound good, V Collection 10 likely won’t help you much either.

Since we’re wildly off topic, following another topic of synths that sound like guitars that sound like synths, the greatest ever What Actually Is That solo is from Yellow Magic Orchestra’s 1,000 Knives, from 1981’s BGM album (also thought to be the first use of an 808 on record). To this day I don’t really know what the solo @ 2.07 is - just when you think it has to be guitar it does this simply impossible pitch sweep which says it has to be keyboard. Sounds incredible.



Some great live versions online too, the solo is usually guitar there.

(BTW I’m still not remotely over the passing of Yukihiro Takahashi and Riyuichi Sakamoto months from each other).

[dlandis]

cant say ive heard much jan hammer, aside from the miami vice theme.
i think i was still a child when that was on?

it sounds similar to jmj to me, so never looked further as its not my kind of thing.
would you have any recommendations for a couple of tracks that stand out?

I don’t know anything more than you do about Jan Hammer. But I’m sure you recall that people (or at least kids) were amazed by how he made a synth sound like a guitar.

nope, i wasnt even aware he had?
are we saying people thought it sounded like a guitar on the miami vice theme?
ill have to have a proper listen to this sometime, i can barely recall it tbh, as i say, i was but a child.

I don't want to irritate people by being OT, so I'll make this my last comment on Jan Hammer. I'm not sure if this is where it came from or if it was a reaction to the opinions of those who listened to him (my guess is the latter,) but on the back notes of The First Seven Days, there is a remark assuring the listener that there are no electric guitars on the album. I don't remember ever thinking there were guitars on it, but his technique in his solos on the first and, I think, last compositions are really guitaristic. I can definitely see someone being confused about it.

please don't misunderstand, i wasnt saying i didn't believe it or that i thought it didn't sound guitar like, now ive listened to crockets theme, right through, i can hear what jamcat was talking about.
my recollection of the track, was from the opening, which ive never listened past before knowingly, so never noticed it before.

and yes, it doesn't sound like a guitar per se, but it does have a guitaresque performance, which i guess at the time was "different".

i really don't think miami vice, caught on much in the nw of england back then, so i never really took much notice.

now im older, im always happy to find new music to listen to, or learn bits of musical history i may not have come across before. so thanks all for the conversation and information, interesting to hear different view points

No worries, I think I understood your comments. I certainly wasn't irritated at all. And Google photo searches aside, while it's overstated to say that his entire performance identity was based around his guitaristic solo style on certain songs (the "Keytar-style" synths/controllers were getting popular around this time and many synthesists took to them basically to get out in front of the band rather than being stuck behind keyboards; even Herbie used one on some tunes. It really had nothing to do with trying to sound like a guitar,) it was definitely a "part" of his stage presence. I saw Hammer with his band in concert about this time. If memory serves he used the Keytar-style keyboard on four, maybe five, tunes. While a popular part of the concert, it wasn't at all like most of the night was spent on the instrument. And, it should be noted (and to which you obliquely allude,) what Hammer played while using the neck-slung keyboard was often not guitar-like at all. His solo style had many facets, whether on Keytar or not, e.g., I'm not sure that I can think of a single solo that he took with Mahavishnu Orchestra that was guitaresque in any manner outside of the use of the pitch bend wheel.

But, no concerns, sir. I took no offense at all. While the OP has been very patient, however, I am totally done talking about Jan Hammer. It's been a good talk, but it's really very OT.

[TheMaestro]

The last three pages is what we can expect from Arturia's next release.

[egbert101]

We're getting an AI Jan Hammer V!

[vurt]

i dont see the problem tbh?
and yeah, of course im going to say that, i was the lions share of the conversation.

let me explain, i do agree with jamcat in at least one point he was making, technique counts.
and discussion of techniques, some people may not have known of, that can help them get the best from the tools we use, seems an appropriate topic imo

while the speculation of what might happen in the future is indeed fun, its not useful information.
so peppering the thread with ideas on usage, is indeed worthwhile!

but im happy to leave it, just wanted to explain my thoughts

[BBFG#]

I may be wrong on this, but I remember the first keyboard pitch "bends" being done by Herbie Hancock with Miles Davis by running his Rhodes through an Echo Plex and manually reaching into it to manipulate the tape head.

