The story

A little while ago, I was messing about pushing big fat Moog square waves through the Strymon Big Sky Chorale reverb machine, with a view to creating something for the Winter Voices project.

However, the dark and foreboding nature of these sounds seemed a little lacking in Yuletide optimism. So I decided to take the instrument in a different direction…

Round about the same time I had just gotten hooked on the Stranger Things TV series and thought it might be fun to try and create an imaginary pitch for a bit of sound design for “the upside down”.

I whipped out my anodised aluminium Strymon smorgasbord, and set the controls to “radiophonic workshop” to create an additional layer of bonkers Sci-Fi sizzles.

I’ve included separate instruments for layer A, B and a combo. The raw samples are also pre-looped / cross-faded.

I hope you might consider the Alternate Reality Choir for your next Sci-Fi / Horror / Supernatural vibe project!

Reviews for Alternate Reality Choir (ARC)

  • Sound
  • Character
  • Playability
  • Inspiration
  • GUI

Leave a review to let others know what you thought of the instrument!

  • Scifi drones!

    This library offers up a few usable and evocative sci-fi drones. Mod Wheel is handily mapped to filter cutoff, and there's a reverb control on the GUI as well. The attack on this drones is really long. I think they would be more playable with a shorter attack, or at least offering up a shorter attack in the GUI. If you're willing to dig a little, you can access the ADSR for both volume and filter cutoff within Kontakt. Unless you write a lot of sci fi, this probably won't be the most useful library, but it's pretty cool and has a lot of character. Well done!

    Sam EcoffSamplist 28 October 2021
  • Ghostly ambient effects

    This is a really nice modulated and heavily effected sound. It really pulsates and keeps evolving and saying interesting. This would work really nicely in ambient music or anything sci fi related. Although you dont have much control with the GUI i dont really feel like its necessary i feel like for the job it does its perfectly programmed. This could work well on its own but i also think it could be really cool to use ontop of more chill ambient sounds and subtly bring it in and out throughout the track with volume automation

    septemberwalk08 November 2021
  • This isn't labeled properly!

    I am not sure why this is only labeled as an EXS download only, because it actually supports DecentSampler and Kontakt, and it's unfortunate because this is a decent pad sound that I'm sure many would enjoy. The sound quality is very nice, and there are 3 patches for you to choose from. The only control you will find is through the mod-wheel which I think is a low pass filter, and a dry/wet knob. Keep in mind that if you turn the knob down, the sound is still really wet. It'd be nice to have a more dry sound with ADSR controls.

    Alex Raptakis24 October 2021