- Sample Magic are developing a keen reputation for providing bespoke sample CDs to cater to the needs of a wide variety of producers. Jono Buchanan checks out two of their latest titles.
Organic House - SM19
As a musical form, house covers so many bases that sample libraries now often subdivide their output to cater to the specific needs of individual genres within this heading. Organic House does something slightly different, representing a kind of musical swiss-army knife to cover several bases at once, including techno, minimal, disco and tribal. Samples are offered in the following categories: Drum Loops, FX (both single hits and loops), full Music Loops, Percussion Loops, Synth Loops, Top Loops (drum loops lacking kicks and often snares), Bass Loops and, lastly, Combi Loops. This latter category provides loops with drums, percussion and musical elements and, accordingly, much of the material here sounds finished, perhaps representing more of a place to go to seek musical inspiration rather than featuring loops you'd want to use in their entirety.
Loops are provided in a variety of easy-to-use formats including Wav, Rex and Apple Loops, so bringing the material into your productions is child's play. The quality of the samples is excellent, with generous amounts of single hits for those who like to build their beats from the ground up and huge variety in the looped material. The drum loops are organized nicely, with the fullest version of a loop always coming first, before three variations which usually features combinations of the kick with either the other drums or the percussion, before a final kick-free version.
Stylistically, there's plenty on show with progressive and deep house loops rubbing shoulders with more minimal styles and disco fare aplenty too. Content in each category is organized into folders at 125 and 128 BPM but the material is different in each, with slightly edgier material at the faster speed. The Bass Loops are excellent with a wide variety of sound sources having been used to create the deep and rich content provided here though I'd love to hear a variation or two, with either musical or tonal variety offered for each loop, or a short set of developing patterns from sparse to busy.
What pleased me Percussion Loops-wise was that many featured two or more sound sources with different reverb treatments, so, for example, you might find a deep dry conga loop enhanced by a reverberant, more resonant single hit from a different instrument mixed in on top. This brings a 3D nature to these loops which will have them appealing across the sub-genres of house, I suspect. The FX folder is good as well with plenty of single sweeps, hits, falls and rises with loops made from glitchy drum kits, cut-up vocals and analog synths. Again, effects treatments are brought to bear here to create a variety of standout tricks which should effortlessly slot into your productions. While some purists devoted to a single house sub-genre will find some things extraneous, there is a lot of material here to provide inspiration and form the backbone of your tracks.
Ultimate FXs - SM18
If it's FX you're after, though, the Ultimate FX library could well be the one for you. This aims to cater to a wider range of producers than Organic House, with folder titles such as Orchestral Hits, Tape, Vinyl & Static FX and Noise & Detail Loops giving some indication of the range of material provided. Again, samples here can be found in single hit and looped form, with a great collection of Fills within the latter category. These are provided in four sub-folders named Classic, Glitch, Nu-Rave and Twisted Vox, which makes tracking down a one or two-bar slice of special audio to aid a transition from one part of your track to the next a treat.
Once more there's a huge variety of sound sources here, with the Classic Loops largely formed of acoustic toms and snares, while the other material features electronic sources and plenty of effects-based chop-ups and effects-based post-production. If you'll excuse the pun, there's very little filler. The Falls and Descenders folder features a good collection of effects sweeps; straight white noise effects with opening/closing filters are complemented by pitched content and synthesized self-oscillations. Usefully, these sweeps are organized into BPM folders at 125 and 128, so finding a sweep which will last the right number of beats is simple, making their integration straightforward.
The Machinery Hits provide some nice industrial loops, though there's not quite as much content here as I'd like. Frequently, the best part of these loops comes towards the end, as many feature little combinations of heavy clattering at the beginning, followed by quieter, machine-based loops which chatter away in a pleasingly glitchy manner afterwards. The Impacts and Bombs folder is great, though, with a series of long, stretched out and frequently reverberant single hits which will work well not just as sounds in their own right but also as doublers for individual drum hits, particularly for pop or minimal house producers.
The Orchestral Hits folder might stir memories of those old enough to remember the classic Roland synth patch from the D-50 but, in reality, these hits are all created from orchestral percussion sections, with a series of loops and atmospheres formed of timpani, gongs, suspended cymbals and even some ethnic percussion. They're good, reminding me of the kinds of effect frequently used by TV writers scoring chase sequences and dramatic thrillers, though again I'd like more loops here.
Far less dramatic, yet potentially more useful is the folder of tape, vinyl and static noise which pleasingly (almost) completely stays away from vinyl scratch effects to instead provide tape stops and starts, a wide collection of vinyl crackle effects and some electric voltage effects which are particularly great. Again, for sound designers and composers of minimal genres, these are sure to appeal. Ultimate FX covers a lot of bases and, in doing so, occasionally stretches itself a touch thin but what's here is well-produced and ready to integrate into a variety of musical styles.