KVR Audio

The Chase · Post by **The Chase** » Mon Aug 30, 2004 11:43 pm

Im surprised no one has mentionsed the bass in "Blue Monday". wasn't that the definitive 80's bass? If not, it is still the funkiest and coolest bass ever used EVER. Also, that song was made before the DX-7.

donkey tugger · Post by **donkey tugger** » Mon Aug 30, 2004 11:47 pm

lavoll wrote:excellent suggestions thx.

i dont really have one song to emulate.. hmm.. but how about "dont you love me baby" - human league?

what do you call that style of singing?

Yorkshire monotone.

Pantsdown666 · Post by **Pantsdown666** » Mon Aug 30, 2004 11:47 pm

lavoll wrote:i dont really have one song to emulate.. hmm.. but how about "dont you love me baby" - human league?

lavoll wrote:what do you call that style of singing?

tortured ...

lavoll wrote:and how is it processed?

with a blender!

DX-7s, any rubber hexagonal drum pads and particularly heavily gated drums are the go.
I was nearly arrested in 1984 - police broke into my warehouse when we were slamming a snare drum in a bathroom to get that explosive sound - all mixed down to four track cassette via a hardware gate of course. In retrospect, they really should have arrested me for overuse of eyeliner and mascara.
It's funny being 42 and watching my early 20s being recycled. Back then, we used to make fun of the retro crowd with their 60s affectations, mod scooters etc etc. ...

blaster78 · Post by **blaster78** » Mon Aug 30, 2004 11:48 pm

donkey tugger wrote:
lavoll wrote:excellent suggestions thx.

i dont really have one song to emulate.. hmm.. but how about "dont you love me baby" - human league?

what do you call that style of singing?
Yorkshire monotone.

steve.

SuitcaseOfLizards · Post by **SuitcaseOfLizards** » Mon Aug 30, 2004 11:55 pm

Didn't Human League have some kind of Arp in their tunes, like a 2600 or Omni or such? Or am I having an acid flashback?

LBN · Post by **LBN** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 2:03 am

General (early) 80s tips (some of these from a Future Music article on this very subject):

Analog is your friend. Samplers weren't readily available in the early 80s.

Synths: MiniMoog V, Pro-53, Korg Legacy Collection (for MS-20 and PolySix), impOSCar, FabFilter One, iBlit, polyIblit, Poly-850, Mercury-1, SuperWave P8, Square I, and many, many others. Basically, analog emulation with maybe a concentration on monophonic. Arpeggiators are your friend. Strings should be run through a phaser

Drums: Any of the Roland analog stuff (TR-808, CR-78, CR-5000, etc), Korg KR-55 (snare used on Depeche Mode's "Speak and Spell"), and, of course, the Linn Drum. Here, Waldorf Attack and Sonic Charge Microtonic would work very well or samples of classic machines. No off-beat hits. The rhythm should be tight. Kick on every beat. Big, big snare (some reverb, short delay, and EQ boosts around 1 to 4kHz) on 2 and 4. Also, don't be afraid to synthesize your own drums. Add a small amount of distortion to the hi-hats and lock them to 1/4, 1/8 or 1/16. Tempo shouldn't stray above 130.

Do a bright and bouncy bassline with a bit of chorus. Basslines were rather melodic.

Vocals should be up-front with few effects except maybe a little reverb or short delay. Reverse reverb can be used for that cliche early 80s sound.

I suppose the most important thing to think of is what are the limiting factors. At that time it would be technology and the budget of most bands early on. Songs rarely had more than 3-4 different synths on them - reuse your synths. And tons of effects were beyond the budget of most bands but you can use something like the Lexicon PSP 42 to good, uh, effect.

More as I think of them

neverwhere2012 · Post by **neverwhere2012** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 2:26 am

wow... i've never seen such an in depth study in the 80's sound... though i try to emulate it quite a bit in a lot of my music, i never really thought about it quite that hard

in all honesty, to truly get that 80's sound, go to www.hollowsun.com and download all the samples on the entire site (especially the drum kits). load them into your sampler, and have fun with it. i highly recommend the Akai XR-10 kit on that site, it has some great 80's toms in it. there's also simmons SDS V kits on there that are perfect for the 80's drum sound. Linndrum and Obie DMX kits too.

my personal opinion on the 80's sound? to hell with anybody that doesn't think the snare drum should sound like it's as big as your house

lobotomie · Post by **lobotomie** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 2:49 am

that's a really nice site, but why don't they offer wav.-files?

soulkraka · Post by **soulkraka** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 3:31 am

I read an interview with Quincy Jones the other day and he mentions that Z3TA+ is ALL OVER "Thriller" and "Bad"

I guess it pays to be bigtime huh? get your vsti's like 20 years in advance...cool

dvonae · Post by **dvonae** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 6:58 am

lobotomie wrote:that's a really nice site, but why don't they offer wav.-files?

The ZIP files include the WAV files and an Akai S5000/6000 .AKP preset file. The AKP file just configures the keyboard ranges and other settings (if you have a compatible sample player)

If you don't have a sampler capable of using the AKP file, you can still use the WAV files; you'll just need to map the individual WAV files to the appropriate keyboard ranges.

lavoll · Post by **lavoll** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 10:16 am

LBN wrote:General (early) 80s tips (some of these from a Future Music article on this very subject):

Analog is your friend. Samplers weren't readily available in the early 80s.

Synths: MiniMoog V, Pro-53, Korg Legacy Collection (for MS-20 and PolySix), impOSCar, FabFilter One, iBlit, polyIblit, Poly-850, Mercury-1, SuperWave P8, Square I, and many, many others. Basically, analog emulation with maybe a concentration on monophonic. Arpeggiators are your friend. Strings should be run through a phaser

Drums: Any of the Roland analog stuff (TR-808, CR-78, CR-5000, etc), Korg KR-55 (snare used on Depeche Mode's "Speak and Spell"), and, of course, the Linn Drum. Here, Waldorf Attack and Sonic Charge Microtonic would work very well or samples of classic machines. No off-beat hits. The rhythm should be tight. Kick on every beat. Big, big snare (some reverb, short delay, and EQ boosts around 1 to 4kHz) on 2 and 4. Also, don't be afraid to synthesize your own drums. Add a small amount of distortion to the hi-hats and lock them to 1/4, 1/8 or 1/16. Tempo shouldn't stray above 130.

Do a bright and bouncy bassline with a bit of chorus. Basslines were rather melodic.

Vocals should be up-front with few effects except maybe a little reverb or short delay. Reverse reverb can be used for that cliche early 80s sound.

I suppose the most important thing to think of is what are the limiting factors. At that time it would be technology and the budget of most bands early on. Songs rarely had more than 3-4 different synths on them - reuse your synths. And tons of effects were beyond the budget of most bands but you can use something like the Lexicon PSP 42 to good, uh, effect.

More as I think of them

excellent !!!!! this is perfect. thanks

lavoll · Post by **lavoll** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 2:04 pm

the more cliche the better

dekky · Post by **dekky** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 2:07 pm

80's cliche drums, two words: simmons sds!

donkey tugger · Post by **donkey tugger** » Tue Aug 31, 2004 2:12 pm

Huge fuckoff evil digital sounding gated reverbs on those drums too, try freeverb2 with the gate on for the snare.

lavoll · Post by **lavoll** » Fri Sep 03, 2004 12:04 pm

help me think of videos with some great 80's dancing

again, cliche is good.