Perhaps Hammer used the pitch bend in specifically using guitar limits, but most keyboardists had been playing with that little wheel since it was introduced. I remember that wheel was equally as much of a controversy as was the "whammy bar" was with guitarists. Hammer may be the one that just pointed out the musicality in technique that needed to be from that point on. Pitch bends in different instruments each have their own structure and application according to those limitations. I especially love interchanging those instruments and applications in ways that shake up perceived notions of what should be allowed. Maybe because so many of us had read JLS during those times as well, we instinctively gathered that as keyboardists, we'd be called on to do the same. And equally judged for it.

When it comes to Hammer in this discussion of "what's next", I find myself wondering about his custom Freeman String synth that was modified with a wood resonator. Go back to those Mahavishnu albums and give that instrument a second going over. There was something different about it that's not quite emulated yet.

Although I doubt it's enough for most people to think much of it and string synthesizers have never been a major component for my pieces either. It's just that the interview discussing it impressed me at an early age.

[CrystalWizard]

I first heard him with Jeff Beck, then the Mahavishnu Orch.. That's smoking hot sauce fun. Interesting about Herbie, i have never heard that. I know that Joe Z (Zawinul) could do amazing stuff with pitch bending, like amazing.

ON TOPIC: because this is very important business speculating on what we can buy in the future-
a synth or two, some effects,..
My vote would be for another update to Pigments or something original.

[BBFG#]

In the vein of those Fusion greats and Folk Rock legends, I'd be more interested in a couple more organs from Arturia. Specifically, the Yamaha YC45D and also the Lowrey home organ used in The Band.

[Gribs]

Interesting observation: Steinberg is advertising Arturia bundles on their website.

I’d like to see Arturia pull off something like Softube modular in a similar vein with sections from their vintage synth models becoming modules. Wasn’t Arturia’s Origin hardware synth something like that? Also, Spark 2 is modular to some degree but if I remember it didn’t allow feedback.

It would be great to have a Spark 3 with built-in drum machine models. It needs polyrhythms and adjustable lengths and timings for each pattern/track/sequencer lane.

Cool stuff that will probably never happen would be virtual discontinued Elektron boxes like Sid Station, Machinedrum, and Monomachine.

Some more obvious things would be a CP-60 and a PPG-Wave.

[egbert101]

Maybe Arturia will actually develop emulations of famous drum machines and add them? I think Roland themselves created some amazing virtual versions with their ACB technology so it is possible.

[dlandis]

Maybe Arturia will actually develop emulations of famous drum machines and add them? I think Roland themselves created some amazing virtual versions with their ACB technology so it is possible.

This is a great suggestion, but perhaps even better might be using the Pigments model and coming up with something more ground-breaking in the realm of drum synthesis/resynthesis? If they could do that and develop an engine that could produce realistic fills and variations in defined feels with AI, that could be amazing. This would be especially cool if it could also deal with odd meters up to 14/8 with subdivisions. User importation of samples, of course, would be a given.

I don't think that's asking for too much.

Also, it should never be late for a gig, hit on the club owner's girlfriend, play too loudly/busily over the female vocalist, or drink too much on breaks.

[dlandis]

Interesting observation: Steinberg is advertising Arturia bundles on their website.

I’d like to see Arturia pull off something like Softube modular in a similar vein with sections from their vintage synth models becoming modules. Wasn’t Arturia’s Origin hardware synth something like that? Also, Spark 2 is modular to some degree but if I remember it didn’t allow feedback.

It would be great to have a Spark 3 with built-in drum machine models. It needs polyrhythms and adjustable lengths and timings for each pattern/track/sequencer lane.

Cool stuff that will probably never happen would be virtual discontinued Elektron boxes like Sid Station, Machinedrum, and Monomachine.

Some more obvious things would be a CP-60 and a PPG-Wave.

I don't know about the PPG Wave suggestion. It's a great thought, but I think that model is still licensed to Waldorf, even though Wolfgang Palm sold his other (s/w) synths to Brainworx.