Eclectic Expanded

Review: Eclectic Expanded

Bolder Sounds

Format : Kurzweil CDRom

Review by Clif Marsiglio

Saturday, July 07, 2001

Three months ago I promised Dennis Burns a review and I've FINALLY gotten around to doing just this. To be honest, I think I could play with this another three as I've barely scratched the surface of this disc.

Eclectic Expanded is just as the title would have you imagine. Eclectic sounds focusing on the timbres that seemed to catch Dennis' ear and exploring forth from that. Expanded you ask? Because Bolder had a previous release of these sounds, decided to rework the programming and add about 400 Megs of new material to the mix. Was it worth it just to come up with another derivative of a previous CD? Definitely. This is the kind of stuff that makes us love the expressiveness of our Kurzweil as it takes full usage of the available programming capabilities.

Eclectic Expanded contains 7 banks of sounds including Bass, Synths, Keyboard, Percussion, Plucked, Winds and a miscellaneous bank. But wadda they sound like you ask??? It is almost indescribable. Everything, even the synths, sounds smooth and organic, but this is the nature of Bolder's work. Their last release, Granular, was of this same nature: Completely synthetic chaotic soundscapes made to feel like they sprung from the earth as if Demeter herself had arranged to allow their growth and cultivation.

Ok, so what does this disc offer me? While this is considered an 'eclectic' disc, there is enough on here that it could be considered an acoustic 'meat and potatoes' type disc if it were pared down just a bit. In my ears, the Bass and Plucked directories are the star of this show.

The Bass directories contain 5 well sampled basses from Standard Electric and Fretless to more specific Taylor Acoustic, Upright Jazz and a Zeta Electric. These sound fabulous, not to say that I hadn't heard some complaints. One keymapping had some oddities within it which one of our reviewers noted, but most listening to it felt it was only capturing the true nature of the instrument.

One of the greatest things about this disc is the amount of variation I find within the sounds. It is almost a warts and all approach. The problem I find more annoying is when synth programmers smooth out a sound to be 'consistent' and more easily playable to the point that the original sound no longer exists. Com'mon folks. It takes a 'real' player years and years to learn how to play their instrument, stop expecting knowledge of the piano to be sufficient to play emulations of organic instrument to be immediate. I WANT bits of inconsistencies and I WANT to hear quarks of the instrument. Its these 'features' that will have listeners guessing whom you had sit in on a session and what mic ya used instead of thinking "Wow, another synthesist trying to emulate a guitar using standard keyboard chords and no techniques." Ok, I've insulted enough folks here, so its time to segue into the Plucked directory, the likely counterpart to the Bass.

Plucked contains 10 guitars of differing breeds and 22 'Others' such as Autoharp, Celtic harp (2 of them), Bouzouki, hammered and mountain dulcimer, banjo as well as a few effect type sounds created from the guitar. Again, if the sound is organic and played with the correct voicing; your listeners may never know that they were listening to a big plastic box with the heart of a computer. The only patch I didn't care for was the mountain dulcimer. I've had one of these for the last two years and I've not come up with any playing style that can match that of the real thing. Dennis vehemently disagrees with me, as any proud father would be. He notes my frustration but claims it is included because it gives a synthesist more textures to play around with and claims some instruments will never be fully emulated on a synth. Yeah yeah...true true. Probably the entire reason I have as many acoustic instruments sitting around as much as I do synthesizers. How's the sampling on it? I'd have to say perfect. This is as close as one will get with the current crop of synths.

What did I like? Practically everything I loaded in. Have I loaded everything in yet? No, and I probably won't for a while. Every time I sit down to finish up this review, I pull up a patch end up playing around with a single damn patch for a few hours. I've had to mark up my cover with pencil ticks telling me not to load certain patches until I've checked everything out. To me that is telling of a disc. I could start quoting features from each patch, but it would only betray the nature of it. You will have to take my word, or at the least listen to some of the demos, and make up your own mind.

Next on my list would be Synths and Keyboards. The Synths really seem like the odd man out. There are only 3 patches represented, but one has to check out the programming to see what is actually there.

Keyboards includes three standard squeeze boxes, five if you are willing to consider the harmonium and Sruti Box. I had never even heard of this last instrument and had to check the net to find that it is a smaller keyboard-free Indian version of the Harmonium (See: http://www.eyeneer.com/World/Sa/Instruments/sruti.html). In addition, we get the standout Harpsichord, as well as a slightly different version of the Yamaha C7 that appeared on the Bolder Piano's disc.

I want to THANK Bolder for actually having a decent Harpsichord. This is the BIGGEST omission in the Kurzweil. A real version doesn't even appear in the orchestral board and I believe this is the first native one I've heard that sounded usable. The only thing I dislike about this is the fact that this patch was designed to be velocity sensitive. What harpsichord have you ever heard that is velocity sensitive? As this annoyed me much, I troubled Bolder for an explanation:

No............. harpsichords have 1 dynamic level period. They create there "volume" through what baroque aficionados would call "terraced dynamics" If Scarlatti or Bach wanted a crescendo. It would be done by gradually adding more voices.

The harpsichords on EE have some dynamics to 'em. If it were possible in the 1700's to make a harpsichord dynamic they would have, guaranteed. So why not do it in a sample of 'em since it easy? Someone would argue it wasn't "authentic"............... I would respond by saying "neither is sampling" :)

I don't know if I agree, but it's easy enough to fix if one cares that deeply about it. Other than that minor detail, it sounds great. One of the other reviewers helping me with this noticed a small bit of artifacting on a lower sample, but it to my ears, sounded more like a bit of mechanical noise from the instrument itself.

