Reconstructed Textures – free Refill for Reason 5 users

Posted 10 CommentsPosted in Distant Activity, Geekery, Patch design, Reason

Reconstructed Textures is a free Refill available to owners of Reason created using Reason 5. Some of the patches also make use of the ElectroMechanical Refill, which is free to registered users of Reason (if you’re not a registered user, I’m afraid I can’t help you there). You can download Reconstructed Textures here and use it in any of your productions, totally free of charge.

So, what is it? Reconstructed Textures consists of 26 Combinator-based ambient drones, each built using heavily processed samples found in the Factory Sound Bank & ElectroMechanical Refills. But why make a Refill using samples found in the Factory Sound Bank? Well… a little while back I was trying to remember how I created some of the droning sounds featured in one of the tracks on Distant Activity (the track in question being Travelling Light). There are some neat piano drones and reverse effects found in the intro, and – being as I wrote the original version of the track about half a decade ago – I’d forgotten where those sounds came from. After a quick examination, it turned out I’d taken some piano samples from the Factory Sound Bank and processed them. I thought it was a neat idea, so I figured “why not go beyond using just piano samples and see what else I could find in there?”.

All the Combinator patches start with FSB/EM samples – re-mapped, re-pitched, re-looped and layered up in an NN-XT. Then they’re processed with filters, distortion, EQ, compression, reverb, delay or whatever else I fancied doing at the time before being sent to the Combinator’s output where they’re mixed with more layered up, processed NN-XTs. It was an interesting exercise in creating unrecognisable sounds from stock banks as opposed to creating ambient textures from scratch using synths and external devices.

Fancy giving it a go? Download it from here. I’d love to know what you think.




Current goings on and off

Posted 3 CommentsPosted in Album 3, General, Music, Patch design

So, first up – the good news! My previously mentioned production album is progressing smoothly, with the bulk of the tracks completed and ready for some further tinkering. I’ve also recently started working on another patch design project and have been working on potential ideas and songs for album #3. You can listen to one of said ideas using the handy player below (or, indeed, here if the embedded player is giving you grief).

(edit: sorry, the preview is no longer representative of how the track sounds so I’ve taken it down -ad)

Unfortunately, I was ill for a few weeks which set me back a bit (glandular fever – which, for future reference, I wouldn’t recommend contracting) but I’m very much back on my feet now. Hooray!

Live webcast now uploaded and available for viewing

Posted 4 CommentsPosted in Geekery, General, Music, Reason

Good news for anyone who missed my webcast for Propellerhead Software‘s Music Making Month – it was recorded, and isĀ now available to view online at your leisure! Huge thanks to Ryan for inviting me to take part, and thanks to everyone who turned up.

For those of a more geeky disposition, I talk a bit about working with irregular time signatures, percussive sequencing techniques and some simple patch design as I build the foundation for a song from the ground up. I would have liked to have talked a bit about atmospheric effects, but I guess there’s always potential for a future webcast…

Guitarscapes for Reason 5.0 released today

Posted 2 CommentsPosted in Geekery, General, Nucleus Soundlab, Patch design, Reason

Today sees the release of Nucleus Soundlab‘s latest Reason refill Guitarscapes, featuring 64 patches lovingly crafted & documented by yours truly, as well as a fully explorable original track serving as a demo for the refill itself (provided in RNS format).

I’m incredibly happy with how both the refill and demo song turned out, thanks largely in part to both the strict quality control standards of Nucleus Soundlab and the plethora of incredibly talented sound designers involved in the creation of the refill. If you own Reason, it’s certainly worth checking out.