Scoring films, recording synths and the advantages of hardware over software

Luke and Tom are back with another chat about the world of synthesisers and electronic music, recorded at Signal Sounds HQ. This time, Luke discusses his work scoring short films, and the pair chat about their respective approaches to recording synths in the studio. They also cover some new arrivals at Signal Sounds and discuss what hardware does better than software when it comes to making music.

Gear discussed:

Fairfield Circuitry Placeholder:

https://www.signalsounds.com/fairfield-circuitry-placeholder-bucket-brigade-reverb-pedal/

Sixty Four Pixels CVOCD-X:

https://www.signalsounds.com/sixty-four-pixels-cvocd-x-midi-to-cv-converter-banana/

Earthlink Modular Trails:

https://www.signalsounds.com/earthlink-modular-trails-eurorack-mixer-output-module/

Get in touch with questions, feedback and suggestions via signalflow@signalsounds.com

Find out more about the gear discussed at signalsounds.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Hello and welcome to episode six of Signalflow, the Signal Sounds podcast. I am one of your hosts, Tom Churchill, and I'm joined as ever by Luke Palmer. Hello, Luke. Hello, Tom. And hello, everyone. Thanks for tuning in again to another episode. This week we don't have a guest, and we're not at Superbooth, but hopefully we'll still manage to keep your interest. Back to the regularly scheduled programming. Indeed, back to a regular normal format podcast. We've got a few things to talk about. We've got a few new bits of gear that have come in. We've got a few topics and a couple of your questions that you've sent us in that we're going to go through.

SPEAKER_02 0:51

Please keep those coming.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

Yes, signalflow at signalsounds.com or leave a comment. And yeah, let's just get into it. Luke, how the devil are you? What have you been up to?

SPEAKER_02 1:02

Oh, I'm alright. I am not too shabby. Um I have been working away on some stuff. Uh at the moment, I am currently in the middle of scoring a film, um, which I am enjoying very much. Uh it's it's it's a nice sort of tonal change from the stuff that I've worked on more recently. It's actually like a little bit more in line with the kind of music that I kind of enjoy making. So the last few films I've done have been a little bit more. I did an animation that was sort of like Gallic. Uh so there was like some traditional Scottish folk-y elements.

SPEAKER_01 1:37

Is this animation that may have won an award recently?

SPEAKER_02 1:40

I did. I picked up a uh best art film at film G and was nominated for Best Film as well, which was nice. Congratulations. Thank you. Uh so that was um Lucy Keegan, who I worked with on that one. Um and yeah, she's she's an amazingly talented animator, and it's all hand-drawn, which is like by herself as well, so it's like a real painstaking process. Like I think she spent over a year doing all of the drawing, and it's like four minutes long. It's like it's painstakingly done and it looks beautiful. Um But this film I'm working on at the moment um is from my friend Alice Viscat, um, and it's called Mercury, and it's a little bit more tonally like black mirror, slightly dystopian. Um, and so I kind of get to indulge in some of the slightly more like dark ambient cinematic sort of sounds that I really enjoy to just sit and write with anyway. So um I've been very much enjoying that process.

SPEAKER_01 2:33

Um What kind of gear are you using on that one?

SPEAKER_02 2:36

So the the last month I've basically had a rough edit and a little bit of like stills and some footage, but I don't really like working on or like starting to actually work properly until I get a locked edit, because like so much can change that like it's it's actually I find it way more difficult to have written something that has all of these timing cues, and then you have to go through and change them all. It's like it's really not how I enjoy to do it. So I basically said I'm gonna be working on some sketches and ideas and kind of getting a feel because I can now can see the film, but I'm not actually gonna start like putting pen to paper, so to speak, until I get the locked edit. So I've just kind of been farting about with uh surge. Um so I think there'll be a few sounds in the film that are from that. Um I made a sound that um my partner Phoebe described as one of the worst sounds she's ever heard in her life.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Wow, that's quite an accolade.

SPEAKER_02 3:31

I know I was like, success nailed it. Um so uh I'll maybe pop a little clip of that in. Um I think everyone would love to hear the worst sound Phoebe's ever heard. Yeah, so uh she said it sounded like the world was about to end. So I was like, that's good. Um and then I watched Obsession recently, which was excellent. Um and there was quite a lot of like really big hits, so I took that surge sound. Uh I'll play a little, we'll play a little clip of the surge sound by itself, and then I'll also do like a little clip of like me adapting it to be like a slightly more cinematic hit as well, which was just adding some layers of like percussion um and a big uh throbbing uh super six bass line. Um and then uh super six and profit X stuff for um like the more tonal and melodic elements. Um I recently upgraded the Super Six that I have to the ST4.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

Yeah, I was gonna ask you about this because I know you've recently we were we had your synth in the building and Kyle was helping you swap out the keyboard for the new. So this is the upgraded polyphonic aftertouch key bed for the Udo Super Six.

SPEAKER_02 5:01

Yeah, and to be honest, I've always sort of been that guy who's like polyphonic aftertouch. Who needs it?

SPEAKER_01 5:08

Yeah. Uh who do you think who do you think I am? Some kind of professional keyboard person. Yeah, exactly. I don't I I don't know how to use these fingers.

SPEAKER_02 5:14

What are you talking about?

SPEAKER_00 5:15

That's what sequences are for.

