OSC 6 - sfxr comp - Vote!

[Gamma-UT]

Thanks for the comments and votes, especially with a bunch of great tracks to go up against.

After much chin-scratching and umm-ing and ahh-ing, I can't quite make my mind up but I've whittled my shortlist down to Eurofishin, Forbidden Planets and Visit the Planet but I need another run through the tracks to make a final decision. It's tough.

For the next compo, I think I'm more in favour of SQ8L because it's a digital synth. I'm on a Mac so it makes no difference from a logistics standpoint whether it's SQ8L or Felix - neither runs on OS X, although I am going to take a look at VFXmachine and VSTHost to see if that approach is workable. But SQ8L has the advantage of bringing something new because it is very much a digital synth rather than a VA. Ensoniq didn't even like resonant filters. So, potentially there are some opportunities for different sounds.

[slugfest99]

For the next compo, I think I'm more in favour of SQ8L because it's a digital synth.

Hi Gamma,

I was just bringing up Felix as an example of a good recent VST - not really proposing it for OSC. As said, happy to go with the flow - it's always interesting

Decided to download SQ8L to have a look at it. What a lovely digital synth this is. And it's free - how does Native Instruments bash out FM7/8 when little gems like this are around

Just wish I could program it and it had a friendlier interface. It's obviously a faithful emulation but I'd love an easier time of playing with it.

Off for a preset troll methinks

Cheers,
Mouxbar

[Gamma-UT]

I was just bringing up Felix as an example of a good recent VST - not really proposing it for OSC. As said, happy to go with the flow - it's always interesting

Decided to download SQ8L to have a look at it. What a lovely digital synth this is. And it's free - how does Native Instruments bash out FM7/8 when little gems like this are around

Just wish I could program it and it had a friendlier interface. It's obviously a faithful emulation but I'd love an easier time of playing with it.

Off for a preset troll methinks

I think Felix is an interesting candidate - it's even more minimal that Tal Elek7ro and the S&H modes could be handy.

The Ensoniqs had a great sound, just not very fashionable once the '80s were over. John Carpenter was a big fan of it IIRC. It does take a while to get inside the programming of these things but the modulation is very flexible for a synth architecture of that age. The one thing the SQ80 doesn't have is the Transwave support, which was Ensoniq's take on wavetables. I'd love to a see a plug-in that replicated those.

I haven't checked but on the assumption that it loads ESQ1 and SQ80 presets, there should be zillions around the web although a lot of the old Ensoniq sites have disappeared.

[slugfest99]

I haven't checked but on the assumption that it loads ESQ1 and SQ80 presets, there should be zillions around the web although a lot of the old Ensoniq sites have disappeared.

I just hit KVR's own patch library and the first one ever loaded has more banks than you can shake a stick at. Awesome.

This is one of those VST's that comes as a complete suprise as I can't remember it being mentioned in the usual "What's the best freebie synth?" type threads that I used to read when new to KVR.

Whilst I appreciate it has got that late 80's DX type sound issue I think that the modern "rediscovery" of Moogs, Jupiters etc. in detuned minimal tarnce and the like shows that nothing should ever be dismissed out of hand. There is always a usage that a synth will slot into at some time in the future

And did I mention it has minimal CPU usage on my steam driven old Athlon? It's a keeper for sure.

Cheers,
Mouxbar

[Gamma-UT]

Whilst I appreciate it has got that late 80's DX type sound issue I think that the modern "rediscovery" of Moogs, Jupiters etc. in detuned minimal tarnce and the like shows that nothing should ever be dismissed out of hand. There is always a usage that a synth will slot into at some time in the future

Although one of the surprising things about house, particularly tech house, is that it's survived more than 20 years - so maybe there is some psychoacoustic aspect to a 909 kick and burbly sawtooths that just keeps it all going - these things always go in waves. I'd say that there is so much use of VAs right now that there has to be a backlash against those sound: people just get bored with the same old stuff. You have some dance genres that have seriously hit the end of the road and will get reformulated: so people with ideas will pick up on stuff that they've just rediscovered.

Then you have the other unfortunate influences - songs in movies, untimely deaths and all that. I've heard so many people play Michael Jackson stuff from the 80s in their cars lately that I'd expect sounds from Thriller and the like to turn up. I'd lay money money on the opening 'clang' (PPG Wave?) from Beat It turning up real soon now (if it hasn't already). People go "I remember that sound; I can use it".

The contrast that some of the digital sounds can give you I think can be very effective. It doesn't all have to sound as though the track was wrapped in marshmallow. Plus, with all the great saturation and waveshaping effects around now, it's possible to either enhance the aliasing for effect or put a sugar coating on it. I've been going through some of the sounds on the KLC M1 and there are some in there that need a bit of rediscovery (although the classic house piano and strings have been showing up in commercial tracks in recent years).

[tattiemannie]

Hiya folks, great to see such a load of discussion re. next comp!

