[00]="kick"

(HS-211.212.1. Originally [04].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGIAAABgAAAA8FF7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPKBABIAEgAfAAAhACDyAQASAPJQAPlgABMA9BkAEKEAQPzg9mEA-CIA9FIA82AA9g8KUPHPDHD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

The classic 808-style synth kick drum sound is playing a waveform with its pitch starting high and rapidly falling. For economy's sake, we used the same envelope for pitch (TUNE) and volume, and also...

...I mean, it sounds better with a bit of distortion. And we weren't using our second node, so, use it for shape distortion. The parameters we have here - high GAIN, high ELBOW, moderate CUT - are pretty normal for giving a sound a bit more drive.

You could probably go way harder on the distortion, we just don't have any instinct for that.

Oh, little Picotron trick: by using the "/4" mode on the shape mix knob, we could dial in the volume more precisely to match the stock triangle sound. Which we did - all the instruments are volume-matched to aid with mixing.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Play with SHAPE parameters.
• Remove SHAPE effect.
• Change waveform.
• Add another carrier oscillator to the main one to thicken the sound.

[01]="tom"

(HS-211.212.1. Originally [23].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGAAAABeAAAA8E97aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPGBABIAUAD_AAAfAAAhACDyAQASAPJQIP7xEgBA-FD66AAQgQBAAPjwHwsQ8XAATwBQfwrw-4Cg--D4AP9w0B8Ah9")

While wrapping the pack up, we decided we needed more percussion instruments, since those have a reputation for being hard to synthesize.

The big difference between a tom and a kick, as far as we understand, is where the bulk of the sound lies. With a tom, you have a higher pitch.

It's not actually pitched, though, so we wanted to make sure that it didn't just end with a static tone. That's where we got the stacked tone envelope thing: ENV-1 is an attack envelope, getting the sharp note of the initial sound, and then ENV-0 continues morphing the pitch as it fades out. But because the envelopes are so much shorter, the final pitch is much higher, giving it a mid-percussion sound.

Other than that? We chose a square wave, both for contrast with the triangle-wave kick and because it sounded cool, so we decided to also bring in a filter to round off those edges. The low-pass closes on the attack envelope, so there's a lot of high-frequency sound initially for an even more dramatic attack, but the body of the instrument sound is less harsh.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Add some high pass to the filter setting.
• Change waveform and waveform envelope range.
• Adjust tune envelope ranges.
• Add shape effect for distortion.
• Add new oscillator to the main one, possibly with ENV-1 attached to volume so it's just beefing the attack.

[02]="snare"

(HS-211.212.11. Originally [05].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGcAAABlAAAA8FZ7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPJxABIAEgAfAADxIQAg8gEAEgDyEgATAPn5ABCBAEDzAPmxAH8KcBYA8hEA8fCg8vCgUPFQUAChAF8LkP_AoP-w_AD-cNAfAIfQ==")

Making a perfect snare drum sound is really hard. But making a functional mid-percussion noise instrument that can fill in for a snare drum? That's very doable.

This one is dead simple: noise into low-pass filter, envelope to fade it out. For added shaping, we put the env on the filter, too - again, sharp attack, duller core sound - but really there's nothing else here.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Adjust envelope parameters.
• Put an envelope on the high pass knob in the filter to take away low end after the initial attack.
• Add a new envelope to the oscillator volume knob with a short decay, extend the decay on ENV-0.
• Turn TUNE on the oscillator down substantially to get a different timbre to the noise.
• Add a separate WT-0 oscillator to the instrument and set it up to make a kick-like sound.
• Add an ECHO effect to imitate the technique where the stick impacts the drum head multiple times in quick succession when hitting it. (We stole this trick from Many - viscountexx on Twitch.)
• Add a SHAPE effect for distortion.

