One Sample Many Producers - Challenge

On Sunday last week a friend was over and wanted to pull something up on YouTube. I opened up a fresh browser with no history, and the first video was this: Hey mom.....5 generations...Ages 3,21,42,72,92 - YouTube

Like myself, my friend has just got back into music, and mentioned another mutual friend who has done the same (I’d love to see some figures for synth and controller sales since COVID, I’d imagine seeing a heavy increase?) and seeing this very random video inspired me to challenge them to use it as a sample in a song.

There were no rules really. We said 2+ minutes, use the sample as you see fit, and we’ve got seven days. No other requirements. The primary objective was not to use this sample in any particular way, but just to stop fscking around picking samples or fine tuning kicks till your ears bleed and just get something that resembled a song finished in a reasonable amount of time.

I had a few fairly decent song ideas developed around the samples, but an unfortunate update mishap on the Zynth disappeared much of the work as the weekend approached. This is more convenient excuse than actual loss, I’m just softening the blow for you so you’re not expecting musical genius from this post.

So this morning I took the soundfont I’d made and some of the ideas and produced this:

Other than the kick which is a modified NoiseMaker preset, this is 100% samples from the YouTube clip. The bass line is a zero point cycle I captured and filtered. Everything else, including the snare and percussion, is literally just pitched slices from the sample, with either echo or reverb or filter.

It’s pretty minimal, but it was my entry to the challenge. Needs better mixing and a few fixes, and I still wanna include the sample more. I may keep working on it, we’ll see what happens.

On the off chance it isn’t obvious, aside from the chops which were done on my computer with Audacity, and the soundfont that was done on my computer with Polyphone, this was created mixed and recorded entirely on the Zynth. Right now I have a friends MPD32 plugged in, which along with @riban’s new ZynSeq updates turns the Zynthian into an MPC! This track was made before the update, but using ZynSeq to arrange everything in the pattern editor. Thanks to the upates the next track will come together much quicker!

Anyway, please consider putting something together using the same sample, and sharing your work!

P.S - I don’t own the original video, it was just a truly random video, that made the whole exercise a bit more fun. Many thanks to the original uploader.

Edit: I haven’t heard my friends contributions yet, they aren’t due till tomorrow. I can share them if there is interest and they allow me to, but neither are using a Zynth.

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Great idea man! Sounds like a challenge that we could adopt as a bit of fun occasionally.

The lesson to learn from your recent update experience is not to update software mid-project, always backup your content and think twice before using bleeding edge development branches for production use. (Which is my way is saying sorry!) :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

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Was definitely a bit daft on my part. I keep meaning to move over to a newer faster card, and keep a backup image of a working state, but I’m having too much fun for all that!

Definitely don’t lose any sleep over it, all this is a bit of fun, and what I lost was no great opus. I have a recording of one of the sketches:

The main hook is a NoiseMaker synth from memory, but there is more obvious use of the original sample. Something to it maybe, but like I said, no great work of art hahaha

I’m going back to play. You have made my day/week/month for the latest ZynSeq release! One day I hope to be able to buy you a cold beer.

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Not too cold - I am British :wink:.

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:rofl:

If it were I who had ventured north I wouldn’t object to a tepid pint, it’s been far too long since a proper one, but you’d be disgusted with me if you came south. Since moving to Asia I’ve taken to the local tradition of drinking beer with ice in it! (I’m not even joking hahahahaha)

However it comes! (More-or-less, within certain parameters etc etc hahaha) I can certainly imagine worse people to bump into in a bar somewhere, whatever the beer may be.

Ohhh! It’s no so local … i enjoyed that shit on Cuba on the 90s but i thought that this venerable “tradition” had not survived the “periodo especial”. Now I see it has spread over the world!!!

I tried to import the tradition to spain, but after having lost some friends, i desisted :grin:

Cheers!

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:rofl:

Yeah, I wouldn’t dare suggest it going anywhere else. I like to think it serves a dual purpose tho, keeping my beer cold, and offering a little hydration :joy:

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