Microwave XT shadow drone

kirlian · 2015-01-13T03:37:23.000Z

yeah sure this isn’t elektron made, but the MnM, MD and Octa were meditating nearby while i coaxed this drone out of my microwave XT. recorded into logic in one pass, did some parallel processing and voila.

if this is your thing let me know! i’m working on OT ambient/drones lately. would love to hear your work.

dust_ward · 2015-01-13T04:38:28.000Z

i’m gonna have to check it out through better speakers when i get home but i’m digging this drone so far.

Orwell · 2015-01-13T11:23:37.000Z

that drone is ‘lush’

please tell us all more about the XT as i have always looked to buy one

it doesn’t sound like a waldorf to be honest, more analogy and round

guga · 2015-01-13T11:36:39.000Z

the XT! what a synth. if you manage to find one prepare yourself for some knob-fiddling time
it comes in two different flavors: the 10 voices (which is probably easier to find) and the 30 voice
it’s a wavetable synthesizer and boy it sounds good (you can even pass some audio to it)

edit: here you’ll find some good info

kirlian · 2015-01-14T02:27:56.000Z

it sounds thick and warm to be sure, but as i said i did some parallel processing on this track which warmed it up considerably. i have the 10 voice and i’ve never concocted a situation in which that is not enough… i don’t use it in multi mode though. it’s taken quite a while to feel really comfortable with it mostly because it’s hard to visualize how the wave envelopes will affect the sound in advance. it’s unpredictable and different from any other synth i’ve owned. now that i’ve programmed about 100 sounds on it, i’m finally starting to “feel” it, in the sense that i can program the sounds i am hearing, but it’s never an exact outcome, and that keeps me coming back often. it makes it into almost everything i do these days. it definitely has the X factor that makes it greater than the sum of it’s parts. although i still program the ti2 polar a lot, evolver, and bass station2, i find myself working with the XT, sculpting sounds and ideas more than anything else aside from the MnM and OT. it’s becoming more a partner in the process than just being an ingredient or means to an end. i don’t really deal with the on board fx. i have it permanently patched into an eclipse and when i occasionally turn off bypass on that, it’s a new dimension entirely. there is so much intense and intriguing motion in the sounds of the XT, that it often takes away from the patches to turn an effect on though. anyway, that’s my short, emotional take on it as an instrument. the specs are everywhere, and others have written well on that. it’s a life time keeper for me. i used to randomize it in the early days and i still have no clue how some of the patches it came up with are sounding the way they do. people don’t think it be like it is, but it do. it’s just a beast of a synthesizer.

dustward: i saw that you had a link up this morning, but i didn’t get a chance to follow it. can you put it back up?

Orwell · 2015-01-14T02:37:45.000Z

thanks to you both for sharing your XT thoughts
next time one comes up locally i will slam down the credit card and try one out!!!

dust_ward · 2015-01-14T07:48:46.000Z

haha yeah man, i just had knee surgery and the pain pills they have me on are making my brain slow. i felt like that second sentence with the link in it was wicked awkwardly phrased so i deleted it.

anyway, yeah this is the death industrial project that i do with my wife: http://malignantrecs.bandcamp.com/album/starving-the-fires-part-i

it’s probably harder on the ears than most will be able to hang with but a lot of the eerie droning looping stuff buried in the noise that sounds sort of synth-like is my voice processed through a bunch of pedals and looped and further mangled with the OT.

Uturunku · 2015-01-14T11:01:14.000Z

2Kirlian: Nice drone!
2Orwell: I have XT in my studio and I can say that this is an incredible unique machine (especially for ambient-like music). It has its own character of sound which you won’t find in any other synth. You can create unlimited amount of great endlessly evolving patches/textures just using randomizer feature of the synth. But keep in mind that bass sounds is not strong point of the synth, but in general I can say – XT is a must have synth for any serious studio!
Also I have to admit that Waldorf Q will be my next purchase as it is also fantastic synth! Deep bass is not a problem for Q at all like an other sounds. And it has randomizer! You can also buy Q without any doubts.

Check https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNsgT_XxwSPdjRka1LD7RRw user where you can find tracks created with different synths.

E.g.

vardagligheten · 2015-01-14T12:02:27.000Z

Nice track! Great atmosphere and minimal sound design.

The XT is my favourite synth. I’ve done a lot of ambient stuff and droning sound on that one. For me the kind of digital evolving sounds you get out of Waldorf synths is a lot more interesting than what you get from your standard analog synth (sorry Elektron). End of rant

guga · 2015-01-14T16:12:42.000Z

""kirlian"":

…there is so much intense and intriguing motion in the sounds of the XT, that it often takes away from the patches to turn an effect on though.

that’s the thing which got my sitting on a chair for hours
the first time i was in front of an XT i didn’t really know where to put my hands on (well, on the knobs, that’s for sure ) but the friend who showed it to me, played some patches that really amused me (not sure this is the right word to use here) for their ever evolving/never ending sounds (especially those lush pads, mmm); well, shortly after that visit i got my (first and only) XT and was blown away from its power
orange or black, with tapered knobs or pulse-like ones doesn’t matter, if you get the chance of getting one, do it! don’t hesitate
worth have a look at the Q as well, another bad ass synth which i still regret having sold
also: for less money you could get yourself a Blofeld… now, it doesn’t come with all the extra features you have on the XT (40 odds knobs, sub out, analog in…) but you do get the Waldorf sound, and with an external MIDI controller i.e.: BCR2000 you could get pretty close to it, just a thought

dust_ward · 2015-01-14T22:03:44.000Z

hey since guga mentioned it, i figured i’d chime in and say i use the blofeld all the time for spacy tangerine dream meets inade type dark ambient stuff and it sounds great.

