The story
Oh my gourd, another kalimba!
About twenty years ago on a trip to London I visited Camden Market with a friend. We ate the best steak sandwiches we’d ever tasted and had a mooch round a record store where I picked up the first Unkle EP on vinyl despite not owning a record player. I was that kind of kid. Then, just when it was time to head back to the train station I noticed this stall selling various musical things. There were small drums, shaky sticks and a little kalimba made out of gourd. It was really just a block of wood with some flattened nails attached but there was something about it I like so I bought it and we headed off. When we go to the train my friend sat on my kalimba and it emitted an unpleasant crunch. Ah well…
I brought the little kalimba home and forgot all about it until two decades later when I decided to learn how to make sample packs.
This is my first go at a Decent Sampler instrument so I thought I’d throw everything at it. We’ve got round robins (which didn’t take long as the kalimba only has six notes and two of them are the same), delays, reverb, ‘wonk’ and global tuning. Oh yeah, and the choice between ‘pro-thumber’ mode and a special ‘two beers in’ option which ruins your timing. You know, all the stuff you expect from a kalimba.
I’ve made a quick track which demos the various effects. I’d love to hear what you do with it and if you have any suggestions about making it better.
Cheers,
Your friend, Pete
## Version 1.1.2 UPDATE:
Some people had issues with the GUI labels not appearing, this has now been fixed.
Interface
Reviews for OMGAK
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Welcome to the new world
I'm usually not a fan of kalimbas but this made me reconsider. Wonderful job!
Great work Pete!
A wonderful sound with amazing texture - thanks for the great job Pete and welcome to the DS world!
Dry or wet, it sounds very nice!
This is a very nice kalimba instrument with lots of depth effect options to mess with in order to give it some great ambience. It sounds really good and it plays well too, with four round robins (!) sampled accross 5 keys. Despite the nature of the instrument, the entire keyboard range is available, though in some extreme lows you might see a slight stretching of a prominent attack that exists in some round robins.
The instrument sounds very well in both wet and dry scenarios though, and the fact that it is available in DS makes it even better, since it's completely free for everyone. Awesome job by Pete!
Sadly, on my end it seems that the labels on the GUI don't seem to appear no matter what I try, though everything seems to work as intended. If that happens to you as well, you can edit the image file yourself, and label it according to the preview here!