[03]="hi hat"

(HS-111.142. Originally [06].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AF0AAABbAAAA8Ex7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPJRABIAEgAfAADxIQAg8gEAEgDyEgASAPEA--kAEIEAQPGA9OAAQPQg_l8K4NAATwxQ-4Cg--D4AP9w0B8Ah9")

Same story: making a real cymbal sound is hard, but making something to do the job is not so hard. Instead of focusing on the low-pass filter, we mostly used the high-pass. The envelope is quite short, imitating a closed hi hat.

The one hidden little trick is the R on the WAVE knob. This has very little effect because WT-1's sounds are quite similar (especially after filtering), but the R means every hit uses a random sound from the entire range ... and so is sliiiiightly different.

(Initially we were going to include a very obvious use of the random envelope in the collection - square wave with random pulse width and low-pass resonant filter - but we ran out of slots, so you'll have to try that one on your own.)

Suggestions for playing with the hi-hat:

• Adjust various knobs - e.g. low pass and high pass, decay of the envelope, TUNE.
• Add a tiny bit of RES to the filter. (This changes the sound drastically!)
• Add an ECHO effect.
• Add SHAPE distortion.
• Add a second, similar FILTER effect to remove even more low and/or high end.

[04]="crash cymbal"

(HS-111.142. Originally [07].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AF0AAABbAAAA8Ex7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHhABIAEgAfAADxIQBg8gEAEgDyEgATAPLQSAAQgQBAAPdwAED0kPkfCuD0oADxHwxQ-4Cg--D4AP9w0B8Ah9")

This is basically the same as the hi hat, but with a few tweaks and a much longer envelope. There is also a subtlety in that the volume envelope is applied to both output and oscillator envelopes - this causes the sound to die off slightly quicker at first and slightly slower as it trails off - but it is deliberately quite similar to the hi hat sound so that you can interleave the two to get an open-hihat effect.

All the same suggestions for playing with the hi-hat apply to the crash cymbal.

[05]="marimba"

(HS-111.212. Originally [20].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AG4AAABsAAAA8F17aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPJRABIAEgAfAAAhAGDyMPHBEgDyEgBQ-TAAEED0EPJ4APEQIQBA8yDxIBMAIBEAEgBA9ADxoB8KEPHQ9AAfAFBvCvD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

This one, we made out of pure vibes. Lots of choices we can't explain, I'm afraid.

FM synthesis was an obvious choice for this - it's easy to put an envelope on FM depth to make the sound change as the note plays, and it's easy to make hollow timbres like you get from idiophones. In order to make the initial hammer-strike stand out, we stacked two volume envelopes: a fast envelope for the initial attack and a slow envelope with sustain for the body of the sound. Because ENV-0 (the body-sound envelope) takes care of silencing the sound on release, we didn't need any sustain on ENV-1 - we could control the range directly on the knobs.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• 4/1 ratio for FM modulation. The other ratios didn't sound like marimbas to us, but that one, maybe.
• Adding an additional oscillator to the instrument.
• Tweaking envelope parameters and ranges on knobs they control. (Unexpectedly interesting option: a tiny bit of attack on ENV-1.)
• Detuning the BEND knob on the FM modulator osc.
• Adding a SHAPE effect. (We had its gain drop after the initial attack using ENV-1, so the distortion mostly only affects that transient.)
• Adding an ECHO effect. This one is really sweet.

[06]="celesta"

(HS-111.222. Originally [14].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGAAAABeAAAA8E97aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHRABIAEgAfAAAhACDyAQASAPISAFDx0P3wEEDzSQAQkgCiAPivCvDxcPYA8PsAGgDxDwrA-4Cg--D4AP9w0B8Ah9")

This one is, we fully admit, a JPEG of a JPEG. We made a celesta patch a while ago for PICO-8, and with that one, the echo and vibrato were big parts of that sound ... so we just kept those two things.

To our credit, though, another part of that effect was a detune, and we went about making that part in a pretty clever way. Normally, you make a detune effect with two oscillators that are out of tune with each other, but we don't have two oscillators because we used that space for an echo instead. ... so instead we set the vibrato - which is to say, the rate at which the tuning changed - to 16 and the echo - that is, the timing between when the note plays and is repeated - to 10. And so we do have two notes playing at a time out of tune with each other ... but the second one is just the echo of the first.

