Need Synth Patch ID

[razor7music]

Hello--

Cage the Elephant has a track out now that I'd like to ID the New Wave sounding keyboard patch that's used throughout the track.

The song is here.  =

Ideas?

 

Thanks!

[Robert Bone]

Are you talking about that weird little chirpy lead sound, or the pad sounds underneath everything else?

There are about a dozen additional people credited on that track, playing all kinds of different instruments and some backing vocals...

In the video, I see a Prophet, and a Kronos - and I guess the guy plays that weird lead sound on the Kronos.  It is a bit hard to figure out because they aren't really playing what we are hearing.

[razor7music]

10 hours ago, Robert Bone said:

Are you talking about that weird little chirpy lead sound, or the pad sounds underneath everything else?

There are about a dozen additional people credited on that track, playing all kinds of different instruments and some backing vocals...

In the video, I see a Prophet, and a Kronos - and I guess the guy plays that weird lead sound on the Kronos.  It is a bit hard to figure out because they aren't really playing what we are hearing.

Hello--

I'm referring to the high range key you hear playing a lead melody right when the song starts.

I also know enough about music video production to know you can't rely on what instrument's being "played" in the video to actually be the instrument in the recording.

I just thought a fan or someone with the actual synth might know. I like the sound. I had something similar with a Korg Poly 800 II back in the day.

[Robert Bone]

10 minutes ago, razor7music said:

Hello--

I'm referring to the high range key you hear playing a lead melody right when the song starts.

I also know enough about music video production to know you can't rely on what instrument's being "played" in the video to actually be the instrument in the recording.

I just thought a fan or someone with the actual synth might know. I like the sound. I had something similar with a Korg Poly 800 II back in the day.

Gotcha - I just wanted to make sure I understood which sound you are looking for.  I will circle back and take a listen and look, sometime in the early afternoon.  I am knee-deep in getting a bunch of remote-recorded drum tracks merged into the master versions of their projects.

In addition, it looks like I am at least 2 quarts low on motor oil, by which I mean coffee.  (having a slow-motion morning)

Bob Bone

[Starship Krupa]

If you have A|A|S' Ultra Analog Session 2 (I think it came with SPlum, I got it as a Pluginboutique BOGO), load it up and select the first bank, category "Leads." Crank the mod wheel and go through the patches and try to find one that doesn't sound like that. 😊

I remember it being a popular electro-pop lead sound back in the day, maybe a sawtooth and a sine with the filter modulated? Could have been an attempt at "violin." I can imagine it coming out of an SH-101 or Poly 800 or other price-smasher.

[razor7music]

2 minutes ago, Starship Krupa said:

If you have A|A|S' Ultra Analog Session 2 (I think it came with SPlum, I got it as a Pluginboutique BOGO), load it up and select the first bank, category "Leads." Crank the mod wheel and go through the patches and try to find one that doesn't sound like that. 😊

I remember it being a popular electro-pop lead sound back in the day, maybe a sawtooth and a sine with the filter modulated? Could have been an attempt at "violin." I can imagine it coming out of an SH-101 or Poly 800 or other price-smasher.

Awesome, thanks. I have AAS, but not that patch. I'll look for it.

[Starship Krupa]

If you have only the player, they are offering loyal customers a free sound pack right now. My guess would be that you will find your '80's lead in the Plastic Pop collection. I have so many of their sound packs that I can't decide which one I want.

The Ultra Analog Session 2 I referred to is a cut-down version of their synth, part of their Session Bundle, and I ran through a few presets on it. It gives you access to some of the parameters and the arpeggiator. It has presets that I can't find in any of the sound packs, but I may not be looking hard enough.

[razor7music]

2 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

If you have only the player, they are offering loyal customers a free sound pack right now. My guess would be that you will find your '80's lead in the Plastic Pop collection. I have so many of their sound packs that I can't decide which one I want.

The Ultra Analog Session 2 I referred to is a cut-down version of their synth, part of their Session Bundle, and I ran through a few presets on it. It gives you access to some of the parameters and the arpeggiator. It has presets that I can't find in any of the sound packs, but I may not be looking hard enough.

That's the one I have. The Plastic Pop collection. I'll look through it again.

Thanks!

[Christian Jones]

On 12/18/2019 at 9:18 AM, Starship Krupa said:

Crank the mod wheel and go through the patches and try to find one that doesn't sound like that. 😊

Word, this sound isn't hard to come by if you have some cool vintage synth vsts. If you have Kontakt full I'd check out Synth Magic as that type of sound is all over his synths. Just listening to the demos of the various SM synths and I bet you'll hear that sound or close to it and mod wheel should get you the rest way. 

[razor7music]

I did end up using a patch from AAS Plastic Pop collection.

OT, but it's really strange that when I record that synth, it's recording an audio file and not a midi file. I typically like to record in midi for editing and a/b patches. What did I do wrong there?

[Starship Krupa]

13 hours ago, razor7music said:

it's really strange that when I record that synth, it's recording an audio file and not a midi file. I typically like to record in midi for editing and a/b patches. What did I do wrong there?

You created the instrument as a Split Instrument, with separate MIDI and Synth tracks visible and accessible. Then at record time, you armed the Synth track and not the MIDI track before recording.

To get the result you want, you could either create the instrument as a Simple Instrument track, which is a hybrid combination of both the synth and MIDI tracks, or you could leave things as you have them and just remember that you need to arm the MIDI track for recording before you hit record.

[razor7music]

5 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

You created the instrument as a Split Instrument, with separate MIDI and Synth tracks visible and accessible. Then at record time, you armed the Synth track and not the MIDI track before recording.

To get the result you want, you could either create the instrument as a Simple Instrument track, which is a hybrid combination of both the synth and MIDI tracks, or you could leave things as you have them and just remember that you need to arm the MIDI track for recording before you hit record.

Ah, I armed the wrong track. Gotcha!

[Starship Krupa]

Yes, when your intention was to record the MIDI, which is what I typically want to do. I've never used a program before that made it so easy to record the audio output of the synth, but thinking about it, it could really have its uses in the case of synths where their sound engine is such that no two performances are the same.

Ah, Cakewalk. With more options comes greater likehood of unforseen consequences.

Good news for those who use Split Instrument tracks as we do, you have the ability to show and hide entire types of tracks in the Track and Console views.

So let's say you don't want Synth tracks to appear in the Track View, because you don't want to accidentally arm them for recording or perform other operations on them that you intend for their MIDI counterparts. Up at the top of the Track View, open the Tracks menu and select the Track Manager (or just hit "H"). From there you can hide individual tracks, or just turn off display of Synth (or MID or Audio) tracks entirely.

This same functionality is under the Strips menu in the Console View (do not accuse Cakewalk of consistency here). I usually hide Synths in the Track View and MIDI in the Console View because I have no need to see MIDI tracks in my mixer. I don't adjust MIDI volumes during mixing except by accident.