Next on the agenda are the Winds. This includes orchestral - 3 different bassoons, clarinet, flute, oboe, and piccolo, Exotic - a standout 20 meg bagpipe, duduk, Ullian pipes, and both a 'real' and PVC Shakuhatchi (you know the one...the sound immortalized in the old Rolands and featured at the beginning of Big Time by Peter Gabriel - but without the cheese of the original overused undermodulated sample) and finally what I would call everyday winds - several harmonics, penny whistle and sax.

I love the sound of the orchestral groupings. Everything sounds the way that it should. The bassoon comes in 3 versions - No Vibrato, Lyrical and Vibrato. The Oboe has several variations within VAST to give it different characteristics. As a standard sample, it is a little breathy. Bolder fixes this with vast and allows it to sit back in a mix with much more ease. The piccolos dance across the keyboard and sound like the real thing. Again, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference between the real instrument and my Kurzweil on most recordings.

It might be of note that some of these are harder to play and get a consistent feel across the keyboard. It will take a little practice to get use to these as well as a little planning. As I've said above, I'd rather have it this way. On the bagpipes, going from one chanter to another will bring a small bit of headache when noodling around. This instrument was not designed with subtly in mind. I'm very glad that Dennis left it the way it was meant to be played in most instances, though for the folks that could give a rats ass about authentic voicing and just want to plop down triads and wonder why everything sounds like a Casio easy-play arrangement, some programs were left in smoothing over the transitions for you. These, however, will be deleted from my HD as soon as I copy this disc into the permanent collection.

Finally, the Percussion and Miscellaneous: I've not explored the percussion as I should have. I've loaded everything up and they sound good. I'm simply overwhelmed by the amount of instruments are here. Eclectic fits these two directories to a T. There are 6 groupings of Mixed Percussion. Don't expect any rock kits in here. Expect to hear ethnic sounds. They sound great. I would have to pull 2 banks out of this as my favorite: the Darbuka Loops and the Tibetan Singing Bowls. The loops are just amazing, but I've never heard the bowls played anywhere except in badly recorded CDs in the back of Borders Books. One could teach the New Age guys a lesson or two and rerecord a few of those as 'new masters' and let the SUV Driving Crystal Wearing Hippies think that ya trekked to Tibet with a few llama's packed with DATs, preamps and microphones (as well as a few portable generators). Considering all these yuppies are striving to reach inner peace while trading stocks and oppressing the common man, you'd make a mint.

Speaking of Crystals, the miscellaneous section features 33 Megs of Crystal Glasses with several dozen programs associated with each. I'm starting to believe Dennis is simply sampling all the jewelry he has hanging around his neck. Seriously, this is just crazy. I loaded this patch up simply to hear what 30 Meg's worth of crystal glasses could sound like and played for an entire evening with these.

Glasses rubbed, ground, tapped. Glasses with obvious imperfections were used to some extent and then capitalized on. Certain loops use these imperfections to give motion and character. I am just amazed by all of this. I didn't expect to be so amazed by this, but you can see what one can do with something they obviously love. Heck, I believe there is even ANOTHER sample of this with an entirely different set of characteristics on Bolder's Free Sound of the Week page.

As an added bonus, these programs can easily stand in for Ben Franklin's Glass Harmonica. A scan of the internet brings up a few Bach pieces that have been outta the public's ear simply because of the expense and fragility of these beasts. Played through these crystal patches, you can actually hear these as originally intended.

The Misc section has several other standout pieces and it is sad that this area be entitled as such. Normally this would deem an area normally considered a leftovers area: Don't let this fool you. The Bull Roar is 20 Megs and gives several articulations of this never before heard on a sampling disc like this before. The Bowed Psaltery, which is similar in timbre to a violin but played on something looking similar to a smallish Hammered Dulcimer, is another piece that I find very interesting and amazed that it is here. 4 Megs of Jaw Harps that would fit perfectly into a country western motif.

Finally, the Hurdy Gurdy, an ancient instrument that was designed and played by the common class, was essentially a mechanical violin with a crank spinning a rosined wheel bowing a series of strings, including both droned (the dogs) and melodic keyboard controlled ones. It sounds like a mixture between a bag pipe and a cat with his tail caught in a spinning wheel. This was one of the patches Bolder decided to release Warts and All.

Oh My Gawd!!! If you've never heard one of these, get yer booty to a renaissance fest or pull up some CDs from the time of Arthur. It is a delight that can only be understood if heard. Words cannot do it justice.

Everything is reproduced as it was 'meant' to be played - meant being a strong word as most of these were one of a kind instruments and had their own peculiarities. This is, again, one of those addictive type instruments that Dennis has included out of his own eclectic nature and the world should be lucky to have someone like him including sounds like this.

Final impressions, this is a great disc and a great addition to my collection. We would be so lucky to have more discs like this on the market. It is obvious that this was a labor of love and many hours went into such eccentricies as the Hurdy or the Bag Pipes or a few dozen other patches when ya know the programmers here just went nuts on and HAD to have the sound or felt the need to program dozens of patches because they wanted to. If we rated products on the thumbs up system I'd be sitting here like the Fonz.

The only real wish that I have would be to actually see the rest of the liner notes finished. Visit http://www.boldersounds.com/ecxnotes.htm to read through the notes yourself. That and maybe Bolder needs to change the name from Eclectic Expanded to Eccentric Expanded as there are definitely sounds that are just out there :)