Lo-Fi samplers, beats and things

The Lounge Other Gear
#61

Im going to answer my own question on drum sampling into the microgranny - sounds great. I was thinking it would be too much but I fed my Tr6s into it and it really made magic happen to the 909 kick. Just huge and distorted if that is your kind of thing. I was able to control the amount of distortion by balancing the MG’s input with the output of the Tr6s. It honestly sounds good on all the other drums I tracked in, mainly claps and hats.

Gets a lofi sound that I think a lot of people probably chase with plugins. PO33 is next whenever may AAA batteries are charged again. For now I am going to make some analogue beats on my Rytm and see how the Granny handles that.

4 Likes
#62

Microgranny is epic for crunchy drums! Shame it is monophonic, but that also has an interesting effect on the sound. Sold mine but would definitely buy a Microgranny groovebox. Someone make a granular groovebox please :pray:

1 Like
#63

I can vouch for their Kastl Dum as well. That thig is a secret weapon for percussion tracks. Pairs great with the Granny or a PO-33, since they all use the same clock ppq.

and yeah sometimes sending a stereo sound like a pad or chord into a mono sampler can sound amazing. Something about how it flattens the sound. I rewiden it later with a stereo verb/delay.

3 Likes
#64

Made a mistake recording a CD, which led to….

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image3984×2365 880 KB

I use a “normal” type tape, set the recording to “chrome” and rec level to max. I use the volume on the AR to find the sweet spot.
Then play the tape back at “normal” and record to the Blackbox.
Fattens up nicely.
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image3978×2534 860 KB

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#65

Ensoniq Mirage remains my personal king of lofi samplers, wish I still had mine. From all the samplers tried to this date it remains a beast of true sonic magic and sublime mystery
Nothing I have tried since comes close to what that sampler can do with its filters from the most mundane of content
Lofi loop junky is pretty neat too

4 Likes
#66

Pocket operator KO33 is pretty much fire on drums. I tried both the melodic and drum sampling slots and the drum sampling is the way to go, which only makes sense. While the Bastl microgranny absolutely distorts the snot out of a kick, the PO33 dusts it up a lot more and gives it a lot of punch.

What is special is pitching the drum with the PO33. So what I did was make samples out of the Po33 into my blackbox by triggering the drums while playing at different pitches so I have options when I want to make a track. This is pretty much a foolproof sampler to make your own lofi drum sounds with. It just sounds awesome.

I have to give it to the Microgranny though on the open 909 hi hat. It just does something special to it. But pitching down the 606 closed hats on the PO33 is amazing.

I may track down an sp202 for samples I want to keep in stereo but I want to pitch. I think that would be a perfect companion to these little guys I have now.

5 Likes
#67

I can only speak to hardware techniques. It seems to me that resampling, be it internally or across different samplers, really is key to a good lofi aesthetic. When resampling from sampler to sampler, using the pitched up vinyl technique again can introduce aliasing on your aliasing!

For specific hardware up to the job, I agree that the po33, microgranny, and SP series are great starts and you can’t go wrong with any of them. A lesser known option is the Boss BR600, a recorder, which has many of the SP effects including the vinyl/cassette ones. You can run anything through it directly with the effects on and they are very affordable.

My own secret sauce(or lesser known about sauce) is an onboard modulator on my MV8800. There is a parameter within the patch edit called Analog Feel. I’m not quite positive what it does but I believe it is a random pitch and amplitude LFO of some sort. It’s definitely not linear in its response so a little goes a long way. I works best on synth or melodic samples. Drums not so much.

4 Likes
#68

Likewise.
Every Goth keyboardist had one in the late 90’s, myself included. It had the perfect sound between the real and the imaginary. That factory pipe organ patch is to Goth what the 303 squelch is to Acid.

4 Likes
#69

I like old four tracks for lofi, not just the tape saturation but distorted preamps, analog eq, pitching, etc.

I just got back from a trip to the US for the first time in four years and found an old microcassete recorder in a box of my old things at my mom’s house. Gonna need to see what that sounds like at some point.

