Downtempo Spirals ($34.99)
[Download Only] - [.wav format]
1.5Gig download --
Divided into 3 parts for easy downloading.
Opens to over 2.5Gigs of samples
when downloaded and uncompressed.
ELECTRONISOUNDS "Downtempo Spirals"
User Reviews
Scroll down to see user reviews of DTS.
There are currently 6 user reviews on this page.
DTS REVIEW BY JAY PHIL
Truthfully everything sounds good, and thats very very rare. Especially these days and times when people have a tendacy to take quality for granted. Hey let's throw this together right quick, give an unexpected hype to get everyone's mouth water watering, and charge a few hundred bucks for this unorganized noise that we call a "sample pool" and leave 'em with that empty filling that you get for christmas when you open the biggest box under the tree with your name on it, ONLY to find out that its just a box of old sweaters from 10 years back that the giver didnt want in the first place. Uh uh, that ain't right! Well this is not the case here.
Man, the file structure you guys have is quite amazing. Even though you have 3,000+ files and right at 200 folders, navigating through is quite a breeze. I especially like the way that the folders are split into 2 main groups; Loops, and Sounds. Again quite easy to navigate. Even with the complexity, you guys managed to keep it simple. That's a BIG PLUS++++ in my book. Nicely done.
Let's start with Groove Kits. Under Groove Kits you 2 have main branches: JUNEBUG Groove Kits, and Rythm Lab Groove Kits. These kits are like Whoa! I like the way in JUNEBUG's kit that you have all these loops that sound great, ranging from 88-100bpm, and then you have an example of how it all sounds together. And to mention that in this set you even went one step futher and broke down the oneshots so you can take the same drums that were used in this kit in the loops and program you own sequences. Not only the drums but the lead and pad sounds also. Nice guitar solos that can be used for a bluesy type track too. With the Rythm Lab set you're getting not only the wave files, but identical .rx2 files also. These sound good as well. But the kicker is all that "FUNKYSHIT" that's filed under JTEKK LOOPS. Yall call these loops, MAAANNNN they are more like tracks. WTF were you guys thinking ? This is crazy. I can't say just a spark, because you guys are some pyromanics! This shit is HOT! Can you say Inferno!?
Ok, to be honest, it's too damn much in these sets for me to write about detail for detail! You just gotta check 'em out for yourself. They have every file marked with bpm and pitch which is another major plus. Customer support is the fastest that I had ever seen. I had a question concerning the kit and before I had a chance to close my browser after checking other emails I had a reply! I was like Smokey on Friday -- Daaaaamn that was fast!!!
All in all this is a great product. Everything I checked out lit my flame. And thats rare. Every time I open it I find something different. Ideas just keep perculating. And the strings, OOHHHH!!!! Smooth as silk. To be honest, off the top thats what sold me. Even with everything mapped out across my board all pitches still sounded nice.
I can be here all day talking about this, but I'm not going to, I got music to make! For the price if you don't jump on this something has seriously got to be wrong with you! This IS a GREAT product and I will most definitely be back for more. You need to try it so you can be hooked too. I can't think of the last time that I got a kit and stayed up all night with it. Been some years.
There is nothing at all I can say bad about DTS. It's a keeper. My drum quest is over -- I have found what I've been looking for. I hope you bring your quest to an end also and do youself a favor and get "Downtempo Spirals. It's a MUST HAVE!
Samples production quality rating: 10+
Samples useability rating: 10+
Variety of samples rating:10+
Overall rating:10+
Thanks Guys,
JayPhil
DTS REVIEW BY DANIEL (ALOYSIUS) HOGAN
Quote from download page: "In these difficult times,
your support makes a world of difference!"
I like the acknowledgement of that fact. We are ALL
suffering. However, I'm now convinced that this
collection is really called: 'The
downward spiral'. That kinda puts a negative spin on
things!
This Library seems to be pretty packed! :) WOW! I'm
impressed!
My next check always involves viewing how well
everything is labelled. I find that it is best to make
any changes (if necessary) at this
stage, rather than messing up projects by making
alterations later on! For example; I like things
labelled by BPM or KEY. If there are
NKIs, then I like to create a Kontakt Folder on
another part of my hard drive. If there are Formats
which I don't use (eg, Sondfonts) then
I delete them at this early stage! Everything seems to
bein order . . .
Fuck me! These sounds are wicked. I didn't quite know
what to expect to be honest. First impression is of a
Mowgli SamplePack I have. Live
and dangerous sounding! This set is not 'polite'.
