Rich in atmosphere, Zodiac offers a more organic approach in what is becoming a very electronic world.
Here's a collection inspired by 'musique concrete' - no, don't run away! It's an often misunderstood and pretentiously used term - as is a lot of French, let's face it - and a subject i studied (albeit briefly) a few decades ago. Essentially, it's a way of recording and manipulating found sound - that is, real noise: industrial, atmospheric, anything you hear outdoors - and this is a collection inspired by the process. So, as Big Fish states, 'no synthesizers were used to create the instruments in Zodiac. Instead, all instruments were created from organic sources'.
This makes the listening experience all the more remarkable beacause as you step throught the collection of 200 patches and play single notes or stacked chords, you get sounds and atmospheres from far-off places - other plantes, even - and as the patches evolve and develop it really is hard to believe that nothing electronc lies at their source.
Music Tech Verdict
Pros
- Inspiring atmospheres
- Great recordings
- Huge sounds when you stack them up
- Fantastic kits
Cons
- Some individual percussion sounds a little ordinary
- Some samples not so useful at their extremes
If you want something organic and inspiring to counter your real electronic worlds, look no further.
8/10
Original Source Music Tech Mag Feb 2014
