Not everyone’s Kalimba.
While there is a plethora of Kalimba VSTis around, “Gritty Kalimba” is special as it comes in two flavours which can be blended to taste.
* The first flavour is a very clean and pristine sound. It was recorded using a Brauner Valvet, a clean sounding high-end tube microphone. Here the sounds are classy, “glassy” and precise in the transients.
* The second flavour is gritty, almost crunchy with rich overtones. The sound breaks apart if pushed a bit harder. This one was recorded using an 1976 Winston DM100 dynamic microphone. The mic itself comes already with some dirt and almost distortion-like compression when pushed hard. Especially in denser mixes this can help to cut through and make the Kalimba stand out.

Both have been tracked through an ISA preamp and Apogee AD-16x converters.

In the VSTi you can blend the two sounds to taste. Special care was taken to ensure the samples are phase-aligned. Sending the output through some distortion or – my favourite – adding some wow and flutter can give you some awesome results.

Contributors

Laguna