Excellent job!
Deep clean kicks. Nice! Many sample pack makers make a
balls of the kick frequencies imho.
REX2 = another plus.
All the samples are processed properly. I REALLY like
that. As a home recording musician, I don't have the
facilities to be able to
determine how best to set the reverbs etc. This is
part of the reason I like sample packs so much.
They're pre-processed by pros who know
exactly what they're doing. You've won me over on this
aspect.
Just then I was thinking; I REALLY hope they've
included single hits (one shots). Well, I'm looking at
a Folder called 'Individual Slice
Format'. I'd prefer the one shots to be honest but
these are dead good all the same. Their inclusion will
help nudge me creatively in a
slightly different working method/direction! Good . .
.
The grooves and all are inspiring. I'm thrilled to own
a copy of this set now. There seem to be different
pesonalities involved in the
making of what comes across as a very 'complete'
collection.
Bass & Rhodes. Well, anthing programmed, I'm always
slightly disappointed if the MIDI files have not been
included. They're not progammed
though. Are they? NO! :) It's just that if I'm working
up a track, I like the flexibility of having the MIDI
files for note/key changes
etc.
My two cents. This is a fantastic, fresh, full on
collection. I will get HUGE enjoyment,inspiration and
use out of it!
Overall rating: 9.5/10 (No MIDI? - No One Shots of the drumloops?)
Samples production quality rating: 10/10
Samples useability rating: 10/10
Variety of samples rating: 10/10 (plenty of different
'personalities' involved)
Cheers,
Dan
DTS REVIEW BY AARON BERGMAN
I have always loved mid and down tempo music. It was more sensous, and grooved a lot deeper than faster tunes. You could fake excitement with a lot of high velocity music, but you had to be real for the slower ones.
Downtempo Spirals is perfect for anyone making downtempo, including trip hop, ambient, acid jazz, and even old school funk. It lets you work in a lot of different ways. If you just like to put together loops and then add your vocals, it comes with a lot of excellent loops in wav and in many cases rex files. Even though the wav files are not acidized, the hits are very clean and respond well to tempo shifts. The rex files work great, too - especially since most DAWs support them natively. There is enough variety for many different tracks and styles. The most important thing is that these loops really groove.
The sound quality in general is very good. Downtempo tends to be a little more lo-fi. These samples are in 16 bit, not 24, but I think they serve the feel of the sound just fine.
Those who like to roll their own completely will find lots of one shots, fx, multi-samples (though without specific sampler patches) and a unique feature -- a number of soundfonts. The soundfonts are great on their own in a simple soundfont player, but they really come to life when you drop them in instruments that use soundfonts, like HG Fortunes VSTs or Alchemy. There is a great variety of sounds, both old school funk sounds like electric pianos and basses, guitar chords, and drum hits (though while not really acoustic), are very clean - so you could dirty them up any way you wanted. You also get a lot of great ethnic and spacey sounds that are very trippy. Even if you make more uptempo music, the sounds work well at faster rates.
One of the best features is the inclusion of so many chords, and not just major and minor. You can do some very jazzy progressions, though the sounds themselves are not really for straight forward jazz. This allows for some very sophisticated arrangements.
The primary challenge of this collection is the way the samples are divided and identified. You get two large files, one for sounds and one for loops, allowing you to start with whatever approach you want, and then look through the other. Each file is then broken into producer names, not the specific sounds. You get that breakdown when you open each producer's name. This then tells you all the styles. Things are not always really clear even here, because in the folder marked synth, you do not know which synth sounds they are. Some are analog, some FM and some a hybrid. They are excellent, but I spent a fair amount of time auditioning them. I realized that I should treat this as digital crate digging.
Tons of great sounds, and some wonderful surprises.
A lot of love went into this set. You cannot beat the value for the money. No matter what style of music, there is something for you. This was clearly put together by people who like to make music themselves, not just sample sets. Even if you make more uptempo music, the sounds work well at higher BPM's.
Overall rating: 9/10
Samples production quality rating: 9/10
Samples useability rating: 8.5/10
Variety of samples rating: 9/10
DTS REVIEW BY DAN SCHUMACHER
Downtempo Spirals is the latest download release from Electonisounds. It includes over 3,000 samples / 2.5 gigs of content geared towards making music that is 100 bpm or lower. I took a few hours to dive in and check this set out. Below are details of what I found during my adventure. Here we go.
