Easter Egg in Nord Lead 1 & 2

The Lounge Other Gear
#1

Posted this over at Gearslutz as well, but thought it was quite funny, so posting it here as well, as I know quite a few of you have Nords.

Some of you probably know this already, but I’m sure a few of you haven’t heard of it. I was troubleshooting my Nord Lead 2 when I stumbled across this weird little easter egg which will give your Nord a bunch of sounds based on physical modelling synthesis. You can’t save in this mode, but can send sysex, apparently.

To access it, do this (copied from Nord User Forum);

[i]First you have to enter Pelle’s year of birth: 1965. Set Slot A to Program 19 and Slot B to Program 65. Only the numbers will do, so never mind if memory location 19 is holding another Program than the factory preset. Than press and hold the Portamento Auto button, after which you press and hold the Shift button (what else). Holding both press the Velocity/Morph button and release it again. Still holding the two first knobs press the Performance button and you will hear a click, which means the Pelle mode is active.

Only on the NordLead(1) and the Nordlead2; NOT on the NordLead2X, NordLead3 and NordLead4. It is an non-documentated mode which produces Physical Modeling and is only developed in an experimental state. It can’t be saved, although it can be send using SysEx. It is a part of the Manual mode.[/i]

Quite funny! :joy:

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Nord Lead I and II owners - cool "Pelle Mode"
#3

The 2 also has a hidden filter mode not in the manual. Tbh, i haven’t gone back to the easter egg so much because turning the knobs blind was a bit hit and miss. Rather just power up the Nord G1 to get off-piste
.
Fwiw . Shift + Filter gives new mode (ie filter type combo)

#5

I did a really bad sounding video of this “Mode” a few years back,

The webpage containing the information is not always available so i zipped up the whole webpage

#7

How do you doEs this mode sound say In comparison to the monomachine, is it covering similar territory

Is it worth sourcing a Nord 1 for this hidden os?

Idm and ‘noise’ genre wise

#8

A bit slow picking up on this reply - but i’ve just been having some fun pairing the NR2 with the OT and wanted to re-explore the easter eggs

Pelle’s mode is as impenetrable as ever … fun to explore for 10 minutes but too random and not something i’d miss

I did struggle to get the Hidden Filter Mode to play ball - same as described by yourself, except i could see that the third LED was occasionally briefly flickering -don’t know why but i thought maybe the MIDI activity was the problem and sure enough disconnecting the MIDI IN from the OT did the trick - i’m not sure which OT messages are the issue but it’s something to do with that (probably CC Direct)

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#9

Copied from Dylan …

Got a Nord Lead 2 - try this …

Copied from Ben "woah…

Some of you probably know this already, but I’m sure a few of you haven’t heard of it.

I was troubleshooting my Nord Lead 2 when I stumbled across this weird little easter egg which will give your Nord a bunch of sounds based on physical modelling synthesis. You cannot save in this mode, but will send sysex, apparently.

To access it, do this (copied from Nord User Forum);

*First you have to enter Pelle’s year of birth: 1965. Set Slot A to Program 19 and Slot B to Program 65. Only the numbers will do, so never mind if memory location 19 is holding another Program than the factory preset.

Than press and hold the Portamento Auto button, after which you press and hold the Shift button (what else). Holding both press the Velocity/Morph button and release it again. Still holding the two first knobs press the Performance button and you will hear a click, which means the Pelle mode is active.

Only on the NordLead(1) and the Nordlead2; NOT on the NordLead2X, NordLead3 and NordLead4. It is an non-documentated mode which produces Physical Modeling and is only developed in an experimental state. It can’t be saved, although it can be send using SysEx. It is a part of the Manual mode"

…

omg who knew? sold my nord in 2001 to then go buy a video camera on sale in the Sydney cbd during a surprise afternoon rainstorm … didn’t know about this mysterious multi-button “extra secret access cool mode”

1 Like
#10

Man I was so pumped till I read it wasn’t on the 2X :frowning:

#11

i was so pumped until i remembered that i sold the nord 16 years ago

try to forget it ever happened lol :smiley:

1 Like
#12

there you go @VanillaSun nothing to worry about lol :smiley:

i didn’t know there was a IIx version of the nord lead, fascinating … prolly has more cool features … gotta love the soapstone mod wheel and the wooden pitch bend mechanism

2 Likes
#13

I wish there was more information about what’s possibly happening in this mode. I’d love to try re-creating it on the nord modular…

#14

drop some random oscillator/delay/lfo modules down and ask a total stranger to connect them, that’ll get you close enough :wink:

the modular is far more useful, there is no discernable scheme in place for the pelle’s mode, it is rather random, sometimes in a good way (as per some of vid above), but usually not and or silence … easter egg is a generous terminology to use, it’s some 10% finished physical/Karplus thing - the extra filter easter egg is legit though

the 2x has a quite different DAC chip that’s a bit more ‘pure’ but in a ‘less interesting’ way (as per G2 vs G1 NM), according to some …

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#16

Haha this is funny.
I remember I must have been in this mode by accident years ago on my Nord Lead 2. Thought I had broken it. Didn’t know what the hell had happened :joy:

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#17

I would disagree. Although the parameters are not optimized and the application remains cumbersome, it can still generate specific timbres: Stream Waveguide Chronicles | Listen to podcast episodes online for free on SoundCloud

#18

dumbfounded, had no idea bout this wow