The original generator gained acclaim in the buzz community for being simple and very flexible. It produces sounds ranging from simple and phat moogy basslines to dope synth-stabs. The TB4005 is almost an exact copy, encorporating the same 9 parameter setup.

The 1-oscillator synth comes equipped with 6 waveforms (2 saws, 2 sines, a square and a triangle), controllable decay, note-length, pulsewidth modulation and, being a really interesting feature on a little synth like this, a chord function. It has no GUI at all, so how it looks will depend on the host application you’re using:

The ‘lack’ of parameters make this plug-in easy to use, and the sound is great for such a lightweight synth. Because of the low CPU usage you can use lots of instances of the TB4005 so that it could be the only synth you need in your track. Check the audio clips below for some heavy useage (courtesy of robotplanet.dk):

by Ricardo Ferrari

by Shro0m

by JoaCHIP

Get TB4005 here

The first time I tried Native Instruments Pro-53 I was immediately sold. Based on the Prophet 5 synth, it makes some hot sounds that can be used for a retro 80s makeover as well as fresh crispy electronic music we hear everyday. It does use a bit of CPU which is nasty on older systems, and it’s price is ranged from $130 to $200.

In comes Roberson with his Prophanity 1.1. Next to coming real close to the Pro-53 sound, it even has an interface that captures the Prophet 5 feel.

prophet 5	pro-53	prophanity

Although the Prophanity doesn’t meet the full specifics of the Pro-53 (no built-in delay, filter keyboard tracking, less customizable LFO and only 15 presets opposed to the 500 Pro-53 offers), it still has the bare essentials and produces a thick and warm sound. It’s also notably lighter on the CPU, so you can use multiple instances while retaining room for other plug-ins or samples.

4 clean Prophanity presets

The other synth Roberson has recreated is the legendary Arp Oddysey, of which Gmedia already gave us the software build known as Oddity. A pure 70s machine which is best known for emitting freaky bleeps that go wild next to the clear italo-like sound it produces. Chris’ version is called Oddy-free.

oddysey	oddity	oddy-free

Just as with Prophanity Oddy-free captures the original layout of the Arp Oddysey, and it also lacks a bit of functionality that is present on the Oddity VSTi. But again, this won’t spoil the fun. It still delivers clear sounds as well as the freakonomics. As opposed to the $130 you could spend on Oddity, Oddy-free is.. exactly: free of charge.

4 clean Oddy-free presets

Get them here

So you’re doing a mix-down of a track in your favorite audio software and you got everything set up nicely, when you notice that somehow you don’t get the desired volume. You check every setting and effect and it’s all like it should be, but the volume is still too low. Then you’ll probably apply some gain to get the desired loudness, which works but pushes the meters totally in the red while the track doesn’t sound loud at all.

There are a number of reasons that could lead to this situation, and one of them is easy to fix but also easy to forget: the DC offset.

Wikipedia has a clear an decent explanation of what DC offset is, so I’ll point you towards that. As explained in the article you can get rid of it by using a one-pole high-pass filter, but you probably can’t be bothered (like me) to set up yet another filter. In comes Sony Sound Forge with an easy solution.

From the pull-down menu, choose ‘Process’ -> ‘DC offset’. Advanced users can set their own parameters there, but the ‘automatically detect and remove’ option works fine too.

This is because every plug-in has it’s own sound, and that’s definitely not a bad thing. After a while, you’ll know the specific sound of every effect by heart, and know which plug-in to use when you want a certain sound.

Almost all digital compressors work great on electronic or synthesized sources like vsti synths or drum generators, but when it comes to sampling I’ve ran into a simple but heavy problem: most vst compressors lack feeling. Sure, they provide a clean and clear sound, but that sound is often really static. And that’s just the thing you don’t want when you’ve sampled an old record.

This is where Blockfish of the The Fish Fillets package comes in, made by Sacha Eversmeier of digitalfishphones.com (the guy actually works for MAGIX, freaky huh.. ;). The Fish Fillets is actually a pretty old set right now, developed in 2004, but it has been one of my favorites since I’ve first discovered it.