(We chose 10 and 16 because those are near the golden ratio, and that means multiple echos are relatively far from synchronizing.)

I think it sounds nice playing high-pitched celesta parts, however accurate it is or isn't. The waveform is quite mellow.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Give it a sharper attack with an ADSR envelope (new or not) acting on the oscillator volume with the range restricted.
• Modify the timbre with FM or ring mod. This may be a bit tricky, but try things.
• Double up the echo effect.

[07]="steelpan"

(HS-111.241.12. Originally [24].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGsAAABpAAAA8Fp7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPIBABIAEgAfAAAhAGDyUPEhEgDyEgAQ-9EAQPRAABcA8RAhAEDxBQAg8qEAEGEAQPIfCjD0EAC-AFDxQACfCtD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

Looking at the list of Hornbostel-Sachs categories, we didn't like any of the pitched membranophones we saw, but we did think that one last pitched idiophone would be a good last instrument.

FM synthesis was basically necessary for this one. We didn't even try to get the sound any other way. It being an idiophone, we decided to go straight for the non-integer ratios, on the grounds that it would make a non-harmonic sound - that is, one with overtones that aren't multiples of the bass frequency - because that harmonic pattern is a function of the physics of strings and tubes of air, not sheets of metal. From there, it was just listening.

Oh, and we did that trick again where we have one fast envelope and one slow envelope.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Adjust decay on envelopes.
• Adjust volume on FM mod.
• Play with waveforms.
• Change level of detune between carrier and FM BEND knobs.
• Add echo.
• Add a mod or oscillator to the FM modulator. This is tricky but there's a few possibilities to find.

[08]="glass pad"

(HS-...133.2? Originally [11].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AFkAAABXAAAA8Eh7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPERABIAEgAfAAAhACDyAQASAPISABIAQAD06AAQkgDyggD8Dwrh8oD4APKPDFD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

This did not start as an imitation of any acoustic instrument, hence the nonspecific name and number. We thought it was a little reminiscent of the armonica - that instrument made up of a bunch of glass bowls and played by friction from the fingertips - but originally we just wanted a beautiful electronic pad sound. So including it here is a bit of a cheat, but not really a harmful one or anything.

The bulk of the effect is simply the volume envelope and the echo, but we did double the envelope onto the waveform dial to give it some more textural interest.

Also, an interesting note about the echo: normally, a delay of 40 makes a quite noticeable, rhythmic echo, but because the attack and decay are also 40, it is smoothed out to unnoticeability and just gives the instrument an even bigger reverb effect.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Adjust ADSR parameters.
• Adjust echo parameters. (Recommend hitting Space to halt playback first, to avoid glitches.)
• Change waveform.
• FM or ring modulate waveform to get new timbres.

[09]="piano"

(HS-314.122-4-8. Originally [01].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGMAAABhAAAA8FJ7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPIBABIAEgAfAAAhAGDywPGREgDyEgASAED14PQZACEBQAESAPJA8gD6kRMA8q8KMPX-AHDxnwrw-4Cg--D4AP9w0B8Ah9")

Again, we have a quick attack envelope and a slower body envelope. We also forgo much of the work we could have done on designing the best body sound in favor of (a) simplicity and (b) making a thump sound to represent the hammer hitting the strings.

We actually pulled a bit of a trick with that thump: 28 is quite a bit longer a thump than we'd prefer, so we set the pitch of our second (thump) oscillator to dive far into inaudibility before the time was up. You'll note also that said pitch is absolute, ignoring which note was played and its volume; this makes it more consistent, which feels better. With variable pitch, it gets chirpy as you move up the octaves.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Adjust envelope parameters.
• FM modulate the attack phase of the body oscillator (ENV-1 on VOL of the new modulator).
• Add a second carrier osc to the body oscillator with the same timbre (VOL = *64, WAVE = +0) and BEND it a lot to produce a jangly sound.
• Add a light echo to the output.

