The nominees for the Sound On Sound 25th Anniversary Awards are in! And Studio Guitars: The Michael Ripoll Project and Cinematic Percussion have both been nominated in the Best Sound Library category. Readers will decide who will get the coveted top slot in each of the major product-group categories. Voting will take place through the end of November, with the results being announced in time for the Winter NAMM Show this January in Anaheim, CA. Click here to vote for these two Big Fish Audio favorites!
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It’s not often that a product comes along with groundbreaking sounds. Read what MusicTech Magazine has to say about Violence and why they gave it 9/10 stars and their MusicTech Innovation Award.
MusicTech Magazine – October 2010
Back in the 40s and 50s, American composer John Cage pioneered many techniques that would go on to influence much of the sound design and sample-based instruments we use today. One of Cage’s famous creations was the prepared piano, which had various objects placed on its strings to create strange new sounds. This unorthodox approach has been applied to the violin in Vir2’s new virtual instrument, Violence.
The instrument is available as an 800MB download that expands to 1.5GB of content and runs in VST, AU and RTAS formats. Powered by the seemingly unstoppable Kontakt engine, each of the 82 instruments features a custom set of scripted knobs and controls and have been divided into four categories: Drum Kits, Melodic, Pads and Sound Effects, and Tempo-Synced. Each folder has a full range of sounds, from natural and organic to weird and electronic as the violin is bowed, scraped, hit, plucked and played with guitar picks, chopsticks, mallets and wet fingers. The quality and depth of the sounds on offer is truly excellent and represents a masterclass in Kontakt programming, layering and sound manipulation.
The drum kits contain an array of acoustic-sounding glitches, taps and scrapes that would be perfect for electronica producers. Likewise, the highly atmospheric Melodic, Pads and SFX sections would be ideal for deep musical styles and sound-design duties.
Finally, there’s a collection of tempo-sync’ed grooves that although highly original may need a bit of tweaking to fit into a track. Despite the high quality of the audio, the clever use of looping and very short samples means that most of the patches load less than 10MB into memory.
The sounds on offer here may not be to everyone’s taste, but if you’re after some original timbres, Violence is well worth a look.
A beautifully crafted and highly original mix of organic, acoustic and mangled digital sounds. – MusicTech Magazine
One of the most trusted voices in the industry, Craig Anderton of EQ Magazine takes a look at Electri6ity. Read what he has to say and why he thinks Electri6ity has the “wow” factor.
EQ Magazine – October 2010
Electri6ity is an ambitious, complex virtual instrument/sound library that takes playing guitar on keyboards to new levels. Like other Vir2 products it’s based on the Kontakt Player, but this one pushes Kontakt 4 further than I’ve seen before-especially in terms of scripting. (Kontakt allows custom scripts that process incoming data; a simple example is assigning successive string notes to alternate between up and down strum directions.)
Vir2 gets around the “sample dry or processed?” dilemma by doing clean samples of the eight guitars (Les Paul, Les Paul P90, Strat, Tele, 335, L4, Danelectro Lipstick, and Rickenbacker, all with over 24,000 samples per guitar). With “Amped” versions, the Player provides some effects a la Guitar Rig; or load “DI” versions and use other amp sims, or send the out to a physical guitar amp. There’s 27GB of samples, so Vir2 recommends 4GB RAM-but go for more if you’re running a 64-bit operating system.
You’ll need an 88-note keyboard to access all keyswitching and articulations. You could use a smaller keyboard, as you can simply ignore the built-in articulations. Then again, you could drive a Porsche without getting out of second gear, but you wouldn’t want to.
The Systems setting page alone is mind-boggling: Set characteristics for individual strings, like velocity and volume, as well as body resonance and 4,544 other parameters (okay, it’s not really that many, but it seems like it sometimes). Thankfully, someone obviously spent a lot of time on presets, so what you load is ready to go. But, being able to change the sound with this level of detail means Electri6ity isn’t just for keyboard players. Even though my primary instrument is guitar, Electri6ity isn’t irrelevant because I can create “impossible” guitar parts that nonetheless sound like guitar.
