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CHarrell

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    Searching for funk / soul music played with Synth Bass

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    49 minutes ago, Docbop said:

    Everytime I see the title of this thread I crackup remember back when Synth Bass was the in thing and suddenly every bass player I knew at a tiny keyboard in their studio gear and for sometimes for gigs.   They were all we ain't going to lose gigs over we're fighting back and getting a double doing it.   Fun times back when the studios were so busy.   

     

    Hahaha I actually talked with one of my best friends who's a bass player a month ago and he half-jokingly said he hates synth bass because it'll replace him. We're both pretty young too!

    Searching for funk / soul music played with Synth Bass

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    11 hours ago, AROIOS said:

    As for the "right" synth, although Minimoog is the most common choice because of its unique overload design error; most subtractive synthes,  including many free software ones, should have no problem producing tasty funk bass sounds.

     

    I looooove the MS20 for these kinds of sounds. Another note on the filter: though not necessary per se, some synths have filters with selectable filter "strengths", AKA the severity in which they cut-off frequencies past the threshold you set. A lot of traditional bass patches used 24dB low pass filters (LPF), such as on the Minimoog, and is why instruments like Novation Bass Station II are very popular for this kind of role.

    • Like 1

    Korg Wavestate SE

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    15 hours ago, David Emm said:

     

    Finally, someone who seems to LIKE the thing. A lot of people are trashing it like a movie reviewer who hates movies. I dropped my software Wavestation because of the instrument's building-a-ship-in-a-bottle OS. The Wavestate Native version is basically the Wavestation I'd design if I had a magic wand. As with a DAW, there's no overstating the huge leap it represents to have everything in front of you.

     

    Putting it in software was the best decision they made. I love the Wavestation plugin, can't imagine how cool the Wavestate is.

    Searching for funk / soul music played with Synth Bass

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    27 minutes ago, RandyFF said:

    So how to construct a basic Synth Bs patch?  Mono? Drive? Fx?  Tuning? Portamento? Envelopes? Oscillator de-tuning? AT?

     

    You got a lot of basics right there! Mono is always a good idea, with legato and portamento nice to play with. As far as envelopes, you traditionally use a short Attack (A) for that punchy sound, with short SDR so the sound fades or dies pretty quickly. You also would want to consider using an envelope for the filter cutoff and resonance, similar contour as I described in the previous sentence. 

     

    If you're dealing with basic subtractive waveforms, you'd want to use saw or square for a more aggressive, present sound, and triangle or sine (if available) for something more subdued. Detuning between oscillators isn't necessary for a (stereo)typical bass patch, but it's an effect you can try out! If you're using more than one oscillator, stacking them in octaves is always fun, and mega bonus if you have a sub oscillator to get things really thick n fat.

     

    I'm sure the much more experienced members here will have oodles of advice, but I hope those are some good starting out points upon which you can experiment and tweak to your liking.

    • Like 2

    New GSI piano for iPad et al.

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    16 minutes ago, ElmerJFudd said:

    I read that and assumed they meant at a time?  🤷‍♂️  How could we know which to pick without trying the 4? 

     

    That's how I read it as well, you have access to all 4 but only one at a time: you'd need to swap out downloads to switch piano models, like changing CDs in a car stereo but hopefully with less Coke spills from accidentally knocking over the can in your drink holder.

    Korg Wavestate SE

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    I love the idea of Korg putting out these modern keyboards that highlight a particular type of synthesis--the opsix is the most user-friendly FM interface I've ever seen in hardware--but in execution those boards were the flimsiest, cheapest feeling pieces of musical equipment I've ever touched. I've played Casiotone keyboard from the 80s that were sturdier! When Korg USA was doing the blowout sale for the opsixes last year, I jumped on it, got mine in the mail, aaand, the keybed immediately made a cracking sound and several of the keys were pretty much unusable. 

     

    For the price they were mostly asking for those boards, the build quality did NOT justify them...so now they're revamping at least one of them, cool, but at THAT price? I really have a hard time believing it'll do good numbers.