[10]="shamisen"

(HS-321.312. Originally [17].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGoAAABoAAAA8Fl7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPKBABIAEgAfAAAhAGDyAPEBEgDyEgBQ_iAAEED44PGgGADxIQBggAESAPIA-uEAEwD6bwow8lDxwG8AUF8K8P_AoP-w_AD-cNAfAIfQ==")

The shamisen is an instrument we Packbats missed out on, but got mentioned when we asked what to include. So, we went to get reference to draw from.

Ki&Ki's song "Tokitsukaze" is (if we understand correctly) Tsugaru shamisen specifically. Most of the search results we saw on DDG were also Tsugaru shamisen, so Tsugaru shamisen it shall be. We don't know what else is out there.

The striking aspects of the sound to us were the prominent plucking sound, the variable pitch (which mostly has to come from tracker effects, but those weren't implemented yet), and the very short sustain. And the stylistic aspects of play, but we don't know those so we can't help there.

We created that aggressive pluck sound with four pieces: a hard sweep from sawtooth to sine-triangle, a big initial drop in volume, a big bend into the note, and noise, all on the A=5 attack envelope. We let the body envelope have a tiny bit of sustain - that felt closer to right - but the bulk of the sound design was in that pluck.

We shan't have many suggestions for playing with the timbre of this one, just because we don't know the instrument, but a couple possibilities:

• Change the timbre of the WT-0 oscillator with some FM modulation, either on the whole sound or just attack.
• Change parameters (e.g. TONE of noise pluck, ENV values, volume ranges, etc.)
• Add an echo effect.

[11]="guitar"

(HS-321.322. Originally [12].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGsAAABpAAAA8Fp7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPGhABIAEgAfAAAhAGDxwPIBEgDyEgBQ93AAEED3wPWwFwDxECEAQPIlASEAEgBA9VDywB8KEPJg8oA-AFBPCvD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

Don't have an explanation for reaching for FM on this one. Seems to work, though.

For the attack envelope, we modulated both oscillator waveforms, carrier and modulator. And we attached the body-of-sound envelope to the FM mod amount to get that slow mellowing of tone you hear with instruments like this.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• SHAPE distortion. For the best effect, you may need to increase the volume in the Instrument box so the shape distortion has more to bite on to.
• Detune the BEND knob in the FM modulation.
• Add echo.
• Add an extra carrier oscillator to thicken the sound.
• Play with other parameters.
• Add other modifications (e.g. stack another FM mod).

[12]="e guitar"

(HS-321.322. Originally [16].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGoAAABoAAAA8Fl7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPIBABIAEgAfAAAhAGD0APOxEgDyEgBQ8_AAEED3IPXwFwAQoQBA_BD0cPQAAPhCAPPyAH8KcPgQAH8AUD8K8P_AoP-w_AD-cNAfAIfQ==")

For this one, we concentrated on overdrive to shape the sound. We, again, have an attack envelope to make the initial buzz, but the bulk of the sound is a tilted sawtooth wave being slowly less and less overdriven.

Does it sound like a guitar? I don't know, but we were trying to make a guitar and it'll do for purpose.

(Also, secret #packbats_2node cart lore: there's a third, hidden SFX file that wasn't open in the editor when we did the final export. Pattern 02 from that is this e guitar patch playing chords, and we really like how those chords sound.)

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Change the envelope parameters and/or tweak knobs.
• Modify the body sound more fundamentally (e.g. with FM or ring modulation).
• Add another oscillator to harmonize (e.g. in fifths).
• Add an echo effect.

[13]="violin"

(HS-321.322-71. Originally [00].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGIAAABgAAAA8FF7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHhABIAEgAfAAAhACDyAQASAPISAFDA-xAQAPiQ_bgAEIEAQPHw9p8LEHDyQPtAuwAcAPP-CqD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

We started with this one because violins are the most pad-like acoustic instrument we could think of, so we wanted it so there would be at least one good pad.

