New Gibson EB 5-String Bass Expansion Pack now available!

On the heel's of last month's free giveaway, Craig Anderton has created a brand new, stunning Gibson EB 5-String Bass Expansion Pack for Dimension Pro. Regularly $39.99, we are selling it through Feb. 28 for only $19.99.
 
Download it today
 
Craig has also put together a blog article which details the creation of this very special expansion pack.

Oh crap... did I miss the freebie? I thought it was still Guitar Month. I was looking at that a couple days ago but had other (extremely boring) stuff to do.
 
/sad panda

rontarrant
Is this the same as the freebie?

Not at all! The freebie was me messing around with one of the EB 5-String's eight "native" sounds...some of the notes were synthesized, they were all looped, etc.. But I liked the results, so offered it to the community as a freebie to say "thank you."
 
The new collection is a much more thorough exploitation of the EB. I sampled all 8 sound to create 8 different instruments, with each note sampled individually and allowed to sustain. I wrote a blog post about the process with a lot more information. I also created an additional 8 "growl" instruments that are variations on the original 8 with a more aggressive tone.
 
The mod wheel emulates pulling back on the tone control, and there are 5 down slides, 5 up/down slides, and 1 FX included in the octave below the Low B.
 
My goal was to create as pure and realistic a sound as possible of the eight different EB "native" sounds so that with subsequent processing (EQ, amp sim, distortion, etc.) they could fit into a wide range of productions. The bottom line is I really like the sound of the EB 5-String, and wanted to have a full set of samples so I could use them in my own projects.
 
There's an audio example (with more to come!) on the store page.

will there be any freeb's for bass month ?
 
thanks

Craig,  I bought the pack this week and have listened to and played with most of the pack.  Wow.  Fantastic sounds that jump off my monitors!
 
Thank you so much for your efforts to this project.  I will enjoy building sounds and such with the goodies.

FCCfirstclass
Craig,  I bought the pack this week and have listened to and played with most of the pack.  Wow.  Fantastic sounds that jump off my monitors!
 
Thank you so much for your efforts to this project.  I will enjoy building sounds and such with the goodies.

Glad you're enjoying it!

Anderton
Hey Andrew - Fixed the typo, it's EB, not Eb
 
Thanks for putting up the audio example! I'll see about generating some more demos, I have some complete songs that use the bass so it gives good context.

Hi Craig,
 
I like your blogs - keep them coming!
 
Just one thing though - the sound clips you have are stored using the "Cakewalk Software" SoundCloud user ID.  I followed the user in SC and now have had my stream flooded with these "before and after" sounds used in your blogs. 
 
Is it possible to "hide" these clips in SC and still use them in your blogs? 
 
Please understand, they're just junk in my SC stream but very useful in your blogs..
 
Jim

Anderton

JimmyBoy
Just one thing though - the sound clips you have are stored using the "Cakewalk Software" SoundCloud user ID.  I followed the user in SC and now have had my stream flooded with these "before and after" sounds used in your blogs. 
 
Is it possible to "hide" these clips in SC and still use them in your blogs?

I don't think so, unless I create a separate SoundCloud account and use that, which would complicate matters. Sorry...I promise I'll make the clips as entertaining as possible in the future

You do know that you can "Edit" the library of sound(s) in your soundcloud and specify them as Private, then the clip won't get mixed up into others stream...  You should still be able to embed the sound in your blogs.
 

 
In anycase, I've stopped following and have blocked the Cakewalk Software user in SC. 

Not being harsh,  I tried to block and didn't remove the sounds from my stream...
 
If I still had following enabled for Cakewalk Software then I would have seen the bass sounds from your new blogs you recently put up, they would have been included in my stream too.

Beepster
So what I was going to do to beef it up a bit was use Melodyne to convert my live bass tracks to MIDI then dig around the various bass sounds or even some of the wackier stuff to double up and blend with the live part.

 
I'm getting into playing bass parts on guitar, then using Melodyne to convert to MIDI and drive the bass sounds. Of course I need to clean up things a bit, but not much. I think I'll post one more example of the EB 5-String Bass Expansion Pack in context with a complete song. What's cool is that it sticks out of the track but isn't mixed particularly high...I definitely recommend some high-frequency shelving on the EB bass sounds if you want them to be prominent as opposed to lay back in the track.
 

