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The general consensus seems to be that it’s a Crumar DP-50 – a very rare Italian electric piano analogue synth from the early 80s. A friend who knows Jonny Greenwood tells me he is always looking for spare DP50s, so that seems to clinch it. But there is the small matter of the wide stereo image, and the very clicky sound that can also be heard in the track. Is that part of the EP sound? or a layer?

We couldn’t find a DP-50  – they are like rocking horse shit – but we did find its’ bigger brother, the DP-80. As far as we can tell, it’s the same thing with a bigger keyboard. But information is so scarce on these units.. it’s like they hardly existed.

the DP80 in The Attic2

After lugging the 40kg brute into my studio, making it sound just like Radiohead was not the easiest thing. It really doesn’t make that attacky click. But the filters are really cool, and when you sweep them, it really is just like the part in ‘Everything’ where the filters all open up.

So, I followed the internet wisdom and added another synth – Minitmoog, also in the Attic2, for the clicky attack. With some fine tuning of envelopes and resonance that worked pretty well. But EP part still doesn’t sound quite right – I realised that the whole Radiohead track is tuned down from a conventional 440hz to 437hz – so tuning like the track it certainly gets it closer.

There is also a layered single drone note on the Radiohead track. It kind of sounds like it’s part of the EP sound, but them you realise it’s not, it’s just floating there behind it, glueing it together. It’s a fairly generic sounding filtered sawtooth type synth wave, so I use the ARP omni2, which sounds close.

But the EP still does not sound as ..flat and sustained as the original. So, I think, lets try throwing compression at it ..also maybe that could make a bit more click on the attack. So, I end up with an NI VC160, running into an SSL X-Comp into a UAD Distressor, which seems to flatten and fatten in good measure.

Finally it seems that the harmonics are a little more pronounced and forward on the Radiohead track, so I add SoundToys Decapitator and this embiggens the sound in just the right direction.

Compressors used on the EP sound

That’s how we ended up with the sound you hear in the demo video. It’s not exactly 100% the same, but I think it’s a close as I can get without an exact list of everything used in the Radiohead track. I appreciate that extra production is needed over and above what is possible in The Attic, but it seems clear that Radiohead and Nigel Godrich must have done quite a bit of processing to the ingredients of the original track too!

The first new release of 2018 will be: Sheng Sho Khaen, featuring three different Asian mouth-organ type wind instruments.

Following that will be a major update to The Attic adding 8 new instruments sampled from rare vintage pieces, including: Minitmoog, Crumar DP-80, Logan Vocalist, Siel Orchestra 2, Apr Omni 2, Cheetah MS-800.

We have a new drum product, Moonkits – a collection of brushed drums with quirky and unusual setups. This will probably see the light of day in the summer.

Also in production is an atmospheric recording of a large church organ, recorded in the famous ambience of All Saints church in Tooting, London. This was a preferred recording venue for Sony Classical for many years in the 1980s and 90s.

Longtime Soniccouture user Anders Wall helped beta test the instrument with us, and he made this great video replacing the audio on a live Nyckelharpas performance with audio direct from the kontakt instrument.

Anders wrote this about the video:
“Magnus Holmström is an amazing performer, my mockup doesn’t come close to his playing.
But then again most of the players I’ve recorded over the years doesn’t have the same skills with the bow as he. I believe the mockup I did, with some added reverb and some light use of an exciter, would sound as good as many players out there.”

The original video:

Anders: “The strength the two instruments Soniccouture offers are that they are so versatile.
For example, I like the noise from keys but not the sympathetic strings. It’s so easy to dial that in.
This mockup has slightly more of the key-noises than default and I activated some of the effects that comes with the instrument.”

Thanks to Anders Wall and Magnus Holmström.

Nyckelharpas Page

He’s made 4 videos about Soniccouture instruments now ( see below), and even we learnt some tricks when watching them. Highly recommended, subscribe to his Solonoid Studio youtube channel now.

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