It's mostly simple - basically a low-passed sawtooth wave - but there's one technical detail in the FREQ=0 setting on the vibrato. With this specific value, the frequency of the tone variation will sync to the SFX.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Change the waveform to a different shape.
• Modulate the waveform with FM or ring mod to change it more.
• Alter envelope settings and/or filter range.
• Stack a new ADSR volume envelope on the oscillator volume knob to give it a more complex contour.
• Add resonance to the filter. It won't sound like a violin any more, but it can sound cool.
• Attach ENV-1 to the oscillator volume knob and adjust it to create a little tremolo.
• Add a little bit of echo.

[14]="harp"

(HS-322. Originally [21].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGIAAABgAAAA8FF7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHxABIAEgAfAAAhAGDx4PIhEgDyEgBQ8cAAEED4MPPwFwAQgQBA88D48B8LEPKg8nCfAFCfCvD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

Another relatively simple patch - the bulk of our attention went into making the attack sound right. In this case, we went with oscillator and low-pass filter - it seems to work fine. It does sound more harp-like if successive notes are spread out across multiple channels so they can overlap.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• A general note: for this one especially, you might want to test with a music pattern instead of or in addition to the keyboard - that way, you can hear the notes overlap.
• Add echo - it sounds dreamy.
• Play with envelope values.
• Modify the core sound by changing waveform and its range and/or with FM or ring modulation.

[15]="pipe"

(HS-421.?. Originally [02].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGwAAABqAAAA8Ft7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPIxABIAEgAfAAAhAGDyQPHBEgDyEMDycAAQ-9EAQPWQ86gA8hAiAPQFACDxIQAQMgB-CiCA8YD98KsAGgDyjwrA-4Cg--D4AP9w0B8Ah9")

This one, like the glass pad, started as a patch and was interpreted as a physical instrument later. We haven't played with ring modulation much, so it was nice finding such a sweet, gentle tone with it. You'll see that it's a non-integer ratio and that the TUNE of the oscillator is up an octave; mathematically, ring modulation creates waveforms at the difference and sum of the input frequencies, so a ratio of 3/2 gives us 1/2 and 5/2. (And then the tilted saw overtones bring in 7/2, 3/2 and 9/2, 11/2, and so on.) Ring mod isn't as prominent in 2024 as FM modulation, but as you can hear, you can find some nice tones.

If you look at ENV-0, you'll see a very typical ADSR for horns and such: instead of being loud and sharp at the start and mellowing, it swells into its sharpest timbre and stays near it until the note ends.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Add some echo.
• Modify envelope parameters.
• Modify waveforms.
• Increase detune with the ring mod DETUNE knob.
• Apply a low-pass filter to dull the sound a little.
• Apply a gentle FM modulation to the ring mod.

[16]="flute"

(HS-421.121.12. Originally [15].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGQAAABiAAAA8Dd7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHRABIAEgAfAAAhACDyAQASAPISABIAQPLw9agA8RAhAEDxMAD0AwAgEQFgDwCSHwogYMD_oK8MUP_AoP-w_AD-cNAfAIfQ==")

Thank you, flute, for landing between the "pipe" and "organ" patches so the list doesn't say "pipe organ".

Again, just kinda reached for FM - if you have two nodes to work with, it's one of the most versatile options. Also, the note of a flute is bright and clear, which you can get with FM.

Interesting mix of envelope assignments going every which way - that's what we get when our focus is on imitating a sound by ear, I think. We also used the 4x option on FM mod 'volume' to get an attack that's just a little stronger, especially for the attack.

We focused on the treble notes, but the results are interesting in the bass register.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Adjust various parameters - waveform, envelope, FM VOL, maybe even TUNE although that can make the sound stop sounding like a flute.
• Add a new oscillator to emphasize part of the sound.
• Add an LFO to the oscillator volume for tremolo or the BEND knob for vibrato.
• Add an echo effect.