SPEAKER_02 5:17

Yeah, exactly. Um but as it turns out, it's bloody good, you know. Um I I think the thing for me that is most impressive, I kind of had this a little bit when I first played the Osmos. Um and the Polybrooke 12 as well, which has got a great like aftertouch, interesting integration on that, is like you almost have like two presets depending on how you play, and you don't actually really need to be that good of a keyboard player, as it turns out, uh, to benefit from that. Like you can just sort of like be playing this thing quite softly, and then just by like leaning into it a little bit, you get these like really expressive tonal things. And I've been really surprised at how much I've it's like kind of taken it like to another level, I would say. Like I I was a little bit reluctant to to sort of like spend the money on the upgrade, but now I've done it. I I like couldn't imagine going back to it before. So uh yeah, I was been really into that. So that's been those three things are kind of forming the palette with a little bit of the slate and ash stuff as well. Um, because it's quite useful to have some stuff that's a bit more in the box and a bit more MIDI. Um, and though those things all sound like quite a bit more string adjacent and like slightly more like orchestral stuff that I don't have real access to otherwise. So um yeah, at the moment it's kind of that sort of stuff, but it's the longest film I've worked on thus far. Um, so it's gonna be about 21 minutes because I've only really done shorts. Um so it's just gonna be a bit more music to write, which is exciting, and there's quite a lot of tonal changes, so it should be it should be pretty good. I'm really look like looking forward to to kind of like I've kind of just started as of yesterday, I got the locked edit. Um, so it was kind of like that was my first night of like putting putting actual stuff down for it and been enjoying that.

SPEAKER_01 7:01

Um what's the process like in terms of like how much free reign do you have in this sort of setup? Because I know I've you know I've I've never done any kind of um soundtrack writing or you know work before, but I've listened to various podcasts over the years with people that have, you know, um talking about the you know the requirements of having to do umpting cues in a very short space of time and then having to change things very quickly when the edit's changing. And yeah, like you say you've got the locked edit, which is obviously helpful, but at that point, have you got like a list of required cues to do, or you know, how how does it work from a kind of how do you organize your workload, I guess?

SPEAKER_02 7:37

Yeah, so the the the thing for me is I think I'm operating currently at a level that is like I'm basically working with um like there's there's no studios or any other thing involved at this point. So like all of the I'm basically just working directly with the director of the film.

SPEAKER_01 7:54

Who is who is also the editor and yeah, often oftentimes it's they're the editor.

SPEAKER_02 7:58

A few of the films I've worked on, there's a separate editor and there's a separate director, but like generally it's like you know quite closely linked. And for me, it it really depends on the director then, because some of them have like really strong ideas of like I want music here, here, here. Um the last few have just been like I don't have like I'm I don't want to restrict you by telling you where music should or shouldn't go. So you just do what you think is right and I'll let you know if I like it or not. Um so at the moment I have a pretty for this film, um like I haven't been told I I've not had any temp music put in. Like it's it's essentially like all I have is a film with um just dialogue and like a tiny bit of like background noises and stuff, but it's I d it's not even like in the audio mix stage yet. So like it's literally just like the onboard camera microphones and stuff. Or like I think maybe a little bit of boom mic, it kind of cuts in between those things. So it's essentially just an entirely blank canvas, which in some ways is a little bit scary because then it's like you know, I I basically have to make all of the decisions of like oh where where is the music going. And there's also quite a few scenes in this where I feel like you could take it two different ways. Like you could be like you could either make it really deeply intense and like slightly horrifying, or deeply sad. Uh, and so for those scenarios, I'm probably gonna do a version of both, and then be like, you can pick which you think is better suits what you were going for. Um but yeah, at the moment it's just um like I don't really have any specific cues that I've been told I've got it hit. In some ways, it's just like I'm gonna go through all of the most obvious parts first and do like a full pass of like, well, this scene definitely needs music and it needs to be like this, and then do a second round of like incidental scenes that could maybe benefit from a little bit of music. Yeah um I'm not gonna work chronologically either, because I sometimes find that like if I was trying to just do the film from start to finish, um, I think it's easier for me mentally to kind of go through and do the scenes that I am like have really strong ideas for because those ideas sometimes inform the incidental scenes along the way.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

I was gonna say you might end up with a theme that you then reference in other bits and yeah, that kind of thing.

SPEAKER_02 10:09

Yeah, I'd written a theme um a few weeks ago um before I got the the even before I got the first rough cut, I'd written a theme. And there's a chance that I might still use it, but now that I've seen the film, it's gonna be in the same key because I think the key was right and and and that sort of thing, but I think it will be a slightly different version. But we'll see. We'll see. I'm still relatively early days in it. Yeah, cool. Sounds good. And I know what's been new with you, you've been moving.

SPEAKER_01 10:33

Yeah, I've moved house um finally after quite a protracted process, uh, which is slightly stressful, but yeah, all done. So I have a new room for music stuff. Um so I'm in the process now of um bringing all the bits that I put into storage back out, realizing I have far too many modular synthesizer modules. No, you you have too many. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um it's a it's a terrible affliction that I have. So I'm gonna sell a few things and try and streamline things a little bit. I'm gonna take the opportunity to kind of like lay things out a bit differently than they were before. Um yeah, it's kind of weird. I've got a space which I need to have, it needs to be quite multi-purpose because it needs to, it kind of also needs to, this is like secondary concern, but it does it does also need to work as a spare bedroom in the property, and but I also need to be able to film video stuff there, and I also need to use that room to like do soldering and DIY stuff for making sense and do, you know, just my usual, you know, actual recording music and playing stuff. So I mean it's a decent sized room and it's got a nice high ceiling, and it's you know, I'm looking forward to working in there, but I'm still figuring out exactly what the layout's gonna be like.

SPEAKER_02 11:41

I can imagine the three things in some ways aren't all like they don't all coexist in a way. Like what makes a really usable studio might not necessarily be the most usable studio for something that you then have to film. And then certainly like, you know, the soldering thing is essentially almost like an entirely different there's no there's no scenario where that fits into like the rest of the stuff.

SPEAKER_01 12:02

No, I mean in my autoset was in a different room. Um and I I've I've got slightly I've got like m fewer bigger but bigger rooms now, if that makes sense. So I think I just need to zone it a bit. Yeah. Um use some room dividers or something like that to kind of you know demarcate the areas and make make so it doesn't just feel like a big homogeneous synthesizer junkyard, which is playing the classic brand next project.

SPEAKER_02 12:28

Uh I was gonna ask you, uh, now that you're kind of in that process of a rebuild, are you taking the opportunity to change how things were set up, or did you have it like did you quite like how it was set up and it's just essentially like getting rid of some stuff, or are you gonna do things differently?

