Depeche Mode - PHOTOGRAPHIC - Re-created w/ Arturia Arp 2600V

Published on Aug 19, 2014 peahix

"For the latest in my series of Speak & Spell era Depeche Mode re-creations, I decided to do 'Photographic' as an excuse to learn a bit about the ARP 2600 via Arturia's software emulation, the 2600V. The original track was done mostly, if not entirely with an ARP 2600, so I wanted to see how close I could get to the original sounds. The answer? Not very. I'm sure much of this is due to my lack of programming skills on the 2600, which I'm just learning. But I also suspect alot of it has to do with the shortcomings of the 2600V. Either that, or Daniel Miller & EC Radcliffe compressed the hell out of those sounds (or something)! The basic issue is that I couldn't get the 2600V's envelopes to sound anywhere near as snappy and punchy as the sounds on the DM track. I could get the patches in the ballpark, but mine all just sounded too mushy and wimpy. The kick drum in particular gave me trouble- I couldn't figure out how to get anywhere near Mr. Miller's famous 2600 kick. If anyone knows how to get it on the 2600V, please enlighten me!

Anyway, the one thing I am really proud of here is my reverse-engineering of the little randomized sequence heard throughout the track. Since the 2600V also has an emulation of the ARP 3601 sequencer (which was used extensively on the original track), I delved into the old user manual for the 3601 and worked out how this sequence was put together. The still image in my "video" shows the patch for this sequence. I was actually going to transcribe the entire part from the original (which would have been twice the job, since there's two passes of this sequence in stereo), but despite being able to hear it clearly much of the time, it was drowned too much in the mix at other times, so I said screw it. I decided instead it was actually more interesting to work out the 3601 sequencer settings for this part, even though inevitably the random notes that my sequence played are different from the original track. The note series is the same, though, which is the same note series as the little riff that plays under "I take pictures," making the random sequence a variation on that sequence. The gate switches are set such that half of them don't re-trigger the envelope, so you get note changes in the decay tails. I transcribed enough of the original part to verify that every other note in the sequence is switched differently. Plus, I got the actual 2600V patch reasonably close for this sound. The squelchy little hi-hat type sound runs on the same sequence just with a different patch.

OK, that's all I feel like typing about this one. Kinda lukewarm on it, given that in theory I should have been able to get alot closer with the 2600 sounds. But oh well. Let me know if you'd like my patches- maybe you can improve upon them!"

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