ONE-SHOTS
Apr 1, 2006 12:00 PM, By Jason Scott Alexander
FABFILTER TWIN
SYNTHESIZER PLUG-IN
Two years after releasing One, a unique-sounding single-oscillator synth with original cutoff-filter design, FabFilter's Twin doubles your pleasure with two of the same pure, solid-sounding and aliasing-free oscillators that offer triangle, sawtooth, square and noise waveforms and the ability to add hard sync, pulse width and phase sync. A maximum of 24-note polyphony and as many as 24 unison notes can be achieved, though at the cost of higher CPU cycles than other synths. Two independent multimode filters provide lowpass, highpass and bandpass responses with 12/24dB octave slopes. The filters can have gentle, hard or Classic One characteristics; each defines the unique sound and overdrive of the filters with wild self-oscillation possibilities. Smooth isn't a strong enough word to describe these filters; they're some of the best analog models I've ever heard. The panned filters allow you to adjust their balance without any phase problems. A huge, 24-slot modulation matrix animates things quickly, as do the three LFOs and three delay-hold-ADSR envelope generators.
Dual-concentric knobs in the oscillator and filter sections save tons of space while providing much-needed new parameters. What's really cool, though, is the ability to set up source and destination routings in the mod matrix by clicking on and dragging any modulations source to any target. Mod matrix slot levels can also be cross-modulated, creating enormous tonal complexity. All parameters are fully automatable within a software host or with MIDI controller messages. Additionally, the more than 500 presets should satisfy producers of all electronic genres.
FABFILTER
TWIN > $129
At a glance: Dual-oscillator VA based on award-winning design of One. Windows 98/ME/2000/XP and Mac OS X 10.3 or later. Audio Units/VST.
Contact: www.fabfilter.com
SONY BOOM BOX HIP-HOP
SAMPLE COLLECTION
This veritable buffet of low-end theory is a five-disc Acidized WAV collection of hip-hop loops and construction kits. With diverse production styles between each title, the material generally appears as kits — always containing at least bass, drum and melody tracks, but with some offering full accompaniment of guitars, keys, scratches, vocals, etc. — for a total of 1,891 samples in 2.5 GB.
Hydroponic Hip-Hop is an ultraprogressive-sounding library of 67 kits that inventively draws on old-school sounds from time to time but always with fresh programming and sound design. The beats meander from kinky to driven and border on techno from the likes of The Crystal Method. Stylus Pressure: Urban Grooves on Digital Wax is equally progressive, but it specializes in the kind of experimental vinyl sourcing that would make DJ Shadow grin. What sets its 37 kits apart, though, is the creamy response curve that only lifting from true vinyl can provide. The loops, licks and phrases are warm and filled with tons of bombastic soul. Mac Money: Electro Hip-Hop delivers a significantly sweeter variety of progressive-sounding kits suitable for clean and punchy Top-40 urban production across the board. From the extra-large beats and engulfing bass lines to the beautifully performed female vocal harmonies and sexy-cool 12-string guitar and electric key phrases, much of this material could slip under background vocals or provide the intro/hook to shimmying R&B romps. Finally, Westside Underground and its predecessor, Underground Soundlab, are inspired by slinky '60s and '70s funk/R&B for the most sophisticated, hi-fi feel of the lot. The 116 kits (between both titles) are in developed 8-bar lengths, making highly detailed tracks a breeze to piece together.
SONY
BOOM BOX HIP-HOP > $189.95
At a glance: Five-disc hip-hop construction-kit collection in Acidized WAV format.
Contact: www.sonymediasoftware.com
LOOPMASTERS POLYESTER LOOPS
SAMPLE COLLECTION
Heavily slanted toward break/house/lounge titles, Polyester Loops takes a favorable foray into the world of glitches, pops, stutters and all manner of synthetic mayhem. Poland's Jerzy Korzen has produced an inspiring collection of more than 2,000 samples across two data CDs for Mac and PC that capture the essence of manmade chemical beats and synthetic musical fabric. The project contains two large folders of drum and music loops named Machinewashed and Handwashed — though stylistically indifferent — and provides 20 quirky drum kits as thread to weave them together.
Drum and percussion loops range from 70 to 180 bpm in Acidized WAV and REX2 formats. Highly inventive and often in complex signatures and break patterns, they don't fit simple genres or description, lest to say that they are labor intensive — sounding edits with an eclectic chillout vibe in the low tempos and an avant-trip-hop/drum 'n' bass-like vibe in the higher tempos. The music loops aren't so much traditional melodic phrases as they are evocative subterranean bass wobbles and vocal formant grooves; distorted piano and melded, ethnic, plucked-stringed instrument experimentations; synthy sequences and chaotic filtered burbles; scratched circuit noises and cuts; and otherwise deliciously distorted, squashed and effected electro-acoustic loops. The drum kits come in NNXT, HALion, Kontakt and EXS24 formats, each typically containing 40 to 80 samples. As a whole, this abstract collection is brilliant stuff for any post-modern hip-hop, techno, intelligent/industrial dance music or film score. Polyester Loops could also easily fit into the fold of pop to give a plain track an unidentifiable splash of depth.
LOOPMASTERS (DIST. BY BIG FISH AUDIO)
POLYESTER LOOPS > $69.95
At a glance: 100-percent synthetic glitch and stutter-based loops and kits. NNXT/HALion/Kontakt/EXS24/REX/WAV/Acid.
Contact: www.bigfishaudio.com
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