Magic Russ

Rick Bass, 60s drums, the organs and pianos, strummed acoustic.

Wasn't that last month's promo?

Sorry about that, I got Amp and FX confused.

Just wondering what everyone's BF strategy is. Are you looking for any savings on big ticket items or just going to pick up a few small things? For my part, I am probably going to go light this year. I haven't had my eye on anything in particular. I will probably pick up one of the discounted AAS packs, and potentially whichever EZKeys stuff Toontrack throws in the basement this year.

I'm sure most of us know about this, but for those who don't, KVR has a page which will allow you to view deals sorted by when they expire. Make sure you don't miss out on anything. https://www.kvraudio.com/deals.php?order=1&inc=0

Super 8 seems to have potential, but I can't say I need another synth and it probably will be included in K13.

I don't have that problem either in CW or SOP4. It does take a while to load, and may well be authenticating online, but it didn't ask me for creds in either host.

That's actually kind of tempting. Is there anything in Elite which you consider a must-have?

The main thing for people who don't create their own instruments is that they added the Mod Pack Effects. The Synth mode of Choral is supposed to be modeled after Juno-type choruses, and the Ensemble mode is based on the ensemble effects from old string machines. I am tempted to see if I can retrofit these effects in place of the old modulation effects in some of my old Hollow Sun instruments. ----- Kontakt 6.2.0 - 2019-11-14 ADDED There are now three new state of the art modulation effects (Choral, Flair & Phasis) ADDED KSP: There is a new type of zone that can be created and is fully accessible from KSP, allowing for dynamic mapping of samples, including end-user ones (set_num_user_zones(), set_sample(), set_zone_par(), set_loop_par() & is_zone_empty()) ADDED KSP: All zone parameters can now be read from KSP (get_sample(), get_zone_par() & get_loop_par()); available for both user zones & standard ones ADDED KSP: New MIR functions to detect pitch, RMS, peak level and loudness of any zone (user or standard) ADDED KSP: New MIR functions to classify samples based on their audio characteristics (e.g., Kick, Snare, Choir, Synth, etc) ADDED KSP: New UI widget (ui_mouse_area), this first iteration of which allows dropping files from the system to an instrument’s UI ADDED KSP: New command to make handling asynchronous operations more convenient (wait_async()) IMPROVED An instrument can now be loaded with missing resources (samples, NKRs, etc) without the references being completely discarded, i.e., one can load an instrument, ignore missing samples, save it and reload it without losing data ADDED A new entry in the Mapping Editor’s Edit menu allows for manually removing all zones with missing samples IMPROVED KSP: purge_group() now returns an async ID, allowing for reliable tracking of the operations completion IMPROVED There were some performance issues with instruments with many automation assignments when running in Logic IMPROVED The scrolling and animation speed in the Libraries tab has been adjusted FIXED There are no more conflicts between MIDI and Host automation in Logic FIXED Kontakt would often crash when trying to run a Batch Resave operation FIXED There were some audible clicks in certain cases involving looping samples played back with Time Machine Pro FIXED Kontakt would crash when saving an NKI after assigning user automation to any of the recently added reverb and delay effects FIXED KSP: Switches and menus would get stuck in their hover states under certain circumstances FIXED KSP: In certain cases, when a control was within a panel, its position would be 1 pixel off of what was expected FIXED Kontakt now works on Mac OS Catalina Creator Tools 1.2.0 - 2019-11-14 ADDED File Browser: Direct access to the file system, complementing the new Project Manager IMPROVED New layout, allowing for more than one tool to be visible at once IMPROVED All factory content (scripts, instruments, performance views, etc) are now easy to copy to a user location for direct editing; just use the new Help menu entry. FIXED Instrument Editor: Pulling data from big NKIs (>90k zones) would be unreliable ADDED GUI Designer: A new widget type is added: MouseArea ADDED Instrument Editor: MIR type tagging can now be performed with Lua ADDED Instrument Editor: Zone and group pan settings can now be set and retrieved with Lua ADDED Tutorials: Populate Zones From Filesystem (Instrument Editor Lua Scripting) ADDED Instrument Editor: New user zones field displays true when a zone is a user zone or false otherwise ADDED Tutorials: MIR Type Tagging (Instrument Editor Lua Scripting) IMPROVED UniqueID property has been removed, zone ID's are now handled automatically FIXED Adding a UI element and then clicking undo would collapse the element tree

https://www.musicradar.com/news/deezer-introduces-spleeter-a-free-tool-that-anyone-can-use-to-create-stems-from-stereo-audio-files I don't know if this is any good, but it promises to split an audio file into stems.

The CS 10 sounds terrible. I thought the SY99 and Maxi Korg sounds were ok though.

The Bias ecosystem allows you to build custom amps and effects which can be shared via the cloud. It's not as impressive as it sounds, but it does give you a wide variety of tones. The sound quality is somewhere between Amplitube and S Gear, the interface is not too clumsy, and the user library is mostly djent or blues rock. Versus others... More options and gain than Scuffham. Better reverb than Amplitube. Guitar Rig's amp modeling is dated at best. I never liked TH3 from Overloud and don't have experience with the others. For some reason though it doesn't seem to make it onto any of my tracks.

At least in version 1 it only comes up if you try to connect to the cloud.

Any comments on the Rob Lee expansions? Nobody seems to talk about those.

The Michael Kastrup Expansion #2 is pretty good. I don't seem to see an Expansion #1 though.

And he has a new one, Japan's Vintage

That annoys me to no end. The human voice is as much an instrument as anything else. On the other hand people seem to give too much credit to many of today's pop stars whose songwriting credits are mostly contractual. I don't know anyone who made such claims about George Martin as a producer, but anyone who has bought an album from their favorite "up and coming" band in college knows the value of production. And as a composer, well let's just say that it seems like a lot of science fiction and fantasy soundtracks owe a small debt to "March of the Meanies". I don't like either of the Fatboy Slim sounds, and I don't think I would like them any more if someone reproduced them with live instruments. I'd take "Weapon of Choice" though.

Also https://help.positivegrid.com/hc/en-us/articles/360025409851-Effect-List https://help.positivegrid.com/hc/en-us/articles/360025480871-Guitar-Match-List

And it's out!

Finally, for the month of November, we have a special Thanksgiving MiniPak bundle at 50% off. This gives you all seven drum-set MiniPaks (including DarkSide) for just $29! www.rayzoon.com

Unfortunately this comes up any time someone uses the word loop. Calling somebody else fat won't make you any skinnier. Calling someone stupid doesn't make you any smarter. And dissing people for using samples doesn't make you a better musician.

This video game came in cereal boxes 20 years ago... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chex_Quest And they are remaking it in HD. https://www.destructoid.com/remember-chex-quest-it-s-getting-a-free-hd-remake-544233.phtml

Does this update do anything?

Personally I prefer how Studio One does it where each track goes to an instance of their sampler with an appropriate instrument loaded according to the MIDI program number associated with the track. That way I can easily replace each track with the best possible instrument to use with it.

Of course the key words are sufficiently and sort of.