SPEAKER_01 12:43

I'm not gonna do it that differently because I'm I I I'd sort of landed on a I mean, we'll maybe touch on some of this a little bit later when we come to one of the um listener questions, which is about how how we record synths in modular and how we multitrack it and stuff. So so my actual the kind of core of the setup is I mean, I have a you know, I have a sound card and I have a small analog mixer. I've got a kind of a vintage task cam and I've got patch bay and I can I can kind of use depending on how I patch the patch bay, I can I can work without using the computer at all, uh, and I've got some outboard effects and stuff there, or I can use that mixer to send buses from Ableton into and just use it as a kind of analog summing mixer. Um, so it's pretty flexible the website, and I'm gonna keep that as the kind of core of it. So it's this kind of hybrid analog digital recording and jamming kind of setup. What I did have before was kind of like a few areas then with different types of modules. So I've got like a 4U corner and then my kind of Euroract zone, which wasn't really big enough for all the Euroract stuff that I have, so I would just like move stuff in and out, and that's where I would film stuff as well. Um, so I'm probably yeah, I think it's gonna be broadly the same, but with yeah, I'm just gonna try and streamline things a little bit because I don't really need all the cases that I've got. And I think I'm gonna definitely move to a thing where I just have one or two smaller Euroract cases on the go at any one time, and I kind of just rotate things around a bit more. Um, because yeah, it's it's my modular grid account is obscene.

SPEAKER_02 14:09

Um you're definitely on the paid for version, right?

SPEAKER_01 14:12

Oh yeah, I've got a unicorn account on that for sure. Yeah, I've had that for a while. I need more racks. Um because I always do, I mean I don't know if Euro, you're not a big modular grid user, because you don't have a huge amount of Euro stuff.

SPEAKER_02 14:22

No, I don't have any Eurorac, which seems which uh like might get be a bit sacrilege. Um but the decision for that was I used to have a bunch of Eurorack. Um and I really like Eurorack, but uh working here and having an almost endless opportunity to just buy a new thing every month, I was like, this feels like probably shouldn't do it. And you got me into the Surge 4U stuff, which for me was the thing that was like most interesting about Eurorack was um interesting, patchable. Like I was kind of more interested in synths than I was like the sort of sound effects process-y sorts of stuff. Um so yeah, I kind of I kind of went down that road rather than the tinkery because the tinkerer and me would just endlessly.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Yeah, I mean the tinkerer and me does waste far too many hours with like copies of modular grid racks saying, well, what if I did it this way instead, or what if I made this case a you know, this themed thing. So and I'm I'm I've actually yeah, I've got a bit better recent months at not not spending too much time doing that, and I'm just trying to, you know, get a couple of cases that really work for me and try and work with them, and they're kind of a bit more manufacturing, you know, like single brand focused and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 15:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

Um, but yeah, one thing I've quite enjoyed in the whole process of moving, because I kind of moved everything into storage for a while while I was kind of you know um just getting logistics sorted for for moving, and I've now been moving stuff back out of storage again. But for a while, the only thing I really had to make music with for like two or three weeks or so was the um electron syntact.

SPEAKER_02 15:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:48

Because we got a B stock one in here, um, and I kind of just I've always been a little bit intrigued by it because I've got the Digitact um and the Syntact is the one with the um four analog drum voices and then eight digital voices. And it's kind of a drum machine, but it can do some synthie stuff as well. Um I I think you've described it as like the ugly duckling of the electron range.

SPEAKER_02 16:08

I I just sort of feel like it it I and I love an ugly duckling. I think the Prophet X was objectively the ugly duckling of the sequential liner.

SPEAKER_01 16:14

Yeah, yeah, you've got the sequential ugly duckling, haven't you?

SPEAKER_02 16:16

Yeah, uh and I in fairness, the presets on it were steaming garbage. But like when you actually dig into it, it's great. I think the syntax for me always had that slightly ugly duckling thing of like, okay, well, the digitact is by far the better sampler because it it it didn't have sampling when it first came out and now it's pretty limited. And the digitone is like the it's obviously not like the analogue, uh it's not like a sort of traditional analog synth engine, but it was like if you're looking for a synth, the digitone made more sense. Um and the syntact was sort of like the the the hybrid of those two things that kind of didn't really feel like it did one uh one or the other like you know tremendously like well at the time. But the way that you speak about it, it seems that like the analog drum voices are actually really, really good.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:04

Um and that it really works for your setup.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Yeah, it does. It just I think it's it just the way I I don't know, just it just kind of appeals to the way I work because I've I've always liked analogue drums. I've had a Vermona DRM one, um, which I kind of wanted to like a bit more than I actually did, if that makes sense. And uh, you know, it's quite big, it takes up quite a lot of space. I kind of like half the sounds in it, and you know, the the other half, I've I've just I know I know it's really popular, and again, another controversial opinion, maybe, but it's it's really you know, it's maybe not 100% for me.

SPEAKER_02 17:35

Tom, it's not for me, Churchill.

SPEAKER_01 17:37

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Watch watch sales tank again. Um no, I mean it's a it's a great, it's a great machine, but um I was kind of looking for something a bit more you know compact and but yeah, the Syntact has very good analog drum voices, really interesting digital engines as well. Um, and yeah, you can use it to sequence external stuff. And I've just quite enjoyed, I guess, during this period of like flux that my studio's been in, just having one thing to play with and just trying to make little grooves with that as a groove box. And I've made a couple of of sort of jams on that, which are actually pretty like not far off. It doesn't they they don't need much more.

SPEAKER_02 18:13

I am a big fan of like quite small, self-contained things, in particular for things like killing time on planes and stuff like that. Oh my god, I love a little thing that I can just be like. I had the dirty wave uh for a while, the the little tracker Game Boy thing. Um and that on a plane was like 10 out of 10. It's just zipping around like when you got quite um quite used to the work.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

I mean that feels like a like a Game Boy or something, doesn't it? Because you have the handheld thing with your thumbs.

