Nord Modular/Modular G2

[haesslich]

the only "bad" thing with the nord modular keyboard is that it's lacking the wheel and pitch bend stick of the nord lead series. i _love_ the pitch bend stick. it's the most natural way of playing vibrato...
anyway, back on topic.

the nord modular it is!
i rediscovered an old patch of mine, simply sines tuned to third, quarter, quint, octave and sub-octave of the root, their volumes mapped to knobs. no envs. so much fun!
nothing fancy, nothing original, nothing new but still.
originally i used that patch to use with the an.schlag midi cube (see here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOopxAyv9Mk ) a friend of mine built. unfortunately no video of that nord modular patch there. we let the x-y-z axes plus side boundary contacts control the loudness of the sines, set the speed to ultra slow and just watched and listened. constant joy!
inspired by a java app i saw in the web years ago...

[moize]

nothing fancy, nothing original, nothing new but still.

That is one crazy looking cube :)

I think your right with these sort of things, it is quite often the simplest in terms of technical, can yield the most pleasing results in terms of sound.

We often forget what might appear simple to us now, might have been not so simple to us years before, and that simple idea we can create now 'does' use a mass amount of experience we have built up over time through much experimenting.

My first experience of using sine tones was an amazing one, as this for the most part was difficult to think of when faced with a keyboard or multiple selections of settings, let alone with the knowledge of 'what' something was supposed to be used for, and how this knowledge influences how we use it 'incorrectly' as much as 'correctly'.

The balancing sine tones is still something I enjoy tremendously and use often some 14 or so years later and it still surprises me with how varied and good it can sound.

I feel it is these sorts of things that are often difficult to remember when programming in the Nord Modular. I personally find it a balance of wanting to learn new things in it, but still allowing great surprise to occur.

Maybe I need a magic box like your friends :)

[moize]

Quite pleased with this one, sorry had to share it :)

Full Swing Edits + Nord Modular = http://www.mono-log.org/snd_102/

1 patch duplicated 3 times, slight tweaked in each, running through a 4th for further eq and compression.

Thanks Stephan for such lovely work.

[cebec]

Quite pleased with this one, sorry had to share it

Full Swing Edits + Nord Modular = http://www.mono-log.org/snd_102/

1 patch duplicated 3 times, slight tweaked in each, running through a 4th for further eq and compression.

Thanks Stephan for such lovely work.

102 is indeed a nice one, Martin! I'll have to check out Full Swing Edits, as well. 

Anyway, I like the balance of elements you've achieved. It's quite similar to some of the sounds and methods I've used, too, and I really enjoy these sorts of meditative, hypnotic pieces that achieve this effect with only a few sounds.

[moize]

Thanks Matt

Yeah Full Swing Edits is a must. I can honestly say whenever I get a little lost with sound in general, it is one of a few goto cd's.

I agree, a few simple sounds is more than enough in my book. Although I enjoy complex work, generally I feel the simpler it is, the more it sounds timeless to my ears, and Full Swing Edits is a collection of simple techniques done very well indeed, I can't find a poor track on there, amazing.

Do let me know what you think of it when you get to hear it.

M

[moize]

Hey all

I just though I post in with how things are going with the Nord G1 and how the blog etc is going.

Well, I thought I loved my G1 before, but now, wow, after using each day the working process is such a joy and much less frustrating, confusing and all those things that it was before. Also there always seems to be new ways of creating sounds, even if the results are similar to other methods, the cpu is often much lower or new ideas can emerge from those different connections.

Also, I am starting to hear the Nord in more releases than I had before, there was always some I knew to be Nord, but it almost seems like everything has it in, although I am sure this is probably just my mind playing tricks. Still, it is nice to re-listen to something from the past, to hear new ideas and potential in a sort of Nord way.

Anyway, just a quick one, and to say thanks to everyone checking out the blog and getting in contact etc, really great stuff.

Best

M

[jórgos]

@moize

first of all i would like to say that i really, really like all your sounds that you created with the nord modular. I check your blog everyday and especially now that i recently got a G2X. So, you can imagine that frustration and confusion is starting to emerge, although i must say that i had more difficult times with max/msp.

It would be nice if you can point out some releases that include the nord modular (i must say that i cannot detect its sound yet) !

[moize]

Hi JÓRGOS

Thanks so much, really pleased your enjoying the sounds, and thanks so much for checking back everyday, amazing really :)

Congrats on getting the G2X, I have not heard the minor differences or really the difference between the G1 and G2, but hope one day to buy myself one to team up with my G1. I have heard the Nord Wave, and the sound was incredibly clean, so I imagine it might have some of this in its sound of the G2/X?

The frustration soon passes with the Modular, and I totally agree, it is nothing in comparison to Max/MSP. I think I gave up pretty much making music to learn that software for a whole summer many years ago.

As for releases that use the Nord Modular, the two that come to mind the most that use it extensively are:

Taylor Duepree - Polr (almost all Nord Modular)
Frank Bretschneider & Taylor Duepree - Balance (I read somewhere they swapped patches)

Perhaps Taylor could confirm this? :)

I have recently wondered if Richard Chartier uses one as a starting point for his sounds before he samples them, but I have a strong feeling it is something else more computer based.

Still, I personally would recommend getting Polr, one of my favourite releases actually.