As you can see the interface differs a bit from most compressors, but it looks (and is) very easy to use. The treshold and ratio parameters are put together under the ‘compression’ knob, and the attack and release are here known as ‘response’. Although it may seem that you lose a bit of control when grouping those parameters, it’s actually this feature that makes Blockfish less static than other compressors. The compression knob also controls the makeup gain automatically, so that’s another thing you don’t have to worry about.

When your sound gets all muddy after compression because your source has a lot of bass in it, hit the ‘low cut’ button. This will enable Blockfish to disregard low frequencies when analyzing the input signal, resulting in a tight and crisp sound. This is also where the little switch on the left side comes in, which will open the more extensive features.

Here you can adjust the low cut frequency to your own taste. On the front we’ve seen the ’saturation’ knob, which can be further defined here to get that dirty (but not clipping!) old tape-overdriven sound.

The ‘air’ controls (also enabled on the front) are used to boost the mid and high frequencies that are often lost after compression. You can set the frequency and the amount to emphasize it. This aids in keeping that original warm sound that you love so much of the sample you chose to use.

The ‘Opto’ (front) setting is the one we’re really looking for. When enabled, Blockfish will let the input signal mainly control the response setting. This makes the compression sound more natural. The ‘Opto memory’ (back) knob defines how fast the compressor will respond on the input signal. Use the ‘VCA’ (front) setting for a more static approach to compression. It will react pretty precise to the parameters you’ve set on ‘compression’ and ‘response’.

Here are 2 examples of Blockfish used on Accadde A Bali, which was used for Walworth Road Rockers’ remix of Roots Manuva – Witness (1 Hope). Most people probably know it from Quasimoto – Real Eyes though.

clean

opto

vca

This is just a plain explanation of Blockfish, I suggest you check out the manual that comes with the package for a detailed view on every setting (like the ‘complex’ feature, which turns Blockfish in 2 chained compressors!). Don’t be scared, the manual is actually pretty easy to understand because it explains everything in terms of ‘how does this affect your sound’ rather than ‘what is happening technically’.

Next to Blockfish, The Fish Fillets also contains a de-esser called Spitfish which works great in losing the hisssssssss sound on your self-recorded vocals, and expander/gate called Floorfish. Like Blockfish those effects are easy to use, but give a natural and clear sound.

Get The Fish Fillets!

First of all I want to make it clear that this is my _own_ vision on things, and that it’s not something that is an universal truth. Most of the production discussions on the net are useless rants on tastes and methods, and in my opinion there is no standard approach on making music or (post) production. You use what suits you, you decide your own rules, and you use it to make the best product possible.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s start with a free VST effect I regularly use: Cyanide 2.0 by Bram of Smartelectronix:

Cyanide is a waveshaper plugin which delivers some awesome distorted effects to your sound, either subtle or heavy. One of the most striking features is that it has both pre- and post-gain filtering options, where most waveshapers only have post-gain filtering. This means you can tweak your sound twice while using 1 instance of the plug-in. It doesn’t weigh heavy on your CPU so you can load multiple instances of it.

The interface makes it clear that Cyanide is easy to use: you’ve got an amplitude, filter-type and filter-frequency on both pre- and post-sides, and in the center is a window where you can manually draw the shape that you want your input to become. The drawing part is pretty down to earth, just click anywhere to add more points in the graph (which work as notches) or click-and-hold on a pre-existant point to drag it around. In the bottom there’s a graphical preview of what your input will look like, and it changes instantly when you play with the points.

The oversampling function aids in getting more smooth sounds (anti-aliasing) and less unwanted noise.

So it looks nice and easy to use.. but what can you do with it? Basically everything you want if you’re looking for a dirty sound. The filter options add the possibility to make a tiny high-end crunching sound, or a low bass-driven boost. When applied just a little bit it can (for example) boost your beat on the kickdrum, and when you go all out it simply destroys everything into noise.

Here are some simple examples of heavy Cyanide use on a beat:

clean

low-end

hi-end