In terms of lofi samplers, I had a Yamaha SU10 at one point that was pretty crunchy. Sadly it randomly died on me. The workflow was not the best though so pretty time consuming for what you get out of it. I’d probably rather have an old SP202 or 303 if I were going to get something to use regularly, but I’m not actually tempted.

(I was tempted to get a Casio SK-10 that was for sale at my local used place for $100, but I passed. The VSS-30 is the one that could probably get me if I came across a cheap one).

6 Likes
#70

Great thread, and making me want to dust off the PO-33.

Microgranny is pretty great, and have been looking at the modded version DigdugDiy makes. He also makes some great lofi effects like Broken Tape, Purple Rain, and his Lofi Dreams sampler looks fun.

5 Likes
#71

Sampling some Lisa Gerrard into the Mirage. Reverse it, pitch down slightly & add some filtering. Drown in reverb and hey presto. Instant uber-goth intro. Loved doing that when I had one.

3 Likes
#73

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/music/news/erland-cooper-interview-burying-masterpiece-island-orkney/

Without paywall:
https://www.orcadian.co.uk/orkney-couple-unearth-music-treasure/

1 Like
#74

I decided to go ahead and pick up the Roland SDE-1000. The guy at the shop gave me a pretty good deal so it’s worth giving it a shot to see if it can do the trick on the 12-bit sound. I’ll try and post some examples early next week if anyone’s interested. It’s definitely not as cool as the Bim but it might be a nice cheap way to get this effect.

So, is it customary to pitch up the sample, run it through the Bim (or whatever processor/sampler your using) and then pitch it back down for the aliasing effect? How high do people typically pitch it up on the way in?

2 Likes
#75

One of the coolest things with the Isla S2400 is that you can resample internally sounds off the SD card and have them processed through the input filters. Anyways, there’s a mode that allows you to resample the sound as if it was on a 33rpm record being played at 45rpms and apparently they did the math and the exact increase in pitch is 5.37 semitones so if you wanted to be as authentic as possible that’s the target.

4 Likes
#76

Thank you. That is very helpful. I was on the waiting list for an S2400 for a long time but I got bumped (I think cause they wanted to send it with the case). Anyway, the sp404 mk2 was announced around that time so I decided to cancel my order and save myself the cash. I still wonder about the S2400 though. It does seem like a pretty amazing device. But seeing as how I still prefer working with the DT over the 404mk2 I think it was a wise call.

#77

Yeah I like the S2400 a lot but the SP-404 MKII is the best sampler on the market in my opinion. You get so much for the money on that device and it sounds great. It’s definitely hard to recommend it to most people because it’s still a very niche product and there’s cheaper samplers that do a lot more but it sounds very good

#78

Sp-404 seems like the best value for money… ive been wanting tontry one forever.

Must. Resist. GAS….

#79
#80

its my recommendation for sampler and effects pedal if anyone wanted a multi FX pedal for synths. It just does so much and it sounds so good.

not that I’m trying to have you cave to gas or anything…

#81

As a contrary opinion, I actually did not like the new 404 that much. It sounds good but not great to me. Something about it’s sound felt fake. That’s not the best word to describe it, but I am not sure how else to. My intention was to use it as an effects box. Don’t get me wrong, it can do those things quite well, I just didn’t love the effects as much as I expected. The OTO FX are a lot more up my alley, but quite expensive.

I also did not like the new MPCs. Many people like both of these samplers so I am probably in the minority, especially since my go to is the Sp16 which does not have great effects. The Sp16 does have an amazing sound though, probably the best of any sampler I have, but oddly enough I don’t prefer sampling into it, just processing everything out and making the track on it. I find it to be perfect for making a track on, after processing the sounds through stuff like the Po-33, octatrack or microgranny.

Cool thing about samplers is they all have their pros and cons and certain ones fit your workflow while others may not. That is why I find this thread very interesting. I like to see what others like and how they use them.

5 Likes