90's Drum n Bass Strings/Pads

devontodetroit · Post by **devontodetroit** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 12:29 pm

You know those thick luscious pads synonymous with early Drum and Bass records?

examples:

Goldie - Inner City Life

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8u7MNG-ug8

What synth did they use to make them? Korg Wavestation?

Also how can I re-create that sound with digital? Ideas appreciated!

Thanks in advance.

Luke.

AK · Post by AK » Thu Feb 17, 2011 1:06 pm

The pads on that track were played via an Akai sampler and were already chords. You'd have to look at the digital synths around at the time to get that type of sound I reckon.

Here's some that may have provided that sound:

Korg 01/wfd
Korg Wavestation
Yamaha SY-99
Roland JD-990

There's actually a pad preset in the JD called 'Look Into The Abyss', which sounds reasonably close and would be pretty much there with a bit of a tweak.

If you go to synth mania you can check out a lot of the sounds from synths in their preset forms. I know a few DnB guys were using the SY-99 a lot btw.

devontodetroit · Post by **devontodetroit** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 1:34 pm

No Roland VSTi available though.. Alas.

What a great age in hardware that was, I remember my brother having an M1 and Wavestation..

Cant make anything like that in Massive thats for sure!

AK · Post by AK » Thu Feb 17, 2011 1:36 pm

What about the M1 and Wavestation software?

N - Jay · Post by **N - Jay** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 7:29 pm

http://www.korg.com/product.aspx?pd=443

Is this something that can equal the hardware? Routing it out of the box to a hardware mixer with preamps and stuff. I've read something about Dennis Ferrer going digital and using preamps to make it 'analog'.

I better go buy a Prophet 08 now, so in 10 years they want sounds of the zeroes

Assuming that a prophet 08 now is what a Jupiter, sh-101, M1 was then.

tone-def · Post by **tone-def** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 9:20 pm

N - Jay wrote:http://www.korg.com/product.aspx?pd=443

Is this something that can equal the hardware? Routing it out of the box to a hardware mixer with preamps and stuff. I've read something about Dennis Ferrer going digital and using preamps to make it 'analog'.

I better go buy a Prophet 08 now, so in 10 years they want sounds of the zeroes Assuming that a prophet 08 now is what a Jupiter, sh-101, M1 was then.

i would say the software sounds better but it's all subjective.

i don't see the prophet 08 becoming a synth classic. lots of people hate them.

korg m1 can be had for £100.

AK · Post by AK » Thu Feb 17, 2011 9:25 pm

The sort of sounds mentioned here are from digital synths anyway so in theory, there's absolutely no reason whatsoever that a software version of a digital hardware synth can't sound identical.

Weird thing is, they are so cheap nowadays, it's of no interest to make the software equivalents because in all probability, they'd have to price them below the 2nd hand price of the hardware they were emulating. Which aint gonna be a lot so it aint worth the workload.

Some of those that were considered, hi end back then are peanuts now compared to their original prices and some are awesome for those ambient, atmospheric pads. They most definitely shone in the digital sense.

oblioblioblio · Post by **oblioblioblio** » Thu Feb 17, 2011 9:28 pm

I reckon you can get these strings with a decent polyphonic synth (analoue or digital) and the right settings.

You could probably get away with using a regular subtractive synth, or maybe a synth with more complex oscillators, like a wavetable type synth. Will need hipass and lopass filtering. Maybe some modulation of pitch. Possibly use a chorous or phaser.

Not sure how in depth you wanna go. I always enjoy fiddling with synth programming. Bur some people get better results from using a smaple from a peice of music.