A Performance page is where you change parameters like which pickup you’re using, the guitar’s tone control, pick position (closer to the neck or bridge), pick direction (up, down, or alternate), how morphing is controlled, and much more. A real-time Fretboard page shows notes being plucked and mapped (with artificial intelligence to map notes in a “guitaristic” way, although you can turn this off); with Amped presets, an additional page offers effects.
This is a remarkable virtual instrument, and yes, the manual does need all 54 pages. You can just load presets and go, or get lost in an amazing level of detail. This is an instrument with a serious “wow” factor. Wow. – Craig Anderton
The R&B genre continues its hold on the number one loops spot. Last month it was G-Strings and this month it’s R&B Swagga. The confident attitude in this 38 construction kit library is as good as it gets and with 5.8 GB of drums, bass, guitars, synth, strings, rhodes, organ, harp, moog, piano, flutes and more, there’s plenty of attitude to go around. Also claiming two of the top three loop spots were two Xtended Series products, Electri-Fried Blues and Classic Rock.
Violence from Vir2 Instruments took over the top selling instrument spot closely followed by Electri6ity and MOJO: Horn Section.
Music Tech Magazine Review August 2010:
From Stevie Wonder’s triumphant Glastonbury gig this year all the way back to the Temptations, Diana Ross and Marvin Gaye in the 60s and 70s, the classic Motown sound has had a massive influence on modern music. Detroit Soul is the latest library form Big Fish Audio, created in conjunction with Funk/Soul Productions, that aims to capture the sound of the great soul and R&B artists of the Motor City.
The dual-layer DVD contains around 2.8GB of 24-bit WAV content in ACID WAV, Apple Loops, REX and Stylus RMX formats. This breaks down into 626 loops across 28 construction kits, plus a folder containing the individual multi-track drum recordings. As with many of the previous Big Fish Audio libraries, the quality of the performers, the recording and the mixing is top-notch. Instruments include drums, hand percussion, claps, bass, guitar, piano, Rhodes, organ and trumpets, plus alto, tenor and baritone sax.
The exquisite production places each instrument perfectly on the soundstage, with just the right amount of ambience for each part gluing the whole sound together and instantly evoking images of the large-scale recording sessions of yesteryear.
Tempo ranges from 53 to 200BPM, with Curtis/Marvin-esque ballads sitting next to more upbeat funk/soul grooves. Each kit contains around four parts for each instrument, which generally include an intro, several variations and an outro or fading tail note that helps make the pack more flexible when arranging. Although trumpets and saxophones are all mixing together into one horn section, they deserve special mention as the dynamic stabs and falls are fantastic. The inclusion of the original multi-track drum recordings only adds to the flexibility of a superb collection.
Whether you are composing for a 60s or 70s-themed TV show or wanting to add some authentic Tamla vibes to your songs, this is a beautifully written, beautifully recorded, high-quality collection of toe-tapping tracks.
Verdict
A high-quality set of instrumentals with an impressive authentic vintage soul feel.
One thing we’ve found out is that good R&B loops are always in demand and you can never have enough good R&B guitars. July’s top selling loop titles proved that as G-Strings came in strong as the second most popular product behind Detroit Soul. This new set of kits puts you right in the studio with Legendary guitarist Tommy O who has recorded and toured with some of the greatest names in music including Janet Jackson, P. Diddy, Toni Braxton, TLC, D’Angelo, Vanessa Williams and more. Also in July’s top 10 loops was Studio Guitars: The Michael Ripoll Project which features incredible guitar loops and licks for rock, pop, blues, funk, country or jazz.
Vir2 Instruments continues to dominate the top instruments in July with it’s latest release Violence becoming a hot seller next to Electri6ity. Created for both musical use and sound design, Violence features an unprecedented deconstruction of a solo violin recorded from numerous angles. The unusual textures and perspectives has made Violence an instant top seller. Also in the top ten instruments was Miroslav Vitous String Ensembles and Ethno Instrument 2.