SPEAKER_02 18:42

That thing is great. I like I really, really love that.

SPEAKER_01 18:44

Um I think if I was sat next to someone on a plane who was using an electron box with the clicky clacky keys, it would do my head.

SPEAKER_02 18:50

To be fair, it the the key the keys clacked on the the dirty wave as well. It's like it's not as loud as the electron, but it's still it's still clacky.

SPEAKER_01 18:58

Um electron was like sitting next to a typewriter.

SPEAKER_02 19:02

Yeah, to be fair, if I sat next to someone and they whipped out a typewriter, I'd be like, oh god, here we go.

SPEAKER_01 19:09

Oh yeah, so that's yeah, that's where I am. Um basically I'm gonna just try and get back into um I've got various videos to make. Uh we are gonna be doing some more sort of short demo videos of of new stuff that's come into the shop pretty soon. So there'll be another kind of like video series we're gonna try and launch alongside the pod, which is a bit more gear focused. But on the subject of gear, is there anything that's come into the shop in the last couple of weeks since the last pod that has caught your eye that you wanted to mention?

SPEAKER_02 19:38

Well, the the one that I took home and will stay there is the Fairfield Circuitry Placeholder, which we had mentioned a few podcasts ago as being something I had my eye on.

SPEAKER_01 19:51

Um So for the people that aren't familiar, can you describe what that is?

SPEAKER_02 19:55

Yeah, it is a BBD reverb. So it is three bucket brigade delay chips in a early digital reverb algorithm configuration. So they kind of feed back on each other in a quite a nice way. But tonally, it ends up in a really interesting space of sort of being at times, it sounds really like a spring reverb, which I've always loved the sound of spring reverbs as well. That's uh like there's just something about that, especially on like certain types of synths. Like I think it's just because you know the booklet had one built in and that kind of thing. That's there's something about that with quite bright, buzzy synths that just really, really like, yeah, there's something about I really love um and then sometimes it veers into like slightly more delay territory, um, but it's kind of like underwatery. It's like it's it's really tonally very interesting. Um and we'll feature it in the little um roundup video that we just mentioned that we'll launch. Um, but I've I discovered that um it will self-oscillate and it will feed back on itself. Um, and I always really thought the Audrey from Synthux Academy was really interesting for that. You know, you can kind of do the sort of A24 horror film sound horoscapes of like that sort of thing. But it will do that, which I was like quite impressed by. You just have the decay all the way up, and then you can kind of play with the size, um, and you can get these like really haunting that I think might actually also end up on Mercury a little bit of that. It's just like it sounds really good as obviously as a reverb, but um, you can actually use it as a somewhat of a hellscape drone synth if you want as well, which was was really interesting for me.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

Yeah, cool.

SPEAKER_02 21:39

And what about you? What has anything caught your eye?

SPEAKER_01 21:42

Yeah, I mean the thing that came in yesterday, which I'm kind of kind of excited to start using, is from our friends at 64 Pixels. Um Jason has re released a banana fied version of the C V O C D MIDI to C V converter. Now, this isn't quite as sexy as a BBD reverb pedal, but At this point. At this point in my musical career, I'm very interested in utilitarian problem solvers.

SPEAKER_03 22:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

So this is like a banana output version of the CVOCD, which is a very configurable four-channel MIDI to CV converter with extra gate outs and stuff. So I'm really looking forward to being to configuring that to work with my surge stuff. I've got a couple of volt proactive tracking oscillators in there, which will be useful to be able to control with that. And also just having been able to configure the trigger outs to be different divisions of the MIDI clock and stuff like that. So I'll have I'll be able to kind of like sync things perfectly to say, for example, the syntax or the digitex, just MIDI cable into there, can do some sequencing of the surge.

SPEAKER_02 22:39

And there's there's quite a bit of configurability both on the unit itself in terms of like the voltage ranges, which I think you with you being working with Surge, you'll kind of have something of a set and forget. But am I right in saying that like you can kind of go via like an editor and do a bit more of a configurable search?

SPEAKER_01 22:57

Yeah, there's a web-based configurator thing, which just generates a sysx file that you then pipe into it, which then you can define what all the different outputs do and what ranges they use and you know that that kind of thing. Because it it'll do um volt per octave, it'll do buckler style 1.2 volt per octave, and it'll do Hertz per volt for Korg stuff as well. Yeah. And then you can set the gate levels to be five, 10 or 15 volt and things like that. So yeah, it's in terms of MIDI to CV converters, it's it's quite a new. I mean, there are there there aren't that many options for interfacing with banana gear without using a format jumbler, so it's quite nice to have an all-in-one thing.

SPEAKER_02 23:31

Yeah, I will probably at some point borrow one of those as well. One thing that I thought it would actually be quite an interesting pairing, which is probably like a little bit more, not necessarily maybe using all of its strengths, because it's four C V outputs. And how many gate outputs is it? It's like there's 12, yeah. More for the C V outputs, something like the um, you know, the Oxy E16. Oh, yeah. I've been tempted to try one of those.

SPEAKER_01 23:56

This is the MIDI controller with 16 pots.

SPEAKER_02 23:58

Yeah. The thing that you can do on that is it's really, really cool in that you just hit record and you can do like recorded automation on all of the pots and it's all asynchronous. Oh, cool. I was thinking you could take those four CV outputs and configure them with CCs, and then you have knob recorder stuff for within the surge. Yeah. And it's all asynchronous. You can have one that's like a really long loop and one that's a short loop. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:20

I hadn't thought of that. That sounds that sounds cool.

SPEAKER_02 24:22

Uh, because obviously that kind of stuff is not really easily accessible in you know like in Eurorack, you can get a CV recorder, no problem, but like it's not really as much of a thing in in the sort of banana refor U world.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 24:33

Um sort of tempted by that.

