eInstruments sale

[Steve Nathan]

Got an email from these folks today, presumably because I own their Session Horns and Session Horns Pro products (which are both excellent BTW). I was unaware of their acoustic and electric piano lines, and the demos sound pretty good to me. Anyone have these, and what are your impressions?

https://e-instruments.com

[drawback]

Both Rhodes VIs sound great and the sale is fantastic. Thanks for the heads up!

[miden]

Not to rain on any parades, but when you add the three together (all three models are usually included in pretty much all other EP sims) it totals near $95 (about $165 in our money) ...not so cheap

[Steve Nathan]

Sale prices seem pretty decent to me, but I understand perspective. It's the sound and playability that matters to me. What are you comparing them to that offers similar quality for less?

[miden]

Sale prices seem pretty decent to me, but I understand perspective. It's the sound and playability that matters to me. What are you comparing them to that offers similar quality for less?

 

Lounge Lizard 4 is out for $89 (and you do get all three - Rhodes, Suitcase and Wurly models - and a few others as well), I only post that just as a comparo (as far as iOS goes Neo-Soul Studio 2 kills it tbh, jm2c ) it doesn't really "work" for me anymore, but at the price Neo-Soul is (for PC) I might revisit it and see if I can tweak some more.

 

I mostly use iPad for these, on the PC, Sampletank has a few really nice ones too.

 

In the case of these plugins, on an individual level yep, well priced! But needing to buy all three (as I would for what I do) it becomes a good deal more expensive. It's still a nice find and worth a look for sure!

[ElmerJFudd]

I haven"t used v4 of Lounge Lizard - however in previous versions I found the modeling to sound very similar to Logic"s EVP88/Vintage Electric Piano which also uses physical modeling. Logic also has a lot of fx built in, a bunch offered in a pedal board interface which is fun to toy with. LL is a neat and convenient package with plenty of fx and lots of presets. Of course in many cases it sounds good and certainly gets the job done. But when compared to lots of sample libraries of Rhodes and Wurlitzers - both LL and Vintage Electric Piano have less character and timbre variation than you find key to key and instrument to instrument than what you get from a sample library of a specific actual instrument. (note there are sampled EPs in Logic as well).

 

Some others to consider and watch for sales on.

 

https://scarbee.com/collections/vintage-keyboards

 

https://www.acousticsamples.net/keys

 

Nice list of the field here:

https://adammonroemusic.com/blog/best_rhodes_vst_2020.html

[Fleer]

Lounge Lizard is a prime example of modeling. If that"s your fancy, do look into Pianoteq as well.

[Steve Nathan]

I opened up a dialog with this company and my resume may be enough to get me some of these instruments to try. I will be back with my impressions if it happens. BTW: Not keys, but the demos of their String Quartet sound pretty dang good!

[stevebard]

I have the E-instruments Suitcase and like it. It's well-sampled, maybe a bit 'polite'. It's among my top tier of virtual Rhodes, along with and just under Canterbury, Keyscape and Scarbee 88. I prefer it to the old Scarbee, Neo Soul Keys, Velvet, Pianoteq, Lounge Lizard which are also in my collection.

I've also recently bought the superlative Skybox Audio Hammers & Waves keyboard collection which is has really impressive grand, uprights, Wurly, Rhodes, felt piano and others. The Rhodes is right up there-may even be the best I have.

It seems that the most highly rated software Rhodes that I don't have are V-Tines and OTS Famous E- but my Rhodes fetish has to reach its limit at some point. However if those two ever have a really massive sale...

[Steve Nathan]

Sorry I didn't get back while the sale was on, but perhaps another Black Friday type sale will be along soon.

I've been playing with the Acoustic and Electric pianos, and I really like what I hear, so be advised: I will probably be endorsing these instruments (along with their stunningly good Session Horns Pro). I won't endorse anything I wont use, so there's that I suppose.

 

I have little to say about all the bells and whistles these come with, insane pattern generators and tonal shaping stuff. Like the aforementioned (also great sounding) Skybox Audio Hammers and Waves, you can do all manner of craziness with these. My preference is the basic sounds themselves, and I'll admit, I did not expect to like all of these as much as I did. Ravenscroft has been my go to for all hard driving Country/Rock/Pop tracks, and these two pianos (Steinway and Yamaha), are less obvious choices for that kind of playing, but the bottom line for me was that both of these sounded and felt more like it does when you sit and play one of those pianos. Same with the two Rhodes and even the Wurly.

I was less impressed by their options for sound shaping and FX. No mike choices or positioning for example, and their Amp Sims, reverbs etc were OK but nothing special. I mostly used plugs for all of that though so it didn't concern me. Bottom line for me was the "out of the box" sound, which as I said, really surprised me.

[Al Coda]

I've been playing with the Acoustic and Electric pianos, and I really like what I hear, ...

My preference is the basic sounds themselves, and I'll admit, I did not expect to like all of these as much as I did. Ravenscroft has been my go to for all hard driving Country/Rock/Pop tracks, and these two pianos (Steinway and Yamaha), are less obvious choices for that kind of playing, but the bottom line for me was that both of these sounded and felt more like it does when you sit and play one of those pianos. Same with the two Rhodes and even the Wurly.

 

I couldn´t resist to buy both Rhodes (R & S) as also the Wurli (W) models,- and I don´t regret.

For me, the basic sounds were playable "out of the box" and by using a synth action MIDI controller keyboard w/ linear velocity curve.

Using a weighted action is even better.

 

I was disappointed the Suitcase Rhodes´ GUI showiing a 88, but the sampled instrument isn´t.

Just only 73 ... while I hoped for a 73 stage and a 88 suitcase.

 

For sure both the Rhodes and Wurli are some improvement over the Scarbee "vintage keys" (Mark I / Wurli A200) being included in NI Komplete (I´m actually using NI Komplete 12 UCE)

 

I was less impressed by their options for sound shaping and FX. No mike choices or positioning for example, and their Amp Sims, reverbs etc were OK but nothing special. I mostly used plugs for all of that though so it didn't concern me. Bottom line for me was the "out of the box" sound, which as I said, really surprised me.

 

I needed some minutes to find out the advertised mic settings are what they call "LIVE" and these are fixed.

And,- to my ears, the suitcase´s ping-pong tremolo´s waveform shape is also not correct.

OTOH, I appreciate, all models come w/ their own FX and don´t use the in NI Kontakt built-in FX only.

 

Anyway,- for that "black friday sales" price, these were a no-brainer.

 

 

 

A.C.

 

P.S.:

 

B.t.w.,- I know J.Waehnelt, who did sampling and sound design, in person from the past.

I was surprised reading he´s the man behind and remember he worked for Yamaha in the 90s.

And he already sampled a nice Rhodes for AKAI S-1000/3000 at that time.