SQ8L is a nice synth alright! ... took me a bit by surprise when I checked it out. Like what has been mentioned, I would prefer if it was more 'tweakable', but at the same time, it would be nice to concentrate on it for a bit, in the making of a track, to really find out where it's at!

However, carry on throwing in ideas/comments etc .... I still haven't got round to going back through the posts and making a list of all the credible suggestions to date, but I will ... Oh ... I remember mentioning Dreamstation, but then again, I've used DS lots and lots over the years, so maybe I wouldn't get as much benefit from using it in a comp, or at least not as much as I do from using something thats new to me.

[tattiemannie]

Another issue .... I was on the verge of having to apologise for not producing a participants prize .... just not had the time lately to come up with something suitably quirky ... however, I'm onto something ... although it may not be quite ready by the close of the voting. Bear with me though, I'm kinda sure it's gonna be worth having!

[Gamma-UT]

SQ8L is a nice synth alright! ... took me a bit by surprise when I checked it out. Like what has been mentioned, I would prefer if it was more 'tweakable', but at the same time, it would be nice to concentrate on it for a bit, in the making of a track, to really find out where it's at!

There is a lot of tweakability under the hood (unless you mean MIDI learn type stuff, which would be tough to pull on in a digital synth of this kind). You've got stuff like amplitude modulation between oscillators and a lot of LFOs and envelopes. The trouble is that it's hard to see from the front panel, which pretty much emulates the top of a late-80s synth: buttons, the odd knob and a cryptic vacuum fluorescent display. I think one of the complaints about the 112dB Mirage emulation was that it also was a bit too faithful to the original in the UI department.

[slugfest99]

Although one of the surprising things about house, particularly tech house, is that it's survived more than 20 years - so maybe there is some psychoacoustic aspect to a 909 kick and burbly sawtooths that just keeps it all going - these things always go in waves. I'd say that there is so much use of VAs right now that there has to be a backlash against those sound: people just get bored with the same old stuff. You have some dance genres that have seriously hit the end of the road and will get reformulated: so people with ideas will pick up on stuff that they've just rediscovered.

It's an interesting subject. I saw a documentary on shamanism a few years back that was comparing its practices to the current dance scene at the time (no prizes for guessing the featured band ).

The main point of interest to me was that psychologists had found out that naturally people don't "get" simple repetative rythym and tune in life - preferring more structured and melodic music by instinct.

However, if people are exposed to that sort of music over a period of time they naturally begin to pick up on the subtle nuances of the genre and begin to tune in to it - a bit like true shamanism in other words. Throw in the typical drugs side of issue and that "acclimitisation" period can become very short indeed - down to about 3 hours in some cases

Also, once the mental barrier to accepting the music was broken, the repeated exposure to such music caused faster and faster "tuning in" until it became pretty much immediate.

Anyway, it mirrors my very early experience with the start of the acid house scene which I found a very peculiar noise to begin with (and, in its early years it was an absolute bleep fest) but I'd already been softened up with my love of the early 80's scene. I used to play Kraftwerk's Computer World to friends of the time just to point out that this "new" stuff they were listening to had been started, in some degree, some 10 years earlier.

As such, I'm sure the scene will endure and evolve as we have seen over the last 20 years. I'll admit that there is some terrible stuff being slung out at the present but there is still plenty of innovation and new sounds to be heard. KVR in its own right sees to that.

Cheers,
Mouxbar

[amiga909]

i voted for shamnix' track. surprising and fresh somehow

idea for next compo: why not use a drumsynth like attack, wehere u can set up midi pitched instruments? thu, dont know wheter there is a free plug that can do this?

[Shamanix]

i voted for shamnix' track. surprising and fresh somehow

idea for next compo: why not use a drumsynth like attack, wehere u can set up midi pitched instruments? thu, dont know wheter there is a free plug that can do this?

Thanks

The track name is no accident, I really just hacked it together in 2 hours as a last minute entry, for the next one I'll try to give it more time, like 2 days instead of 2 hours
Normally I make 10 second in 2 hours and not ~3.5 minutes

[tattiemannie]

Right! About that participants prize! .... right now, it's like an old electronic organ emu! ... but I think it's gonna be a whole lot more when I'm through with it!

If you want to know what I'm doing, feel free to ask ... but I can tell you that the idea has come from 3 threads running at the moment .... neither of which is the home organ thread!!

[tattiemannie]

OK, 45 minutes later, 'arms and legs' are starting to grow on this device! I reckon this is gonna be well worth more than 'thanks for your contribution'!

I'm officially excited about this prize! ....If I won it, rather than be making the bugger, I would be a happy bunny! .. but then again, i'm so happy to be building it!

[Shamanix]

Cool I didn't even know we get prizes just for participating. If you're making an organ better make it a dirty, gritty, grungy one, we have far too many organs with nothing more then clean sine waves and no distortion.

[tattiemannie]

... and an hour later..... I dont want to make it any more wacky! its sounding like a bloody pier organ .... with that crazy vibrato!! ... like game show fodder! hee hee! ..... you're gonna love it guys, or hate it! I dont care anymore hahahaha!