SPEAKER_01 24:34

Yeah. No, that that's um that's gonna be good to try. Um, and then I think the other thing that we've got in, and again, it's a utilitarian thing which doesn't really need a sound demo, but it's the Earthlink modular trails kind of output module, which um they got in touch and sent me a prototype over a little while ago, and I've been using it quite a lot at home. So this is a six-channel mixer with mute buttons and kind of cascaded normaling and stuff, and every channel also has a balanced quarter-inch line output, and the mixes on the on the quarter inch bus are independent of the mixes on the three and a half mil bus. So you can take individual stems basically from those six inputs and go straight into your sound card to record stems, which again we might touch on a bit later with that audience question that we're going to come to. Um, but you can also then have submixes um to use within the system, and you can also just use them as simple attenuators. And so it's one of those things that's like really handy. There's always a use for it, and because it's six channels, you can kind of use four of them as a mixer and two of them as straight up attenuators or whatever you like.

SPEAKER_03 25:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:39

Um, and I'm just a, you know, at this point, again, I'm I'm just a sucker for a really well-made, nicely spaced, well thought-out utility that kind of solves problems.

SPEAKER_02 25:47

Yeah, it's it it very much falls into the category of not sexy, but very useful. Like you don't look at it and you go, Oh, that I can't wait to get that. But like it as soon as it's in there, you're like, oh yeah, of course, this has just made my life so much easier.

SPEAKER_01 26:00

This just makes my life easier, exactly. Yeah. And it's a it's a nicely designed thing. I mean, it's yeah, it's as sexy as that kind of module could be, I would say. Which is good. And they've got a really that their their next thing is really good as well. It's going to be a pedal interface with stereo, stereo and out to to take audio to and from um external pedals, wet dry control with C V control over that, VCAs over the input and the output. Uh, it's also got a built-in LFO and it's got a C V2 expression uh converter for um for pedal expression inputs and a built-in power supply for pedals. So you all you all you really need is to run a um, if you've got a nice pedal, you can just run, you can power it directly from the module, run in and out in stereo and control that wet dry mix and stuff. So there's quite a lot of options for that, but this is the one that's kind of has everything in one. And again, it's you know it's very well engineered and very high quality VCAs and stuff. So um, yeah, I'm trying that out at the moment and I'll report back more when I've used it.

SPEAKER_02 26:56

Excellent. Yeah, I kind of feel like all that sort of stuff is again, it's just like anything that makes my life convenient and easier. I think we'll touch on this a bit more as we kind of talk about recording and workflow, but like I'm starting to really appreciate that. Like it's yeah, all of those things are worth a lot more than I think a lot of people pay attention to, I think.

SPEAKER_01 27:16

Yeah. So shall we move on to some questions from the audience? We've had a few of these building up, so apologies if it's taken us a little while to get around to mentioning it. But um, we've sort of touched on a couple of topics here, which um Wolfendeer was asking via email, and that was kind of how do we record our what are our approaches for um recording our synths, whether that's multi-tracking or stem recording them.

SPEAKER_02 27:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:42

Um, and yeah, like I think we've we've I've sort of mentioned briefly my setup's this kind of analog digital hybrid thing with a patch bay and a sound card. And I tend to, when I'm recording stuff in the modular, try and record the individual stems for the ease of being able to kind of mix them down later. But then I'm usually working with a kind of rough mix, which I'm listening to as I'm recording, which is done in the modular. Um but then I take those individual channels into Ableton and then I can kind of I try and you know take them in without too many effects on, and then I can if I'm if I'm trying to write a proper bit of music, I'll then kind of apply the effects in the box and you know, especially reverb and stuff like that. You don't want to I'd I'd try and record that without reverb baked in if I can, because it's easy to add reverb but quite hard to take it off again.

SPEAKER_02 28:28

Yeah, so this actually that's a really good point. And one of the things that I have done recently is reconfigure my studio setup a bit. So prior to how I was working uh essentially before I did this changeup, was I had a very large pedal board with which everything was connected and I would literally just unplug and go straight in. So all of the effects were baked into the recording. Um and for the most part, I I kind of didn't mind that setup because um the way that I've been writing uh and the approach that I've been taking has been to be more um in the moment and almost like trying to capture like a whole performance in one go and then not really mess with it too much after that. So I wasn't too concerned because like the it sounded good at the time, that's kind of what I'm happy with, and so I wasn't really too bothered. But when I started to think about how I wanted to integrate the placeholder, I was like, because that's mono and a lot of the stuff I have is stereo and I have a therme that's also mono, I was like, it kind of maybe feels like this would be. I recently got a Moto ultralight um as well, which has tons of ins and outs, and I was like, this feels like an opportunity to maybe utilize that a bit more. So now how I have everything working is I record all of the synths. Um I've got the ultralight, and as well as that, I've got uh one of the Audio Fuse X8 ins. So I've got more inputs via ADAT. Um my Super 6, my Surge, and the Profit X, which are the three main things that I'm working with, they all get recorded dry. And then I'm using the I.O. to then have different effects loops for individual pedals and different chains. And then that's all on external audio effect buses in in Ableton. So it's it's a send effect that then goes to rather than like, you know, A reverb and B delay, it's like C like you know, chase bliss pedals. And it goes through the the Chase Bliss pedals, I actually don't have all separate, like I've got three of those, and they all kind of are just in one chain just because I don't have that much IO. But like the placeholder is on a separate one, um and the therme is on a separate one. And in doing this, I've realized that there's like quite a beautiful flexibility that it gives me because I don't have this thing of like I have to commit to a particular effect and I don't have that effect baked in. Yeah, I can choose the level afterwards.

SPEAKER_01 30:58

Yeah, that's the that's the thing for me too. It's like something that sounds great in the moment with the effect, you know, on if you record it with that baked in, and then you realize the next day, actually, I really wish that reverb was a bit quieter in the mix, then it's much harder to undo that.