Samples are broken out between two main folders (Loops and Sounds).
Let’s start with the Loops folder:
The Groove Kits/JUNEBUG Groove Kits folder contains eight different groove kits. Each kit contains drum loops, instrument loops, and one hits. You can make music with these kits regardless of how creative you are. Nice stuff. The Groove Kits/Rhythm Lab Groove Kits folder loops are just fun. There are lo-fi drumbeats, vocal snippets, scratches, etc in wav and rex2 format.
The JTEKK Loops folder contains a large assortment of drum loops. Many of them have bass and/or other instruments incorporated into the loop. Most have either been run through reverb or something to give them a lo-fi sound. Cool loops, but maybe too much there for me to feel creative. Just when you thought they couldn’t pack anymore loops in - you come to the JUNEBUG Loops folder. This contains a multitude of drum loops, percussion loops, and instrument loops. Most of the loops in the drumloops folder contain a rex2 version in addition to the wav version for each loop.
Onto the Sounds folder:
I was really excited when I noticed the large variety of chord types in the JUNEBUG - Sounds/Chords folder.
There are minors, ninths, diminished, augmented, suspended and major sevenths.
The sounds here are good, but the sounds are different for each chord type. For instance DTS-Am_chord01.wav, DTS-Bb9_chord01.wav, DTS-C9_chord01.wav and DTS-Cdim_chord01.wav are not just different chord types - they are different sounds. Also, there are no plain major chords. I would like to see this concept expanded out a little more.
The JUNEBUG - Sounds/Guitar Sounds are set up the opposite way. Less chord types, but they use the same sound/style for multiple chords.
The JUNEBUG - Sounds/Drum Sounds folder contains lots of tasty and well-organized one hits. Where applicable - the sounds are allowed a proper amount of time to decay. Gong01.wav is an 18 second one hit. Very nice! Also on offer are 3 different Trip Hop kits.
The JUNEBUG - Sound/Multi-Samples folder contains something for everyone (flute, organ, guitar, piano, strings, etc).
Also included is a small collection of nice sounding electric piano, pads and strings in sound font format.
There are lots of other folders and tons of sounds for you to get creative with.
Conclusion:
For me - this is new ground, and I like it. Most of my loop sets are a bit faster and more acoustic sounding. But I typically enjoy writing music that falls within the tempos provided by the Downtempo Spirals set. Listening to the loops on hand reminds me of “The City Sleeps by MC 900 Ft Jesus. This is lo-fi mellow stuff you can sink your ears into. The price is right so jump in.
Overall rating: 9
Samples production quality rating: 9
Samples usability rating: 9
Variety of samples rating: 10
DTS REVIEW FROM SAMPLESCIENCE
Electronisounds - Downtempo Spirals Review:
The first impression you will have when you'd just finish downloading this sound library is wow, it's big! Uncompressed, the full package 'weights' 2.51gigs! But a sound library is of no use if its sounds are bad, which is clearly not the case here! So let's have a look by browsing the sounds by it's folder structure. The library is seperated into two big categories which are 'Sounds' & 'Loops'.
The Loops
When opening the loops folder you'll see the Groove Kits & all three producers loops collection folders (Junebug, Rhythm Lab & JTEKK). The Groove Kits are then logically seperated by tempos & keys for Junebug & only tempo for Rhythm Lab. Only there I could make a dozen top quality downtempo tracks easily by just mix & matching. You see that there's clearly some time spent on the making of these sounds! The only problem I have is in the producers loop collection, the Junebug & Rhythm Lab have logical folder structure but the JTEKK one just have the loops all thrown in! It's also the only one that does not include any REX2 files.That's very unfortunate because they are high quality & I have to classify them myself (before burning my backup). Otherwise, a nice addition for me is the Individual Slice Format files in the Rhythm Lab folder, quite usefull to build your own drum kits from the best loop's slices!
The Sounds
One thing that I'm very happy to see is the soundfont folder! For synthetic sounds sf2 are fine & these sounds are a good example of quality sounding soundfonts. But, it's sad that there's only 8 of them though, I would have liked much more! The other folder is aptly named 'WAV' -- in which you'll find the Junebug & Rhythm Lab offering. In the Junebug folder you have basically everything -- it's almost a 'bread & butter' collection of sounds that would suit many different downtempo 'sub-genres'. The sounds range from exotic flute to pianos, strings to textures, bass to chords & many more (I'll let you discover)...
All the sounds are very usable -- crisp, clean & edited to perfection.
