Strings played with string - a universe of obtuse, impossible string like sounds.

All of that distressed string material from the original CLOUD series: the twine, the accents, the col legno, the beatings, the granular grist, the dark and pale reverb clouds rehoused inside a custom double DRIFT engine.

for FULL version of Kontakt 6.7.1 & beyond

£50/$42/€70

Drift Clouds

44 articulations · 210 snapshots ·

9GB download

A brief history of twine

The Cloud instruments were a dysfunctional clan. Each one started as an ordinary 17th-century classical stringed instrument - a cello, a viola, a double bass.
Conventional bowing has been done a million times, so that was out. What sounded more interesting was a ball of coarse garden twine, the agricultural stuff. But to record a smooth note an impossible 5 metre bow was needed, and I know thats impossible because I tried to make one. The solution, after many experiments and many cups of coffee, was a retractable dog lead, an elaborate pulley system and a vintage fishing reel, enough to hold five metres of twine under tension and drag it evenly over the instrument string. I also did some hitting and rough short bowing for extra accenting.

The new weather

The new style drift engine stacks an upper 'cloud' layer of 22 deeply sampled articulation possibilities - including noise and silence. With the lower 'shadow' layer which has the same sounds but in a looping engine that turns an articulation into a tuned string oscillator at its tiniest setting.

A semi random 'wander engine' adds subtle analogue shifts to extreme drunken staggering to lots of the controls. Layer mix, layer pan, drift speed and depth, tremolo depth, layer impulse reverb depth, layer shelving EQ and master glue can all go for a little wander. As far as you let them.

The climate change

CLOUD - the signature string on string sound. Long, slowly distressed, faintly agricultural.
BOWED - a real bow, briefly applied for the moments you need people to remember these were once respectable instruments.
LEGNO - Latin for "gently thwacked with the back of the bow." Still true.

BEATEN - hit gently with a large soft beater (double bass only)

HYBRIDS - pre mixed terrifying combinations of clouds and reverb

SUB - multisampled analogue synths, supplying the low end that the originals politely declined to provide.

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