SPEAKER_02 31:12

Yeah. And the other thing that I like about it as well is like certain pedals are a pain in the arse from a game staging perspective. Anything with BBDs is like you really like whenever I've used them where when they're in the middle of a pedal board or in the middle of a chain, I'm constantly having to go and like turn down the synth and then turn it up at the other end and all of that sort of stuff. And I just turn the effect send down in Ableton and just choose the game stage there.

SPEAKER_01 31:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:42

And and all of that just means that like I get much more control and much more flexibility. And I I love how the placeholder sounds, and it actually does sound really nice when it starts to clip and distort as well. It's got like a really lovely character. Um, but one other beautiful benefit of that is um that placeholder is obviously mono. I can basically record and as I'm recording, record the placeholder. So I've got like dry synth and then full wet reverb from the placeholder. Um I've then been doing for most things, I actually really like how it sounds in mono, but sometimes if it's like a sound that is almost like I want this sound to be the focal point of the whole track. Um, there are certain sounds where I'm like, if I do another pass and just tweak the settings on the placeholder ever so slightly, um, and then essentially just record a separate track again through the placeholder.

SPEAKER_01 32:32

So with the with the same dry audio.

SPEAKER_02 32:34

Yeah, same dry audio, but just tweaked settings on the placeholder, and then you pan those left and right, you then get the stereo placeholder uh sound, which which sounds really, really good because it it does have that character, and there's there's all the subtle slight differences in the timing and because it's like slightly delay.

SPEAKER_01 32:50

Even without changing the settings, it would probably sound slightly different, wouldn't it, with the the kind of imperfections and stuff. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:55

And and the way that you the the way that not to go into too much detail about the placeholder, but there's like a size and a ratio, and the ratio is sort of how much of the feedback path the stuff is happening, and then the size is almost like how how long the delay time is. So you can actually kind of get similar tones by turning one up and one down. So it ends up sounding like slightly different, but there's enough of a tonal change that it doesn't sound it's not like you have just the same thing happening twice. So you get that really wide, interesting sort of sound from that, and just all of that flexibility of then after the fact I can kind of go in and change things and all that sort of stuff. It's um it's been really, really useful to have that. And even just parallel effects chains, to be honest. I'd never really considered how useful that was. Because, like, you know, it used to be placeholder into the chase bliss pedals, and everything is just everything's running into it, it becomes a bit of a mush quite quickly.

SPEAKER_01 33:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:47

And it's really nice to just be able to like, okay, I'm gonna high pass that Chase Bliss pedal like delay line thing.

SPEAKER_01 33:53

And that's not gonna affect what comes after it. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:56

It's it's it's been really, really useful and kind of made the pedals and all of the effects that I had feel way more valuable as part of the workflow. And like actually, like, oh, this is really, really beneficial. Um, and also I just get to do it with any in like sounds that I have in the box.

SPEAKER_01 34:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:14

So like, oh, this drum loop that used to be a pain in the like I would never send audio from Ableton out into effects pedals as well. It's kind of unlocked that aspect because I could just never be asked to hook it up.

SPEAKER_01 34:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:25

But now that it's already configured on the sends, it's just so easy to do it and print.

SPEAKER_01 34:28

Um, so I think I'm doing something in the same kind of ballpark, but with that but less to do with effects and more to do with like running it through the mixer. Yeah. So I kind of like use it to just to add a bit of that analog module. I'll just like mix my eight buses or you know, four stereo buses through the eight channels on this task cam. Um and then I can EQ them on there as well. But you've just kind of inspired me. I think I think what I could do quite easily on the patch bay is like use them to run through pedals or the you know, I've got a quadroverb and I've got a few other bits of hardware, you know, bit bits of outboard, um, which I tend, yeah, I I sometimes run them when I'm when I'm just using the task cam on its own and the computer's off. So I've got the quadroverb on a orcs send and I sometimes run the output through the the warm audio um compressor, you know, the SSL style bus compressor. Um but yeah, I think the sort of hybrid approach where you're using AUX sends via hardware, but from within Ableton, that's something I'm gonna try and explore a bit as well. Because I'm I'm starting to, yeah, I've got a couple of pedals now. Never really been a pedal person, but yeah I bought that Fairfield Meet Mord delay, um, which has yeah, been out for a few years now, but I picked up a secondhand one before we got the stock in. And um, yeah, I think that'll work better as a send effect than as a through effect because um I've noticed the gain staging is particularly um fussy on that one.

SPEAKER_02 35:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:46

Like it's quite easy for it to go completely bonkers.

SPEAKER_02 35:49

I sort of feel like actually, like it was only when I set it all up, I was like, I'm largely using like I really quite like delay and and those sorts of effects. And it was kind of only really when I started to do it on sends, I was like, oh yeah, this this actually is way, way better. Like it just functionally is way better from a perspective. And I could also automate those sends as well. You know, I could do all of that automation within the timeline and within the DAW so that like and also it's just the interacting with the pedal as it's happening again. Like prior to that, if I was playing something in on the Super Six, for example, I can't then also be tweaking the delay and doing like weird delay sweepy stuff. Um, so even just that, it frees me up to then be more interesting and more creative with those effects as well.

SPEAKER_01 36:35

Yeah. Cool. So we'll go for one more audience question for this episode. Um, Kythera asks on email, and apologies if I'm pronouncing that name wrong, um, they ask, what are the things you like to do in modular that are hard or impossible to do in software?

SPEAKER_02 36:49

Yeah, this is a really good question because I think we get a lot of people, I get a lot of people coming into the showroom sort of talking about like, you know, hardware versus software, and you know, that whole workflow thing is is really it's a tricky one to navigate. Um and for me, the things that I love about hardware is I don't ever really love time spent in the computer. Um there's something really meditative about the act of sitting down that I really enjoy and like patching a synthesizer or just playing some with something physical. Now that is one side of the thing, but there are sort of like actual things that I find are much more difficult to do in a computer, and it's generally things that are off the grid. So like using the surge, for example, where uh a looping envelope generator is my clock, and I can modulate that envelope to create these little weird shifts. Even things like just um like a five-step sequence. I know you can set the, you know, I can set a grid in Ableton to five, but it's the combination of lots of little things and like you know, how I can choose to reset sequences and all of those things where it's like if we're excluding VCV rack, which is obviously just your rack in the computer, I find all of those things much, much harder to do in a traditional digital audio workstation. Is that there are other things that you have?