[17]="organ"

(HS-421.222.11. Originally [03].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AHEAAABwAAAA8C97aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPGhABIAEgBQ8QD-EBwAIQAg8gEAEgDyEgAQIQBA82DxqAARUAEBsVAPAaIgMQAQ-8EAQPVw888KEFDygP-wewAaAPE-CsD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

The classic way to make an organ sound is to stack lots of oscillators in different octaves, maybe with some on the fifths too.

With only two oscillators ... well, we tried a few variations, and putting the bass oscillator in the sine-triangle range (where overtones die off fast) and the treble two octaves up with a tilted saw (much more overtone-heavy) seemed to get us somewhere. It has a little of that effect where only some harmonics are emphasized.

And we detuned the two oscillators a touch, because that's nice.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• More oscillators! 2/1 ratio! 8/1 ratio! 16/1 ratio! Heck, 6/1 and 12/1 ratios! And detune all of them!
• Echo effect! A lot of the sound of a church organ is the sound of the room - adding space to an organ really, really works.
• Attach the LFO to the volumes of oscillators to get a tremolo effect - Leslie speakers are another famous tool used to enhance an organ sound. (We set the knobs so volume started high on one and low on the other, and that made a pretty rad effect!)
• Change volume, waveform, and envelope parameters.

[18]="oboe"

(HS-422.112. Originally [22].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AHMAAABxAAAA8GJ7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHxABIAEgAfAAAhAGDyIPGxEgDyEMEAUPDw-wAQQPQZAPEQIQBA8WDyVAAg8QEAEwDvCiAw8oD6EGsAIBAAMFIC9-D--wrQ-4Cg--D4AP9w8NAfAIfQ==")

This should look mostly familiar - very like the flute, in fact - except for the data envelope.

So, here's how we did that. We dialed in a nice amount of vibrato and tremolo, then adjusted the knob values and range on the vibrato with a temporary oscillator to get it dialed in to be in tune during the initial part. Because that's what it's for: the note starts steady, and then when it has settled in it starts to warble at the SPD of the SFX (that's what the SPD 0 setting does).

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Play with envelope parameters, waveforms, amount of FM modulation.
• Add an echo effect.
• Try a low pass filter with resonance. We ended up aiming the range arc above the marker and putting ENV-0 on it, which makes the filter opens up at the start of the note.
• FM mod the FM mod, maybe? You can definitely change the timbre that way, especially if you use envelopes to shape it.

[19]="trumpet"

(HS-423.233. Originally [13].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AFoAAABYAAAA8El7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHhABIAEgAfAAAhACDyAQASAPISABIAQPfg9PgAEIEAQPJQ9w8LEIDxkPvwrwxQ-4Cg--D4AP9w0B8Ah9")

Very simple wavetable-plus-filter design. The changing waveshape creates the trumpet-like attack, and that's tempered and mellowed by the filter. We ended up only wanting the one envelope to take care of all of it - it did the job.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Play with envelope parameters, waveform, filter.
• Add an extra volume envelope for more shaping.
• Possibly, add a little resonance to the filter.
• FM modulation on the oscillator can work, especially with ENV-0 on its volume.
• Add a vibrato LFO to the oscillator bend knob.
• Shape effect distortion, maybe? That could be fun.

[20]="synth bass"

(HS-53 (/321). Originally [08].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGEAAABfAAAA8FB7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPGRABIAEgAfAAAhAGDyAPFxEgDyEgASAED8wPvYABCBAED1MPvgFACvCrD3wADxDwBQ8a8K8P_AoP-w_AD-cNAfAIfQ==")

The original and indispensable subtractive-synthesis bass patch: simple (square-ish, here) waveform into a resonant low pass filter which quickly closes. It'd be a travesty to leave this out.

We did add a few fun details - stacking the volume envelopes, a slow shift in pulse width on the tone as the note fades - but this is straight-up just the classic subtractive bass synth. You just gotta.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Play with envelope parameters, filter parameters, waveform (triangles and sines don't work great but sawtooths do)
• Double up the filter, with more-or-less similar parameters and the same envelope.
• Add a second oscillator in WAVE +0 mode and recreate the filter after it so it filters both. Play with relative pitch in TUNE knob.
• Add a shape overdrive.
• Add an echo effect.

