Virus's - essential?

Might be worth me expanding on the reasons I've kept hold of "hardware" and in some cases expanded the collection:

Live acts playing Cabbage have very often wanted to borrow: mixing desks, synths, effects units, stands, mics etc. So - I have pretty-much all their requirements immediately to-hand. This still happens more often than you'd think.

Similarly, when I'm playing live, I like to use keyboards. Rather than using a laptop and controller, I prefer to use a couple of stand-alone synths. I personally find the Nords especially good for improvisation: I'm able to knock up patches or make extreme tweaks on-the-fly very easily and they're very portable. Most of my "hardware" is keyboards, not modules.

The guy I often work with (OVNI) uses no laptop for his live sets. He's entirely "hardware" based. When I work with him, my input is usually 100% improvised, so I find my Nord Lead 3 very useful.

I love massive for basslines (and just about everything else except leads). Its got such a thick sound. I normally just use one oscillator but it seems to still be a much deeper, thicker sound than any of my other synths.

^^ Completely agree.

Especially with regards to bass - of all the synths I've used, I like this one the most - although, I also like Massive for leads!

Its the only truely NI designed synth I do like. Absynth, FM8, and Reaktor do not count, lol .

here here! although i like the virus (and the nord) and still want one, purely for the reason that having a dedicated physical device is nice and a constant is a good thing to have plus it will take a load of the laptop which in turn will make it more reliable underload (although midi signals have a tendency to just misbehave with me when i need them to behave the most)

Oh look lol.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Virus-A-The-O...s_CV?hash=item2c50a615c9&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

cheapy cheap! 150.

q

equal ranking with the Mini-Moog in terms of infinite programability but sonically superior.

ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm no!

Not all that cheap!

:iconfused


'eres a proper analogue piece of kit whilst we're at it though!

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/New-STYLOPHON...in_0?hash=item2302c25112&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

maybe but its not as analogue or as cheap as this badboy

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/triangle-perc...s_MJ?hash=item2ea709a34e&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

hahaha brilliant XD

My missus got me a stylophone haha. The worst part is that I have actually used it in quite a few tunes for silly noises :irofl:

my mate jim is selling his indigo on ebay

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Access-Indigo...s_CV?hash=item33555680cd&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

virus bass is win for me. there's just something about it...

partly because the virus regular saw oscillator is plenty chunky enough. but also the 'punch' parameter scales down amp envelope attack times... so you can get really snappy basses. i also like the fact that you can set 'phase init' to any value between 0-127, so you can pick the part of the waveform which gives you the right attack.

as for the preset culture... it sucks. perhaps synths that come with over 1,000 presets are part of the problem i'm eternally frustrated by the fact that the virus has umpteen banks, but only 2 are writeable. but some people will continue to use presets, whether as a starting point or unaltered, in their music - whether it's hardware or software or any combination of the two. of course an analog modular without patch recall is exempt

really i think about writing sounds differently depending on the instrument. something like Crystal2 is perfect for long evolving soundscapes; programming it is a unique experience and something which is best realised in software. whereas the virus is more about the immediacy of grab-n-twist, and recording takes as you tweak realtime. both have their purpose and both can result in amazing or amazingly shit sounds.

I know a few people who swear by: initialising all the patches on a new synth - to avoid temptation.

When I'm on my own, I invariably configure patches from scratch, but I do tend to put together a set of template patches: common starting points for basses, leads, pads etc. That makes things a bit faster in that at least some of the necessary common components of each configuration are already set up.

However, when working with other people, I do sometimes use presets - for speed. Those preset patches often then get replaced (or at least heavily tweaked) later on, sometimes replaced by patches from different sound sources. Same seems to have happened often when I've worked on other people's kit at theirs.

If and when I get a new machine (or VSTi for that matter), I'll quite often run through the presets, stick the ones I like in a bank and then reverse engineer them to see how they've been put together.


There is one area where off-the-shelf does work well though IMO:

Some of the G2 Modular patches are so complex, it's worth using at least some of the patch building-blocks other people have spent months putting together.

In G2 modular-land, a "patch" gives you what you might call a synth architecture. For example: a patch might give you something resembling the MiniMoog architecture. You'd then (in Nord terminology) tweak parameters to give you a "variation". "Variations" being analogous to what people commonly call "patches" on non-modular synths.

My G2 "patches" tend to be very simple, but some of the more esoteric ones produced by various members of the community are truly mind-boggling!

People also go to great lengths to combine multiple modules to produce components which you might take for granted on other synths, like - for example: Moog filter emulation.

When I first got my virus I found the patches on there very useful to find out what the synth was capable of. Thats what presets should do is give you an idea of the synths potential.
Also useful as the manual I have seems rather light on the ground to a later updated version.
Also I believe that with thew latest OS update you can flash bank B to C so you can write to three banks kind of. but yeah having that many banks and the majority being unwritable does push you to think that they want you to use the sounds from said sound designer. probably helps push the synth at the market it was designed for.
I talked to people who think the "Virus can only make Dance sound right?"
Duh,,, Its a synthesizer is makes synthesizer sounds.......

yeah, there are bound to be times when reverse engineering is the best way to get to grips with an instrument, or get the most out of it.

Crystal2 is quite confusing with its multi-stage envelopes, different oscillators and mixer setup; if you don't spend the time looking at how patches are constructed you can kind of miss the point of it.

and of course you'd expect a modular environment to be right up there... if only because you can be so damn creative with modules (particularly routing different signal types!).

this is something i'm VERY excited about as my micro modular should be arriving tomorrow (fuck yeah! )

:monkeydance2:

crazy monkey dance = appropriate :iyes:

i'm *so* excited...

Enjoy!

With Crystal 2, I like to create hybrid randomised patches, and then get rid of the bits Id don't like and keep the bits I do. This was a great way for me to learn this synth.

More complex stuff, like Reaktor, or <insert your modular environment her> I just get in there and randomly start tweaking and attatching stuff to other stuff. It was around this point that I really learned the benefit of monitoring the output at more restrained volume in case of serious overload!

I very, very rarely work with the patches that come with a synth.

fucking royal mail cunting striking shitting fucking bastard wank-o-matic fucknuckles :X