SPEAKER_01 38:13

Yeah, no, I think that's that's the main thing for me too, is the kind of uh breaking off the grid and the timing stuff, like being able to do stuff that isn't kind of locked to a uh you know, a 16th note. I know I know you know I know there are workarounds for this stuff, but I find generally kind of interesting sequencing and polymetric stuff and you know, like a seven-step sequence at the same time as a five-step one. And these are all things that you kind of can do in Ableton, but it kind of steers you away from it a lot of the time, or it doesn't steer you towards it in the way that modular stuff does.

SPEAKER_02 38:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:44

Um, so I think generally, you know, I I think the more general thing for me is just that it's it's less about the specific stuff you can and can't do, because there is usually a way to do the same stuff in the computer, but it's the way it's how you get there, and it's the experience of doing it for me. You know, it's like the the the user interface and the the um yeah, the the sort of process of getting to that point, you know, patching cables and experimenting and and playing around with stuff versus having to open a plug-in window and kind of like, well, how am I going to root this? And do I need to like set that to channel one? And and you know, another thing you mentioned, I think, when we were talking about this beforehand was like feedback patching and stuff as well.

SPEAKER_02 39:24

Yeah. Stuff like that is kind of much harder to uh root in a door um and without you know very quickly getting out of control, whereas with analog um modular stuff, it's the stuff you can do with feedback and different points in the patch as well, which is Yeah, this this really was a thing for me of uh and almost like my first six months for the surge were spent largely just kind of doing slightly more of the former things that we were talking about, like slightly weird sequences and like slightly jittery rhythms and stuff like that. Um and I remember sort of like being like, oh, what happens if I do the output into the input? I remember Tom talking about feedback patching, and that sounds quite fun. And exploring the sort of like the cusps that those things can sit on, and uh the non-linearity of all the analog circuitry is like really feels quite organic and rideable and interesting and like quite unstable in a really beautiful way. And while I know for a fact that you can do it in in the computer, those things are typically more done in like a max MSP patch than it is done in a digital audio workstation. Um, and designing those patches is fun and and you know, like it that that's a that's a nice workflow. I don't really again, it's more the practicalities of how you get there. Like there's just something about sitting in a computer that doesn't tend to light a fire in me in the way that like sitting in front of a modular synth and physically patching stuff does. Um the caveat to all of this would be that like I think you and me both have a very um a very hybrid workflow when it comes to like almost like the hardware is the fun part, it's the exploration and it's like where am I gonna go, and like all of the sort of like the inspiration for the initial idea is usually done in hardware.

SPEAKER_03 41:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:17

But God, I would hate, I couldn't think of anything worse than trying to edit audio in a hard like if you were to completely move away from a digital audio workstation and you're like, no, I am gonna go fully hardware.

SPEAKER_03 41:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:29

The idea of like mixing audio, editing audio in a like a more hardware-only capacity, honestly is so unfun to me that I I think I'd be okay with the mixing side, but it's the arrangement side for me that I think that's where that's the real strength of something like live is being able to kind of you know But the mixing side as well is like I suppose it's so part of the arrangement now, isn't you know, automation and stuff. But for me, even the mixing part would be like for you know, I need X number of EQs. Uh you know, like it's it's it's all of that. It's like the little things that all add up for me that I think would make it just so much more of a unenjoyable experience. Um and also at this point, I've also I'm so used to mixing in a computer. Um we've spoken before about like, you know, we have certain go-to plugins and certain effects chains. Like I could probably try mixing in hardware if I had all of the stuff, but it's a lot, it's you know, the physical space required to also do all of that mixing is like a whole other thing entirely.

SPEAKER_01 42:26

Yeah, if you wanted to have an equivalent hardware setup that's even a fraction of what you could do in Ableton in terms of like the number of EQs and compressors at your disposal and all the effects and stuff, it would get very out of control quite quickly. Yeah. I guess, yeah, I guess what I mean is I get I I don't mind doing a kind of rough mix with a small format analog mixer. Yeah. Um, you know, I still quite enjoy that, or the kind of, you know, when I'm jamming, kind of having a being able to sort of jam with a mixer and use, you know, being able to kind of ride faders and EQ stuff as I'm going. But yeah, I think when it comes to actually finishing a piece off, um, there's really I mean, we really are spoilt for like how much power we have at our fingertips for you know finessing every second of that arrangement and automating everything and getting it, you know, you can get it as perfect as you want.

SPEAKER_02 43:09

Which it can be a problem in and of itself.

SPEAKER_01 43:11

Yeah, I was gonna say, I mean, that's the problem is then going down the rabbit hole and and endless tweaking and final mix version seven. Yeah, final, final, final.web and all that. So I'm and I'm getting better at just kind of saying, well, that's that's that's done now. I'm gonna, you know, and I'll I'll sit with it for a bit and then uh I'll maybe listen to it in a few different places and I'll permit myself a couple of small EQ tweaks if I think there's that hi-hat's actually a bit too loud or something. You know, I can I'll go back to that, but I'll try not to get too sucked into endless, you know, sitting because you're right, the the the fun part is not sitting with a mouse no um working out whether it's 12 kilohertz or eleven kilohertz that you need to do that two and a half dB cut.