[21]="fm bass"

(HS-53. Originally [09].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGUAAABjAAAA8FR7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPHRABIAEgAfAAAhACDyAQASAPISABD-4QBA9WDzGADxECEAQPQA8oQAIgAQQQBA8g8KMPKA_eAvDFD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

There's a YouTube channel, currently @carpathia808, which does oscilloscope deconstructions of classic VGM tracks. The Sonic 2 "Chemical Plant Zone" episode lives in our head rent-free. It's such a good track and the deconstruction is immaculately good.

Anyway, while looking at the oscilloscope traces on our tenth or twentieth rewatch, we started noticing a kind of pattern, where you start with relatively strong modulation and ease it off as the note plays. Which, like, most FM synth knowers surely knew, but we figured it out from here.

...so, when we needed an FM bass, that's what we did. And it turned out to be a really aggressive sound, so we leaned into that aggression.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Try other waveforms.
• Change envelope parameters, FM mod amount, FM mod ratios. This is such a simple and artificial patch, you can change it a lot and keep its vibe.
• A weird one: switch FM mod VOL knob to mode. You will likely need to activate 4x on the knob to get a similar effect, but FM mod VOL mode means that changing volume with the bar at the top changes the timbre of the sound, and that's neat.
• Add shape distortion.
• Add echo.
• Add LFO tremolo or vibrato. We went really hard on these and thought that still sounded rad.

[22]="acid bass"

(HS-53. Originally [10].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGgAAABmAAAA8Fd7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPFhABIAEgBQ8VD7DQAhACDyAQASAPIRABBQ86D-EBBA_ID_kBcAEIEAQPOA-CAUAPvvCrBA-lBvAFCfCvD-gKD-8PgA-3DQHwCH0=")

A lot of these instruments were requests, and an acid bass was one of the first requests, and we were not confident at all.

Fortunately, YouTube came through with @IhorMedia's video "Techno Sound Design / 3 Analog Synth Bassline Techniques", which (pleasingly) encouraged the viewer to follow along with their own (other) synthesizers.

Clearly, there's a lot we can't do within our two-node and two-envelope limit, but the heart of the sound seems to be the massive resonance doing a massive cutoff sweep, so we gave it as much spice on top of that as we could. Not sure how to do the variations in timbre that are characteristic of the acid house style but it is at least a basic version of the sound.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Stylistically, an acid bassline is typically played with rapid short repeated notes. There will be a way to do this in the tracker - setting a retriggering interval is in the roadmap - but for now, let's talk about looping envelopes.

  If you hit the "..." line at the bottom of an ADSR envelope, four boxes will appear: SPD, LP0, LP1, and T0. SPD=0 is a special value which loops at the SFX SPD. If you leave SPD and LP0 at 0 and set LP1 on ENV-1 to 1, it'll do the filter sweep every step. You can also have effects that happen less often by setting LP1 to a larger value. Finally, if you right- click on one of the white ears with an envelope number, you can make that repeat on the SFX clock instead of based on when you play the note.

  You can do some cool stuff with looping any kind of envelope, ADSR, LFO, or DATA. And it really fits this style of instrument and house music generally.

• As usual, it's worth playing with knob values - in particular, the low-pass range start and end and ENV-1 attack have a lot of effect.
• A little bit of echo can be quite nice.
• Adding a sine wave oscillator outside the filter can thicken the sound.

