Most abused synths/tones

[CS_TBL]

ORCHESTRA HIT. I've finally stopped hearing it in pop songs. Yes, I am hating on the orchestra hit. It has ALWAYS sounded cheesy and ridiculous.

Man, was the 90s the decade of the orchestra hit or what? Well, the late 80s too...

Well, I'm not sure the concept has gone, but the means to build one have changed - and with that the quality has improved. Back in the days it was all a simple one-shot sample, which sounded like a lo-fi guest sound compared to the rest of the sound palette. Nowadays we can still have 'accents' in orchestral arrangements. Call them cadences if you prefer, but they'll be constructed out of genuine layers, according to the book of orchestration. Let's say that this (3:25 onwards) would be non-annoying in my book.

[synthroom]

I love the Orchestra Strike!

[ppg_wavecomputer]

[...] "Blade Runner CS-80" lead [...]

Nothing wrong with that. Gorgeous sound.

What´s pathetic is all those wanna-be CS80 impersonations executed on cheapo keyboards, like "it doesn´t take a CS80 to do this..." Give me a break...

Stephen

[ahaigh01]

Ha - I just finished a song with my writing partners that features Fairlight orch hit and some other stabs... The whole song was done with 80s hardware (and a little early 90s)

Check it out here:

[Z]

[...] "Blade Runner CS-80" lead [...]

Nothing wrong with that. Gorgeous sound.

What´s pathetic is all those wanna-be CS80 impersonations executed on cheapo keyboards, like "it doesn´t take a CS80 to do this..." Give me a break...

Stephen

That's exactly what I'm talking about.

[Hugo76]

Well, not a synth patch, but one thing I really hate is the auto tune effect

[synthroom]

+1

I wish peeples would just go old school and use a vocoder instead.

[Jay200MPH]

ORCHESTRA HIT. I've finally stopped hearing it in pop songs. Yes, I am hating on the orchestra hit. It has ALWAYS sounded cheesy and ridiculous.

Man, was the 90s the decade of the orchestra hit or what? Well, the late 80s too...

Hehe, I love orchestra hits, but then I like a lot of early-'90s stupid house.

Surprised no one's mentioned the 909 handclap. That was all over everything dance/house back in the day too. Sure, it serves a purpose, but you can replace it with a lot of different sounds that work just as well. I guess if you're doing drums on a real 909 you're a bit limited in options, but if you're on a sampler/MPC there's no excuse for not grabbing something more original.

[meatballfulton]

I'm waiting for samples of preachers sermonizing to make a comeback.

[Walter Ego]

Ha - I just finished a song with my writing partners that features Fairlight orch hit and some other stabs... The whole song was done with 80s hardware (and a little early 90s)

Check it out here:

I applaud your use of the Orchestra Hit. It's mixed better and more subtle than the ones I'm thinking of. Heck, I think Bill Leeb even snuck it into a couple Delerium tracks, but it's done much better than the Roland XP-type that I'm thinking of. But I also really hate hearing it in, say, Britney Spears songs...not that I would listen to those!

[Mac Moog]

Probably people trying to do some synthesized variant that sort of sounds like strings and call that a Mellotron. Usually a poor quality string sound with a sample and hold modulation on about 5%. It is so wrong. I'm not talking about those broken down old scratchy tape Mellotrons, but the brand new ones with the lush sound that is being so wrongfully and poorly copied on synths or bad samples. Nothing short of 24 bit samples will really hold a candle to a real Mellotron's half-speed brass, or 3 violins. Don't even get me started on the supposed Mellotron flute sounds going around. I've heard better farts coming out of an old monkey grinding a toy organ.

[tekkentool]

[...] "Blade Runner CS-80" lead [...]

Nothing wrong with that. Gorgeous sound.

What´s pathetic is all those wanna-be CS80 impersonations executed on cheapo keyboards, like "it doesn´t take a CS80 to do this..." Give me a break...

Stephen

They're like completely right though, go listen to the soundtrack again and tell me you really think the original lead is that special, it's not even that nice. It's all fizzy and harsh due to the post-processing used on it, has way too much dodgy reverb on it. Euch.

The soundtrack overall has a very nice and lush sound just not that famous lead whatsoever.

[GuyaGuy]

"Phat" Moog bass
Lush chorusy 106 chords
Brassy CEM lead
Hi-res 303 portamento squeals

[Bitexion]

Almost every Yamaha DX7 factory preset. Specially the E.PIANO1. Yamaha techs were kind of surprised that most of the synths that were returned for repairs had all the factory presets intact. People just didn't bother to learn how to program FM sounds, even if it was one of the best selling synths of all time, and it pretty much single handedly toppled the analog giant synths market. Most didn't even try to change the presets.

There were also several "programming the DX7" type books on the market, I have a couple of them. Yet still...
The poor Elka Synthex came out just in the middle of the new digital revolution and flopped like a fish on land.

[Walter Ego]

The poor Elka Synthex came out just in the middle of the new digital revolution and flopped like a fish on land.

So too with the T8, right? In fact, if I understand things correctly, the T8's bombing was the nail in the SCI coffin.