I didn’t see a dedicated thread re: soundghost plugins, so I wanted to start one since I’ve seen more than one person on this board say they remind them of Chase Bliss effects (big fan of the Mood mkI here). (@circuitghost, @topo_explo, and @holonology, to name a few).
With respect to Jumble, can someone explain whether the sample can be pitched up and down according to MIDI notes? From the “how to Jumble” video on YT, it seems like MIDI notes serve a different purpose.
Thanks in advance! I love how minimal the plugin interfaces are, and the small number of parameters.
Huge fan of Soundghost in general, so I’m up for a discussion about them. Their sample packs are top tier (imo.)
You can play chromatically in Jumble. This is unlike something like Cycles by Slate & Ash where you can randomly set it to trigger 5th notes at certain intervals. In this case you’re holding down a note and the sequencer will throw in random changes based on the sequence.
You can do the same in Jumble to a point, because you can hold a note and let it do its thing. But it’s locked to randomly trigger octaves up/down depending on how you set it. That said, you can also use your MIDI notes chromatically, so you could programme in something specific if you wanted something other than full octaves up/down.
I have a fair bit of their stuff. Mostly the sample libraries, and a few presets and a couple of the plugs. I came across them when I had the Circuits as they do packs for a variety of synths.
As single-use plugins, they are quite good but if I was being critical, arguably not essential. It’s nice to have them but you may find overlap with other plugins depending on what you have. A good example of this is how you can layer sounds in Shaperbox, but it feels a bit overkill. So if I want to simply add a layer onto a drum sound I’ll often try Texturize, which has very nice foley and texture sounds built in. Super quick to audition new sounds and layers that way. Scatter reminds me of almost a limited version of something like Portal, but with nowhere near the complexity and a much simplified set of outcomes. If that’s what you want though, they can be good. And the simplicity is definitley a plus.
I didn’t pick up the tape plugin or Jumble yet. LIke most folks I have quite a few tape plugs, so I’m not in a mad rush to pick that one up. I always enjoy randomisers so I might get Jumble Black Friday time. The plugins are nice additions, but best suited to a very specific use, so demo carefully.
I heavily recommend the samples & presets if you’re remotely into the vibe they give off in the demos. And the instruments are great. I have Tundra and some earlier instruments from when they were Kontakt instruments. I hear they are being converted into plugin format at the moment, and Tundra feels leaner and lighter in the new format. They feel like something along the lines of something like Arturia’s Augmented series, or the Spitfire Originals series, where you have a small instrument with 100-ish presets, sometimes with layers.
Thank you, your post is really helpful. I’ve had something like Jumble in my head for ages, and I think Drift sounds really nice, but I don’t have a lot of tape plugins to compare it to and I have wanted a Gen Loss for ages (heh).
I do love the simplicity of the interfaces. That’s what’s attracting me most. Otherwise it becomes a preset box, which is less fun a lot of the times.
I was eyeballing the samples, etc. I love the Spitfire stuff, especially the Originals series. The Komplete Kontrol redesign has really put me off, so I m eyeballing other outlets. I am, however, even less of a fan of Kontakt instruments and really like that Spitfire do their own plugins with faders for modifying the sound.
Thanks again for taking the time to write up your thoughts!
I can speak for Jumble: like the comment above, it’s not revolutionary if you have other granular/microlooper plugins, but it’s very clean, quick, and accessible compared to most of the ones I’ve tried. I also like Tundra a lot, though it wouldn’t be hard to recreate most of it with a few Spitfire Labs instruments TBH.
I’ve tried all Soundghost plugs at some point, and Jumble is cool but gets a bit stale after some time. It’s an interesting idea which doesn’t quite carry all the way through. My favourite Soundghost plug is actually their reverb. Despite its simple controls, it has a lot of depth and really sounds like the best ones out there.
After some general exploring, I’m using Spitfire for instruments - almost only the blankfor-ms Tape Synth plug, but a piano or two and choirs also. Softube for effects, their reverb is the best one I’ve ever heard and their tape plug is to die for. And then SSL on channel strip and mastering.
Been waiting patiently like a predator in the shadows until they price dropped, and then went for it. I think I got all this for about 30% of its full price. Patience is a virtue. In this case, at least
That’s too bad! I had seen you compare Jumble to your Blooper and that piqued my interest. Still on the hunt for Mood mk1 in software (as ever, forever lol)
Yeah, I was a little bit too quick there it has this cool thing it does where it jumps around randomly in the loop, which is my fav fx on the Blooper. And then it does a few other things as well that Blooper does, but somehow I managed to write full track on the Blooper and Jumble just doesn’t get me there. In terms of fx and loop messing, it does a lot of things the Blooper does, tho. But if anything, it got me to appreciate the Blooper even more.
If Chase Bliss ever went into software, that’d be something.
I used Alchemy all the time before Apple bought Camel Audio and locked Alchemy behind Logic. 🫠
I tried Logic for iPad out but adding the iPad as a “dedicated” instrument has never worked well for me. Too fiddly, but maybe I should consider giving it another try…
Thanks for the clarifications re: Blooper and Jumble.
The irony about wishing Chase Bliss would go software is that most of their pedals are software anyway! And the interface would probably improve drastically over the pedals despite the latter being hardware.
I don’t want to even think about it because they will probably never do it…
I’m getting this. It’s not granular, but kind of, which is what I like about it, because I’m getting tired of granular though still liking the idea of it
Totally agree, relying more on plugins for FX these days, I’d love to have some CBA plugins I could map to my Faderfoxes. It would also mean you could finally use all of the ramping stuff and have easy MIDI control, both is a pain on their pedals imo, so I don’t bother with it.
I wouldn’t totally rule it out they made a plugin, there’s already a plugin version of Thermae (although you still need the pedal) and they put the Lossy plugin into a pedal.
Yeah, given that Joel certainly flirts with software vendors on a frequent basis in his collaborations, I wouldn’t put it past them to come up with plug-ins within a reasonable future. Though I doubt they’d do Mood But Plug-In, but rather something you couldn’t get in their hardware, to expand more than replace their pedals.
I mean, I’d love the Blooper in software. The closest thing I’ve got is Apple’s Beat Breaker, which is pretty awesome. But it ain’t the Blooper
This may (or may not!) be of interest. And I don’t want to derail the Soundghost chat too much because they’re a cool developer. But for this specific thing, the clock parameter is in this device. ambi - ambient exploration device
I’ve no idea how good it is, as I don’t have much knowledge of the Mood, but I enjoy ijo’s devices. They should collab with SG!
it has this cool thing it does where it jumps around randomly in the loop, which is my fav fx on the Blooper. And then it does a few other things as well that Blooper does, but somehow I managed to write full track on the Blooper and Jumble just doesn’t get me there. In terms of fx and loop messing, it does a lot of things the Blooper does, tho. But if anything, it got me to appreciate the Blooper even more.