it doesn’t have a knob for everything like the microwave XT and its only got a headphone out + a single stereo output pair which might be a problem for some but the editing is pretty intuitive and i’ve never found it to be too much menu diving to handle.

i also really, really like the overflow feature which i guess is a hold-over from the days of the microwave XT… makes everything sound weird, digitally crunched, and broken in the most glorious way.

my wife and i jokingly call it the tim hecker knob.

kirlian · 2015-01-15T02:57:46.000Z

nice… the hecker knob.

i had a blofeld for a while and would never hesitate to pick up another one. it caused me to program sounds that were complimentary and different enough from the XT and virus that it’s worth having. i love the shit out of digital synths though. the drive curves… is that what they were called? anyway, the blofeld has its own sound like the XT when you get to know it, and in some ways i liked it better than the virus. i felt it lent itself to more experimental sounds. the virus is unique in that the effects are studio quality so they become as much a part of its sound as anything else used to sculpt. that pretty much puts it in a different category. i like programming sounds dry, but on the virus i reach for the FX all the time.

someone said XT is not good for basses but i passionately disagree. it makes monster basses (for my money at least). because of all the motion that is easy to program in the sounds, the patches can take over a mix instantly, so i think a minimal approach is valuable when programming the basses.

but yeah, pretty much a synth of myth and legend.

dust ward: just checked a few tracks. nice stuff. not harsh at all… but that’s coming from someone who likes albert ayler, peter brotzman, late coltrane and later schoenberg solo piano works. nice OT drone action though i can’t make out what you are saying, but i can assume it is dark

Orwell · 2015-01-15T07:45:49.000Z

saw tim hecker in melb last night
funny that !
gig of the year, ha - so far !

polyslax · 2015-01-16T02:23:37.000Z

so, so good. one can’t help but be soothed. makes a great brain rinse.

dust_ward · 2015-01-16T03:26:22.000Z

hahaha fair enough, once you dip your toes into some of that really brutal free-jazz stuff nothing is ever harsh again… i dig a lot of that stuff like painkiller and god and 16-17 but some of it is too over the top even for me.

ever heard borbetomagus? i guess they’re supposed to be a “jazz” band but i use that term very loosely… they played at a club i worked at once and holy shit… i left the club that night feeling like someone set a pipe-bomb off inside my skull. now that shit is HARSH. i wouldn’t want to meet the person who makes a habit of stuff like that.

yeah a lot of the vocals on our stuff is wordless breathing/ chanting and throat singing laying down “synthy” looped textures. when i do start screaming real words over the top they tend to be dire, sci-fi damaged rants about the environment falling apart and nature taking it’s revenge.

cheery shit.

anyway, yeah those drive curve settings on the blofeld sound great, the overflow is my favorite but they’re all pretty neat. i dragged my feet on finally getting a blofeld forever cos i already had a virus and i was afraid there’d be a lot of overlap but now that i have both i can say they’re very different beasts.

man, i totally envy anyone who gets to see tim hecker play live.
he played here not long ago… and i found out about it the day after it happened. figures.

him and ben frost are two big ones that i really want to see and just haven’t been able to make it happen yet.

avantronica · 2015-01-16T11:04:34.000Z

[quote=““dust ward””]
.
man, i totally envy anyone who gets to see tim hecker play live…

[/quote]

-1 for seeing hecker live, easily the least engaging and most frustrating thing i’ve seen live since i watched carsten nicolai pretend-eq a virtual cd playback, tim might as wll have sent a dvd, lights out, press play, check email, no risk = no performance in my book, Phill Niblock on the other hand, arguably even more distilled, yet he played and what a visceral experience it was, if not exactly dynamic on stage. Philip Jeck treads a similar territory for me and he’s the real deal, very live and physical and improvised, peerless http://youtu.be/vUoJcD_zzHY
+1 for blofeld as a poor man’s xt and more besides tbh, extraordinary value
+1 for any synth with a separate vca level
+1 for op

Orwell · 2015-01-16T11:38:11.000Z

yeah lets reference some more cooler than cool of the coolest ORG real deal artists in the avantgardedass-la-elecuntronica-smug-dogging-ville space and beat poor old tim over the balls with a big noneurorack modular synth power lead and provide somewhat ‘a sense of juxtaposition’ with jecks 4 deck pitch down sampling of apples and oranges which were eaten by electro robots of adam and eve…lol btw snakehouse rulzzzz here…

got it!! the xt is brill

avantronica · 2015-01-16T12:40:59.000Z

""Orwell"":

yeah lets reference some more cooler than cool of the coolest ORG real deal artists in the avantgardedass-la-elecuntronica-smug-dogging-ville space and beat poor old tim over the balls with a big noneurorack modular synth power lead and provide somewhat ‘a sense of juxtaposition’ with jecks 4 deck pitch down sampling of apples and oranges which were eaten by electro robots of adam and eve…lol btw snakehouse rulzzzz here…

Orwell, you are a twat, please stop responding to my posts if you haven’t the ability to prevent embarrassing yourself, seriously, i don’t care about your twisted sense of purpose on here or your off-beam attitude in general, you don’t have a fucking clue about me, you’re mouthing off like a child mate, it ain’t clever and cool like it’s playing out in your head, ok

dropping the actually vile c-bomb, eh, just like one would, classy !

stay away from me, seriously