Oneshots: Volume 1

Prior to launching Symplesound, I released quite a few Ableton Live packs on my blog. These downloads were very straightforward; basically one-shot samples loaded into Live's Simplers, so producers could use them as starting points for their own sounds.

I've been collecting hardware for years and it seemed those packs would be a cool way to give visitors a taste of several iconic synths – both vintage and modern. Granted, they weren't as sophisticated as the detailed multisampled instruments we now produce, but they were still useful. Basically, these one-shot samples were "snapshots" of each instrument's character, consisting of a C3 note or chord stab (since most samplers use that as the root key for audio files).

Last summer, I was checking the blog stats and was surprised to find that even after five years, I was still getting thousands of visits a month from producers and artists who were there for the instrument packs, despite the fact that I hadn't updated the blog in over a year.

Hmmmm...

So I decided to revisit those one-shots, giving them the Symplesound Treatment™. It made sense to create macros for commonly used synth parameters – and for the longer samples, loops were added to make them more flexible. From there, I refined several of the effects from the Analog and FM collections, simplifying them further, to make the package more cohesive.

I gave these samples away on my blog for close to five years, so I wasn't going to suddenly start charging for them. Instead, it seemed like a cool way to say "thanks" to all of the customers who supported Symplesound's first year in business.

Besides, companies always give away fun stuff to promote their holiday specials. Who am I to argue with tradition?

So grab the first volume of our new oneshots series and maybe a pack or two at 25% off.

After all, 'tis the season ;)