M

[jórgos]

That's the bad thing about max/msp. You find your self in a place where you have stopped focusing on music. With the Nord Modular it's totally different despite confusion and frustration you never stop making music. Although i have to say that max/msp really helped me to understand how certain things work.

Nord Wave is a really good synth but it is really expensive for me right now, i think it costs 2.000 euros. Actually i have played with it but i don't think that Nord Wave and G2 share much, i find the sound different. The Nord Wave has a cleaner sound i guess. The previous owner of my Nord G2 told me that it shares the same engine with Nord Lead 3.

I have Polr and it's a great release. I guessed that if Taylor had ever used Nord Modular it would be in that record.

[moize]

Yep I totally agree with you there about the difference between Max/msp and the Nord, since doing this blog I feel like I did back when I was a teenager, when having lots of time to create and listening back through a growing catalogue of sounds. In contrast to this I remember when looking back what I had pend months working on in Max/msp, and feeling pretty empty inside, and had to make some music to get rid of that emptiness.

I only heard the Wave for a short while at a friends house, and yeah it reminded me of the Nord Leads a little bit, but really clean…I don't see my budget stretching that far…yet

Also thanks for your sound you emailed me, I just listened to it, really impressive for your first ever Nord patch, some really interesting pop sounds, is this through square LFO controlled filters? you got a nice balance there. I can sense a slightly different sound to the G1 too, more delicate perhaps.

I definitely want to hear how you get on with it.

Indeed Polr is an awesome release, might even get it off the shelf and play it again tonight actually.

[taylordeupree]

regarding my nord modular uses..

yes... mine and frank's "balance" was probably 75% nord modular.... as for Polr..there was actually no nord modular in there. a lot of that was Doepfer A100 analog modular and software generated sounds (i used a program called Soundmaker back then)....

thanks for the kind words about "polr".. i haven't listened to it in 10 years... but i skimmed through it just now to confirm that that was all pre-nord/doepfer period stuff for me. it was also non-DAW... way back in like 97 when carsten nicolai and frank were at my house in brooklyn (the first time we met) we realized we both used this Sound Maker program to make sounds... but carsten had taken it a step further and actually composed with it (because it let you open multiple sounds, loop them, and play/stop them independantly).. so it was basically like a multitrack looper but with no realtime control except start and stop!... i adopted what he taught me to create "polr"... it was just starting and stopping loops. very very basic. sort of right before the big DAW explosion.

i had a nice-sized doepfer modular back then... but was sort of frustrated by its limitations... i sold it for the express purpose of buying my nord modular.

richard chartier doesn't use any hardware... (except some very very old recordings when he used to have a dx100).. so, no nord modular for him, either!

[moize]

Thanks Taylor for such a nice look into history and correcting my guess work.

I remember having a desire back in the late 90s wanting something that allowed simple independent looping, and the first thing I did when first incorporating computer for sound editing/processing, was playing with wave editors in a similar way. I certainly wish in some ways I had some great minds around me at that time to share with, it must be fond memories :)

I think I must have got in my mind that it was probably Nord Modular on polr, as I bought both the Nord and polr at similar times, and perhaps that thought stuck. I think this is what is happening now, whilst working with the G1 so much, everything is heard in terms of could it be created in the G1 etc
Now that you mention it is Doepfer analog modular, this is possibly why it sounds so clean, with a sharpness to the sounds, something I don't find some much in the Nord Modular…although saying that it is probably more how I use it to be fair. My partner used the Nord Modular once in one of the mono-log uploads, Snd 86, and both that and also some sounds she created in the Roland System 100 (we don't own one) both had really sharp pin like qualities to the sounds.

I wonder how polr sounds to you some 10 years on since last listening to it. Me and Mike (Smallfish) had it on the stereo a little while back, and both agreed it is something of a hidden gem in many ways, and it probably sounds fresher now than it did back then, and a really great example of Modular sounds.

[moize]

Hi all

Its been a while since I have posted here, but I wanted to share the recent post with you at my Mono-log blog, that many of you have been kindly following. :)

So…I took my first step in emulating my favourite piece of equipment, the Roland TR606 Drumatix Drum Machine.

All I will say here, as it is all said at the blog, is something I and others have said many times…is there anything this Nord Modular wont do.

Amazing machine, I hope you like the post.

Thanks everyone.

Best

Martin

http://www.mono-log.org/snd_186/

[taylordeupree]

wow, you're getting scary good at this nord modular thing. i had a 606 for many years and know the sound well. you came extremely close.. especially that open high hat!... probably as part of a full song you'd hardly be able to tell the difference.

i only wish you had a G2 so i could see how you do these things!

[moize]

Hey Taylor

Thanks. I gotta say I was pretty pleased with how this one come together, just stunned at the machine. I think I would like to get the patch a bit better and put it up for download. The patch needs some work, as the triggers don't quite work as well as they should.

I found more about the the hats online than the other sounds, although they needing tweaking. The TR606 was an amazing box, especially for the hats, so its great to know what it was that made these sounds and the great thing within it is the way its set a simple change of one dial and it is a very very different metallic sound, really useful, and really good to learn about all these old sounds.

I am going to attach some screen shots to the next post as its not to bad patching it really, the guys at Roland just had a magic combination, getting those sounds as they were. :)

I wish I had a G2 too…haha.

Oh, I just see, you said 'had' a 606, you sold yours too?