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Ambient/Post-Rock/Textural bass playing thread

#861
@dukeorock - Do yo have Native Instruments software at your disposal? I'm just starting to understand NI Form (a Reaktor synth) and it seems the sort of sound mangler you'd enjoy. It is a granular synth with powerful LFO shaping. Drop in a sample of your playing and then just mutate it to unrecognizable states.
I did this quick track
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
The robot voice line that comes in at about 0:09 is the Form output from a sample I took from an old vampire movie. I use the original sample, with a bunch of echo, at about the 1:00 mark.

Here's a tutorial that shows some of what it can do. I know of a better one, but can't recall the link.


Edit - A good description of how Form works.
 
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#862
monsterthompson said:
@dukeorock - Do yo have Native Instruments software at your disposal? I'm just starting to understand NI Form (a Reaktor synth) and it seems the sort of sound mangler you'd enjoy. It is a granular synth with powerful LFO shaping. Drop in a sample of your playing and then just mutate it to unrecognizable states.
I did this quick track
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
The robot voice line that comes in at about 0:09 is the Form output from a sample I took from an old vampire movie. I use the original sample, with a bunch of echo, at about the 1:00 mark.

Here's a tutorial that shows some of what it can do. I know of a better one, but can't recall the link.


Edit - A good description of how Form works.
Click to expand...


Reminds me of mid '80's cop movie soundtracks.. I love it!!
 
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#863
Spent some more time with Form. I'm not sure how I'd use it live (though it is Reaktor-based, so it could be hacked open). However, it is really cool for altering recorded clips. I took a simple synth bass pattern, then dropped it into Form, and started playing with the waveform. It really opens up the ideas and gets me thinking of thinking of rhythmic patterns, other than the familiar ones I'm stuck in.
 
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#864
monsterthompson said:
@dukeorock - Do yo have Native Instruments software at your disposal? I'm just starting to understand NI Form (a Reaktor synth) and it seems the sort of sound mangler you'd enjoy. It is a granular synth with powerful LFO shaping. Drop in a sample of your playing and then just mutate it to unrecognizable states.
I did this quick track
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
The robot voice line that comes in at about 0:09 is the Form output from a sample I took from an old vampire movie. I use the original sample, with a bunch of echo, at about the 1:00 mark.

Here's a tutorial that shows some of what it can do. I know of a better one, but can't recall the link.


Edit - A good description of how Form works.
Click to expand...


First off, that jam you made is fantastic! Great job! Form looks really great. I haven’t messed with any NI stuff, but these clips make me want to investigate for sure.
As fate would have it, I was saving up for a more advanced sampler (Octatrack, MPC, etc), but some projects I have coming up necessitated the purchase of a MacBook Pro for working on a record while I’m on the road as well as mobile recordings. That blew a hole in my new sampler and I really didn’t want to use a computer live, but since I now have a new laptop, I’m gonna chase that down and see what happens :)
 
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#865
dukeorock said:
First off, that jam you made is fantastic! Great job! Form looks really great. I haven’t messed with any NI stuff, but these clips make me want to investigate for sure.
As fate would have it, I was saving up for a more advanced sampler (Octatrack, MPC, etc), but some projects I have coming up necessitated the purchase of a MacBook Pro for working on a record while I’m on the road as well as mobile recordings. That blew a hole in my new sampler and I really didn’t want to use a computer live, but since I now have a new laptop, I’m gonna chase that down and see what happens :)
Click to expand...

Hope your Mac has CPU to spare. I used Reaktor’s Rounds along with Form. Each of them are memory hogs. You’ll probably get a kick out of Blocks, too, once you get a handle on it.

Reaktor is a bit of a learning curve, particularly with saving presets, but totally worth it.

And, thanks :)
 
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#866
monsterthompson said:
Hope your Mac has CPU to spare. I used Reaktor’s Rounds along with Form. Each of them are memory hogs. You’ll probably get a kick out of Blocks, too, once you get a handle on it.

Reaktor is a bit of a learning curve, particularly with saving presets, but totally worth it.

And, thanks :)
Click to expand...

Stupid question I’m sure, but can I use just Form inside Logic or do I need some sort of bundle to make it work?
 
#867
dukeorock said:
Stupid question I’m sure, but can I use just Form inside Logic or do I need some sort of bundle to make it work?
Click to expand...

Reaktor is the host software. You can probably buy Form solo, and get the basic Reaktor Player bundled for free, which allows you to run it in Logic as a plug-in. I got Komplete which had a huge software bundle at a discount. The NI crew occasionally has bundles worth grabbing.