[23]="64ish pulse"

(HS-53. Originally [18].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AGEAAABfAAAA8FB7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPGBABIAEgBQ8ZD_IBwAIQAg8gEAEgDyEgARABBA-gD8CAAQgQBAgPVPCyDy0PiQSwAaAK8KwP_AoP-w_AD-cNAfAIfQ==")

Back in 2017, Tomislav Zlatic sampled some Commodore 64s to produce some sample packs and described "the most famous SID lead sound" as using pulse width modulation and fast vibrato. So, when we were asked to make some SID-ish sounds and found this post, that plus some low-pass (the SID had low-pass filters) was our core concept for our first SID-inspired patch. We improvised some melodies as we tweaked values until we thought it hit right and then we added it.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Mess around with envelope parameters.
• Mess around with waveform.
• Possibly add echo? It sounds all right here.
• Add tremolo using an LFO on the oscillator VOL knob.

[24]="bleepbloop"

(HS-53. Originally [19].)

--[[pod_type="instrument"]]unpod("b64:bHo0AFcAAABVAAAA8EZ7aW5zdHJ1bWVudD1weHUAAygAAgAABAABEAYPIBABIAEgAfAAAhAGDg8qESAPJQwAETAPQQ8o8MIPLAADsAIAA0AP--CwD-gKD-8PgA-3Dw0B8Ah9")

The same musician who asked about SID stuff shared a video of someone using a different SID-based plugin, so we poked around in that one and found this very simple patch fit in. It is literally just a triangle with a data envelope so it starts up an octave before it jumps down to the main note. A basic patch to end on, but it is unquestionably a chiptune sound if you like chiptune sounds.

Suggestions for playing with it:

• Change waveform.
• Change envelope values.
• Set LP1 on the DATA envelope to something to make the blooping repeat in an octave arp pattern.
• Apply LP1 to the waveform to make the octave-up part a different timbre.
• Modify the waveform, e.g. with FM.

Oscillators

One Oscillator, Bare:

• [24]="bleepbloop"

One With Filter:

• [01]="tom"
• [02]="snare"
• [03]="hi hat"
• [04]="crash cymbal"
• [13]="violin"
• [14]="harp"
• [19]="trumpet"
• [20]="synth bass"
• [22]="acid bass"
• [23]="64ish pulse"

One With Echo:

• [06]="celesta"
• [08]="glass pad"

One With Shape:

• [00]="kick"
• [12]="e guitar"

Two-Oscillator Additive:

• [09]="piano"
• [10]="shamisen"
• [17]="organ"

Ring Modulation:

• [15]="pipe"

FM Modulation:

• [05]="marimba"
• [07]="steelpan"
• [11]="guitar"
• [16]="flute"
• [18]="oboe"
• [21]="fm bass"

Envelopes

One ADSR:

• [00]="kick"
• [02]="snare"
• [03]="hi hat"
• [04]="crash cymbal"
• [08]="glass pad"
• [16]="flute"
• [19]="trumpet"
• [21]="fm bass"

Two ADSR:

• [01]="tom"
• [05]="marimba"
• [07]="steelpan"
• [09]="piano"
• [10]="shamisen"
• [11]="guitar"
• [12]="e guitar"
• [14]="harp"
• [20]="synth bass"
• [22]="acid bass"

ADSR + LFO:

• [06]="celesta"
• [13]="violin"
• [15]="pipe"
• [17]="organ"
• [23]="64ish pulse"

ADSR + Data:

• [18]="oboe"
• [24]="bleepbloop"

Wavetables

Single WT-0:

• [00]="kick"
• [01]="tom"
• [06]="celesta"
• [08]="glass pad"
• [12]="e guitar"
• [13]="violin"
• [14]="harp"
• [19]="trumpet"
• [20]="synth bass"
• [22]="acid bass"
• [23]="64ish pulse"
• [24]="bleepbloop"

Dual WT-0:

• [05]="marimba"
• [07]="steelpan"
• [09]="piano"
• [11]="guitar"
• [15]="pipe"
• [16]="flute"
• [17]="organ"
• [18]="oboe"
• [21]="fm bass"

WT-0 and WT-1:

• [10]="shamisen"

WT-1 only:

• [02]="snare"
• [03]="hi hat"
• [04]="crash cymbal"

/ 4

• [00]="kick"

x 4

• [12]="e guitar"
• [16]="flute"

R

• [03]="hi hat"