The Rhythm Lab sound collection is more simple. Here you'll find Basses, Chords & FX Sounds. I would say that these sounds are more processed. They have a nice 'in your face' touch even for smoother tones. The chords are (to my ear) a product of FM synthesis, which is a quite complex synthesis method that Rhythm Lab have mastered to perfection for this library. They just seem to fit very well in all my productions! The magic is here. Of course the basses & FXs are top notch too.
Conclusion
So this is my brief review of this giant sound library! As you can guess, there's a lot more to explore in these 2.52gigs of material. I haven't even mentioned the bonus samples folder too, which is a great addition to this already generous collection. For the 35$ it's cost is really a bargain considering the amount of effort & the quantity of quality material you have here. Thumbs up to Electronisounds for this quality fairly priced product!
Overall rating: 9/10
Samples production quality rating: 9/10
Samples useability rating: 8.5/10
Variety of samples rating: 8/10
DTS Review By LotuZia ( www.lelotusbleu.fr )
The sound material is pretty heterogeneous. You'll find in this collection loops, a few sf2 instruments, as well as many one shot instruments ( Drums or tonal instruments ). You get loops of every kind : Drums, basses , keys, guitar, synths, aso.
Sometimes the loops comes with separate instruments - One hit shots-, sometimes not. Sometimes you'll get sliced parts, wich are imho pretty useless as almost everybody can slice loops nowadays, sometimes not. You'll have a few construction kits (ie Loops of drums + instruments perfectly working together) while mostly the material consist of isolated loops. You get single shots instruments of every kind as well : Single drum hits ( a quite large and nice collection ), but also basses, keys, synths, pads and a lot of chords.
The best part of the deal is that all the instruments/loops aso share a common organic and live overall sound. If you're into downtempo, lounge, Trip Hop, New Jazz and even some urban and hip hop styles, you'll always find something that will fit your tracks. The sounds are full, well designed, funky, groovy or just kool, but almost all have a live and pleasant vibe. No plastic and sterile stuff here. Very inspiring material for the most part.
The less good part of the deal is that you'll sometimes have hard times to find the right instrument for the right track at the right moment. This is not only inherent to the big size of the package. After all we're speaking of over two gigs of sounds. The organisation and presentation of the material seems to be lacking of a strict and user oriented hierarchy. Do you need a 70 BPM drumloop ? You'll have to scroll thru at least 3 different folders to find it, because the drumloops are not organised by BPM, as you should expect, but by sound designer, and you'll also find some in the construction kits. Do you want some guitar chords, then scroll again into many different folders. The same with "Chords" which can be found in some of the the Loops main folder, as well as (you already guessed it) in some of the Sounds main folder....
A user friendly hierarchy should obviously follow some other rules : all 70 Bpm in the same folder, whether they were crafted by Mr X or Mrs Y, and all the "sounds" organised in thematic instruments folders : Keys, Organs, Guitars, basses, also. Much more simple, efficient, and well ... user friendly.
Two other minor rants : All the separate instruments and isolated drums sound should at least be organised in playable instruments : Drum Kits ( in Battery format for example) and KOntakt or Halion or another sampler playable instruments for keys, basses, aso. You'll find tons of intereresting one shot drum sounds, as well as nice basses, keys, and especially an organ folder with great samples. But the simple fact to have to organise each of them in a sampler or drum machine to be able to play them (or demo them ) is a serious loss of time, and won't unchain your creativity.
Then, for the very affordable price, and besides all the organisational weakness, you'll get a terrific amount of sounds, loops, and instruments -- if you have the patience to finish building some of them. All these sounds will play well together, because of their strong and unified sonic identities : They're meant to play downtempo tracks, they're meant to play in harmony, and this goal is perfectly achieved. Above all this, you can feel a big love for this kind of musical genre from the authors of the different sonic elements. No cheap or commercial crap here, they're in for the love of it.
Considering the very affordable price, I can certainly recommend this sound pack for all the down tempo lovers : Tons of loops and instruments when some other companies would only include this or that for the same price. With a little more care and user oriented work and a clear organisation, it would certainly have been a god's present.
Laurent Bourgeon (aka LotuZia on Kvr)
Samples production quality rating: 8.5/10
Samples useability rating: 7/10 ( Because of Organisation )
Variety of samples rating: 8/10
Overall rating: 8.5/10 ( Because of the overall musicality + Fair Price Politics )
Thanks again for the soundset. I will use it for some demos on our site :)
Laurent
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