Edit - Form is $99. Komplete 11 Select is $199, but doesn't include Form. The next level up is $449, and that has Form, plus quite a bit more (great savings if you use whats in it, but certainly and expensive and extensive jump up).
 
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#868
I've some Ni stuff to mangle bass guitar sound, mostly good ole Absynth 5. It has for example stuff like cloud filter and aetherizer which are simplistic granular tools, there's a example in this thread some where with waveshaper and cloud filter and aetherizer being used. Other than that NI Molekular is a nice fx bundle.

Other than that vst world offers interesting spectral tools like now sadly defunct Spectrumworx, Unfiltered Audio's Spec Ops and others. Grm Tools have stuff too, don't really know for sure what some of it does..Zynaptiq Morph and MeldaMorph let's you morph your sound to another sound. Spectrumworx could be sidechained.
 
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#869
jesjoo said:
I've some Ni stuff to mangle bass guitar sound, mostly good ole Absynth 5. It has for example stuff like cloud filter and aetherizer which are simplistic granular tools, there's a example in this thread some where with waveshaper and cloud filter and aetherizer being used. Other than that NI Molekular is a nice fx bundle.

Other than that vst world offers interesting spectral tools like now sadly defunct Spectrumworx, Unfiltered Audio's Spec Ops and others. Grm Tools have stuff too, don't really know for sure what some of it does..Zynaptiq Morph and MeldaMorph let's you morph your sound to another sound. Spectrumworx could be sidechained.
Click to expand...

Absynth is awesome. I need to dig in beyond the default presets. I follow the signal chain, conceptually, but haven't tried using it for mutation purposes.

Have you been able to play live (in real time) with any of the software, or is it more for studio trickery?
 
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#870
All the noodling I've posted here(some pages back, or maybe it can be filtered) is real timeish-noodling, there's always some latency but if it's under 512 samples it's tolerable. Edit:sorry I was wrong. some things need to look ahead for a bit and are more suitable for creating samples. But still they were recorded live in DAW.
 
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#871
monsterthompson said:
Reaktor is the host software. You can probably buy Form solo, and get the basic Reaktor Player bundled for free, which allows you to run it in Logic as a plug-in. I got Komplete which had a huge software bundle at a discount. The NI crew occasionally has bundles worth grabbing.

Edit - Form is $99. Komplete 11 Select is $199, but doesn't include Form. The next level up is $449, and that has Form, plus quite a bit more (great savings if you use whats in it, but certainly and expensive and extensive jump up).
Click to expand...

I’ll be checking that out for certain! I did find a new(ish) thing called vcv Rack. It’s an open source (free!) fully (virtual) modular rig with tons of free plug ins. I still suck at modular, but after a couple hours of tutorial videos, I came up with a somewhat usable patch on my laptop
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
 
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#872
dukeorock said:
I’ll be checking that out for certain! I did find a new(ish) thing called vcv Rack. It’s an open source (free!) fully (virtual) modular rig with tons of free plug ins. I still suck at modular, but after a couple hours of tutorial videos, I came up with a somewhat usable patch on my laptop
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
Click to expand...

It sounds modular :)

I was having issues with my hardware synths last night (something I did in Ableton was causing glide on my 0-Coast, which I didn't want, and I couldn't find the fix). I eventually found a hack-ish fix, but I wasn't thrilled, and I have some concerns about this happening live. So, I decided I would build software replica or approximation of my hardware synths, using NI Blocks. After about 45 minutes of stumbling around, I was able to assemble a rough attempt at the Dreadbox Nyx. I used the Monark modules (Moog clones) for an oscillator, and a filter, and an envelope. I tried other oscillators, but they didn't sound as close as the Monark module. The reverb unit available can't hold a candle to the Nyx reverb by Crazy Tube Circuits, but I might be able to get something closer happening, with some more tweaking. I also need to add a second oscillator. Next, I'll try using the West Coast module to mimic my 0-Coast.

I find this kind of exercise really helpful for reinforcing concepts, and understanding sound shaping. Since ambient playing is more about timbre than technical lines, I enjoy this cross-training for my ears.
 
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#879
arbitrary said:
Super curious what delays and reverb pedals you all are using...
Click to expand...

atm the main delay sounds are coming from the red panda particle and tensor (granular delay and tape-stop/reverse/time manipulator) and they're great, really weird textual sounds to be had, im still lacking in the reverb department so i've been using some of the reverb sounds in the EQD sea machine chorus.

what about you man? or have you yet to go down the rabbit hole ;)
 

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