    Seeking for the essentials...

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    9 hours ago, JazzPiano88 said:

    I don't see a lot of detailed reviews of it on KC.

     

    That's surprising, I always thought it was one of the most famous soft synths out there. It's legendary in the video game music community. 

     

    Also, if this is a thread where I can avidly rep for Korg's VST collection, then so be it. I think I must've used at least one VST from it on every track I've done in the three years I've owned the bundle. Amazing deal--including the Triton!

    2023: CP4 instead of CP88?

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    1 hour ago, Dave Ferris said:

    I'll keep watching CL and FB Marketplace. I'm first in line when Sweetwater re-stocks on the CP88, so I'm cool with that for the time being. But yeah congrats, glad you found one.

     

    Gotcha, I was wondering if you were gonna keep on with the 88 or go back to the 4. Ironically I'm in your opposite position, haha: if I were to get another 88, it'd be my third, and while I've made it abundantly clear I love the thing so much, I really wasn't feeling too enthused to pay the average going prices for yet another one.

    No Keyboards In Stores!

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    46 minutes ago, AnotherScott said:

    It's true that direct-to-streaming does not have (at least to me) the negative connotation direct-to-video used to have. And I'm not sure the quality-to-crap ratio is any worse than anything else. But I've seen a recurring problem of stuff that's too padded, too slow. It's a new version of an old problem. TV stories had to fit into exactly w minutes, leading the makers to cut good stuff that would have made it too long, or add unnecessary stuff if it were too short. The flexible lengths of movies were much better, but there were still constraints of effective minimum and maximum lengths (though someone with enough clout could bend the rules). And now I see streaming series where, having watched it, I get the distinct sense that maybe they "had" to produce some number of episodes... it's what the buyer wanted, it's what justified the budget they needed, whatever... but I feel they'd have been better if they were, say, 30% shorter.

     

    Absolutely, short-form narratives have their place and can be a very powerful experience that would be diminished were they longer. Look at the short stories of Ray Bradbury, for example, or take a movie like Raiders of the Lost Ark. I don't see how extending it 3 times over and going into each characters' backstories in depth or prolonging the search for the Ark etc. would make it any better. "Brevity is the soul of wit", or as my boy Iggy Strav once said, "Too many pieces of music finish too long after the end."

    No Keyboards In Stores!

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    I woke up today to find an E-Mail from American Musical Supply blacklisting me because of the returns. 😔 I get why, they do a bunch of in house financing and they take a hit on every return, and I do feel crummy about it. But with this issue that's the thread topic, I don't know what other alternatives there are except to use an online retailer's return policy as a means to try out like 98% of the keyboards out there.

    2023: CP4 instead of CP88?

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    I haven't said this yet, but thanks to everyone's posts here, I've definitively decided to go for a CP4 when I get my next check or when I can sell my Minilogue XD, whichever comes first. 

     

    This will be the first time I've ever went backwards technologically with an instrument I've owned ...and I'm actually kinda excited. The features amd capabilities of the CP4 seem to be very distinct from the 88, so really I'm getting a "new" instrument. I'm excited to mess around with the SCM...people are saying the 88 has better electric pianos but I'm a tweaker (I also like changing parameters of instruments). It sounds really cool to change up an e piano to my liking--definitely wouldn't be something I do live, but usually it's instrument combinations and effects that I change up in those situations anyways. Having more sophisticated sound editing potential for different sounds is really nice, too.

     

    So here I am, a CP88 fanboy...I look forward to giving y'all updates when I can snag one!

    Gigging in 2023

    in The Keyboard Corner

    Posted

    2 hours ago, drawbars said:

    Probably never actually looks at my song list or listens to the MP3s I give her.  Just another Boomer looking to play the songs he grew up with, right?  🙄  (For the record, I grew up in the '60s and '70s, and actually prefer songs from the '80s and '90s.)

     

    Have you ever made an "EPK" video, maybe a kind of compilation of whachu got, and popped it on YouTube? The lesser the barriers and the more convenient it is to access your material, the better!

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