SPEAKER_02 43:48

Yeah. You know, it's um and and I think as well, we've kind of spoken um, or I've certainly spoken to people in the showroom about like the the endless tweaking of of a computer does. Lead you into this slightly horrible scenario where I sort of at the moment my goal is to almost try and work as quickly as possible to get to a final idea or as close to a final idea as possible. Because if I come back to something like six months to a year later, like the original idea that was felt incredibly exciting to me at the time, I don't remember what that feels like 12 months later. And so the amount of times I go back in and I'm like, oh, maybe if I try a different melody over this thing, or maybe if I tweak this thing, it'll like sound a little bit more interesting. And then what I'm actually doing is just creating a new thing to be interested by, which was not in service of the original idea at all, and is now just a new idea that I'm in service of, which might be more interesting, but probably more realistically is actually not. And I'm just ruining an idea that was actually already good, and I'm just bored of it now because I've heard it a thousand times. Yeah, yeah. You know, so I'm aware of that as well with the endless tinkering and tweaking.

SPEAKER_01 44:58

I mean, when I talk about endless tweaking in software, I mean you can definitely endlessly tweak in modular as well. You know, you can just be patching and um yeah, I think I think what you said a second ago, like that the the the key really with all this stuff is to when you're if you if you hit on a good idea, try and just get it down as quickly as you can before you get bored of it and before you endlessly tweak it to the point where it's no longer any good. And you you know, um just yeah, I've I've learned all the best stuff I've done has been done pretty quickly.

SPEAKER_03 45:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:26

The tracks that really work are the ones where the idea comes or you're you know you're doing a jam and you you're just disciplined enough to kind of get an arrangement mapped out, a rough arrangement, you know, pretty quickly, and you and you kind of you you kind of know how it's all gonna you know um play out and stuff, and then and then you can then go back and finesse the mechs and stuff a bit afterwards. But I think if you if you just end up with a drive full of eight bar loops, um which you which you're maybe one day gonna come and revisit and finish off. I mean, come on, no one ever does.

SPEAKER_02 45:54

Yeah, yeah. You know. The one thing just to slightly disagree with Stop lying to yourself. Who are you kidding? Um the one thing to slightly disagree with you when you sort of say um you can endlessly tweak in modular, one thing that I do find with modular is because it's physically patched, there is an end to that when I need to come back to another idea. I don't have that thing of like uh with an Ableton session, I can make as many revisions as I want and it I'll come back.

SPEAKER_01 46:22

Like I you can have hundreds of them and you can load them all up and just to pick up where you left off. Yeah, with modular, you do have to kind of commit to the patch.

SPEAKER_02 46:28

Yeah, and and once it's done, once I've unpatched it, there's no go there's no getting that back. Even with the surge, I think I've mentioned this to you. It's quite funny. Um because of the instability of like takes 30 minutes or so to warm up and all that sort of stuff. Like I've come back the next day to a sequence that I've not touched a single thing on, and it just sounds like a sort of carnival version, like a horrific, like detuned, carnivalised version of like the thing I was doing yesterday.

SPEAKER_00 46:56

The elephants have escaped again.

unknown 46:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:58

But that's really actually like for me cemented something of like capturing something while I can. Yeah. Because like it's I don't even have the luxury of like really stable Eurorack oscillators and all of that stuff. Because with Eurorack, I would usually be able to come back the next day and it was pretty much exactly the same. But with Surge, it's like if I don't record this like quite literally right now, yeah, uh, this is lost forever and I'm totally screwed. So I've that's kind of also helped with that the desire in me. And I think it's kind of almost like one's fed into the other of like getting really interested in capturing things in the moment is because I don't really have a choice with working with a surge. Like if I don't record it now, it won't be there tomorrow. So that has forced my hand to be a bit more like, okay, I'm I'm gonna just quickly bash something out here, and I can maybe come back and revisit it, like with you know, having all the separate um, you know, the super sixes recorded separately and all that sort of stuff. But it really does force me to to capture something there and then. Um that's a good point.

SPEAKER_01 47:57

Even if you leave it patched, it's there's no guarantee it's gonna sound the same when you fire it up the next day for sure. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and I'm I'm very familiar with that. That's why I think when I started patching with the search, I I got quite I was definitely a period where I was like recording every patch, just a snippet of it before, you know, kind of as a document, you know, that's a bit of a diary, patch diary kind of thing. None of them are quite finished track worthy, but um it's still quite fun to kind of just you know get to a point and think, okay, this is good, but if I don't record something now, I'll never be able to hear it again. Yeah. So I'm just gonna just gonna grab it while I can.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

I am tempted to, I think I mentioned this to you the the other week, but I am tempted to it's coming up to a year for me of using Surge, and I kind of am tempted to maybe do like a little Farty bandcamp release of like just the first 12 months. Yeah. And and some of them are more like quite finished tracks, and some of them might just be like somewhat interludy, interesting patches. Yeah. But I'm kind of tempted to do it, it's just I I struggle to find the time, like I'm almost like so interested in making stuff. I always struggle with the actual release because the release part is so boring to me. Yeah. But I feel like maybe if it's a band camp release, it feels a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 49:04

You need an assistant. You need someone that can handle all this stuff for you. That would be great. If anyone out there wants to be Luke's intern, I'm not sure what pay is terrible. I'm not sure what we can pay you, but you know, we'll figure something out. Um donuts, maybe, or yeah, we'll we'll figure something out. Um but yeah, well, that's probably enough for one episode.

SPEAKER_02 49:25

I think that's enough of us talking.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

That's just us waffling on about this and that. Um I guess that's what podcasts are.

SPEAKER_03 49:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:31

Um so thanks if you've been watching, if you've made it this far, um, hope it's been moderately interesting. We've got a few plans for later in the year in terms of more special episodes and guests and stuff. Nothing we're quite ready to reveal as yet, but um, we quite enjoyed having Fletcher on. If you didn't if you didn't catch the last one, go back and watch that. Fletcher from Forge TME talking all things VicX in the previous episode. Um, so yeah, we'll do a bit more of that. And please do keep your questions coming as well. Um it's really good to hear from you, and you know, it's good to have jumping off points for stuff to discuss. Um so yeah. I think that's us. That's us. Thanks again for watching and um see you soon. See you next time.

SPEAKER_02 50:10

Bye bye.