Tangerine Dream got some of Wolfgang's first machines, and the 'Exit' album is covered in all the well known pre-sets. I remember being knocked out by the textures on this.
One day I'll have one. Other than that the plug in is pretty good. You need to understand it using another tiny GUI, but it eventually offers up everything you need. But sometimes I think I would be happy with just a computer and a PPG - and often add up what I would need to let go!
& Syn 303, I love that Wolfgang Duren album,
thanks for posting it.
I hadn't heard him before & to my tastes it is much more interesting than his contemporaries , except for maybe Rubycon & Force Majure,.
well it is more interesting perhaps musically but I love the albums mentioned above .( not that Ive listened to them for a long while)
I respect your opinion and can't comment on how those tracks were produced but I have enough classic analogs to keep me busy for years and I think the PPG sounds fxxking fantastic
These productions sound so nasty, the music is veiled in this feverish digital sheen.
This is the type sound that made me very weary of 80ies digital pop productions.
Not trolling here, just an honest word of reason, it really doesn't sound very good guys
You have a point, but only to the extent that like every decade sounds are used - then abused. There were a lot of albums with a lot of nasty 8 and 12 bit sample sources mixed badly on small format tape, or early digital multitrack and SOME do sound bad.
But you cant write it all off as being all bad as some objective fact.
How do you think the era of 'loud music' is going to sound in the future - people are already sick of it.
Anyhow someone mentioned Propaganda. 'A Secret Wish' is THE essential 80's album for the high point in production. The PPG is all over it, as well as everything else!
dunno which examples does George refer to, but talking about digital sheen would be absurd for Tangerine Dream's "Exit"..
its 95% analog instruments & outboard, recorded to tape, mixed on analog console. PPG Wave2 and Wave360 do some lead lines, and Synclavier I does some fx and metal scraping in the last track. Lexicon here n there. rest is space echo, akg springs and EMT plate.
@Groundbass: you beat me to the punch - its one of my favorite albums bar none. i just picked up the very version of PPG used there (wave2), after many years of dreaming about it. and yes some of the exit presets are still there..
loved Propagandas first album back then, her strange voice and what Trevor Horn did there with production, and all those ppgs 2.2/2.3, fairlights, jupiter and prophet5 iirc.. nowadays i re-visit it from time to time. too intense. it was groundbreaking then that's for sure.
also, still love Saga's album "Worlds Apart" (1981) to this day... lot of multimoog bass, mini, polymoog and CS80 for pads/strings. PPG Wave2. perfect combination.
Agreed. It just doesn't get much better than Trevor Horn's productions during his golden period, if you ask me... top musicians, top songs, top arrangements, top recording. Speaking of Propaganda, I think "Duel" is a masterpiece, one of my favorite songs ever since I heard it the first time when it came out..
dunno which examples does George refer to, but talking about digital sheen would be absurd for Tangerine Dream's "Exit"....
Ok, you got me, I didn't listen to the Tangerine Dream track because I know them well enough, but I listened to the OPs System video and the Wolfgang Duren one, and they have this skull-splitting digital feel. Hence it's a bit of a mystery to me why these machines are considered highly valueable, except when I consider sentimental motivations, and that's fine of course.
One thing to bare in mind is that with some sonic overlap, and the fashion for stacking it is sometimes difficult to tease apart what is what.
The DX7 can do a good 'PPG' - I have a couple of pre-sets - one called 'hyperbor' which outdoes anything from the waldorf plug in for shear 'klang'. Obvious wavetable sweeps give it away, and that vocalish sound that T.D were fond of, but its not always easy to separate what is what on 80's records. In fact you don't get close to some of those sounds until you start to layer, certainly the big Trevor Horn stuff.
In fact interestingly by 1988 the Keyfax series that reviewed keyboards, No 3 I think, gave the PPG and Waveterm 2/5 stars, since the reviewer by then saw it as dated and entirely replaceable with cheaper samplers or...a D50....!
I love my Wave 2 and 2.3. Would'nt swap them for anything.
People bashing the PPG Waves, never tried one. Analog purists gives me ear fatigue :
Finally something else then farty old hippies torturing the poor ppg
But are you sure front 242 used ppg?
They were heavily into ms20 and Emu Emulators, but that they used ppg is new for me. The mc 4 is just as beautifull a machine as the waves btw.
Finally something else then farty old hippies torturing the poor ppg
But are you sure front 242 used ppg?
They were heavily into ms20 and Emu Emulators, but that they used ppg is new for me. The mc 4 is just as beautifull a machine as the waves btw.
Front 242 did use a PPG wave on Geography at least. It's listed
among the synths used on that record.
Do you have a link?
I've seen a lot of 242, but never a ppg around them.
The first sound in Controversy Between is preset no. 95 from Wave 2. And a great sounding one it is! Once in a while give my neighbours a good shake with it. Sounds amazing live in your living room. Controversy Between is full of Wave 2 sounds.
There is several 242 vids on the tube where you can see them with the Wave 2
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- its one of my favorite albums bar none. i just picked up the very version of PPG used there (wave2), after many years of dreaming about it. and yes some of the exit presets are still there..