Still wish I hadn't missed out on that freebie. Gotta stop dilly dallying on stuff like that. I guess I just assume that once it's out there it will remain available but after missing out a few times already apparently I was wrong.

No worries, the Bass Freebie, Wah FX chain, Power Chord FX chain, AND the AdrenaLinn Guitar loop library samples are still available. Just go to the Cakewalk Blog and scroll down to the Guitar Month Bonus Pack entry and you'll find links for all four.

Anderton

Beepster
So what I was going to do to beef it up a bit was use Melodyne to convert my live bass tracks to MIDI then dig around the various bass sounds or even some of the wackier stuff to double up and blend with the live part.

 
I'm getting into playing bass parts on guitar, then using Melodyne to convert to MIDI and drive the bass sounds. Of course I need to clean up things a bit, but not much. I think I'll post one more example of the EB 5-String Bass Expansion Pack in context with a complete song. What's cool is that it sticks out of the track but isn't mixed particularly high...I definitely recommend some high-frequency shelving on the EB bass sounds if you want them to be prominent as opposed to lay back in the track.

I'm mostly a guitar guy as well but did play bass for many many years in a down and dirty crust band and filled in for various other bands on bass over the years when need be. I actually really enjoy playing bass but back then I did fall into the trap of Playing bass like a guitar player". In more recent years I hung out with and played in a couple bands with... well the guy was just a master bass player. So good, so free with his runs but always on top of the rhythm. I picked up a lot of ideas/concepts from him and now that I've got my little studio set up I'm finally laying down some "real" bass lines (even if I'm still using a pick but it's kind of necessary for the heavier stuff I'm doing and it compensates for the mediocre P-Bass pickup).
 
However, and this is kind of off topic, but doing octaving stuff with the guitar where there are ultra lows (bass range) doubling the main part has really caught my attention as far as adding some wacky flavor. If you have finally picked up the full version of TH2 (you said you were thinking about it a while back) check out a preset called Rumble Bee. It's kind of ridiculous but pretty darned awesome. It has some limitations but I bet you with all your knowledge could figure out some fancy ways to reverse engineer it to do all sorts of silly things. It certainly gave me some ideas.
 

Still wish I hadn't missed out on that freebie. Gotta stop dilly dallying on stuff like that. I guess I just assume that once it's out there it will remain available but after missing out a few times already apparently I was wrong.

No worries, the Bass Freebie, Wah FX chain, Power Chord FX chain, AND the AdrenaLinn Guitar loop library samples are still available. Just go to the Cakewalk Blog and scroll down to the Guitar Month Bonus Pack entry and you'll find links for all four.




Now THAT is awesome. Thank you kind sir. This may indeed end up on my current track. I usually use the Zeta+2 Alembic patch for my "real" bass synth sound but this will likely work out much better. Thanks again. Cheers.
 
 

Definitely. As I said this is the type of patch I'd be into as more of a "live" type artist who's gear is somewhat... um... well crappy. I can get my bass input sound pretty good now after all my studying and tweaking the heck out of things but having good, solid, perfectly tuned samples to fill things out would make things easier. I am really happy Cake implemented the ARA audio to MIDI feature and hooked up with Melodyne for exactly this type of thing. Even the live tracks will benefit from Melodyne for simple tuning corrections. I've seen it mentioned multiple times that folks were using V-Vocal on their bass lines to nudge notes into pitch to compensate for intonation issues and the inevitable string wobble that comes from the thickness/longer scale of a bass guit. However I also saw a lot of posts complaining V-Vocal was quite finicky and even more folks (who were lucky to own the product already) praising Melodyne in general. So very much looking forward to playing with all these things. Currently I'm just practicing up/writing a bass part so I haven't tried it all out yet but getting close to having some useable tester tracks and very much looking forward to trying these ideas out.
 
Cheers.

If you want to hear the EB bass sound in a complete piece of music, I've posted a music video that uses it on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8o-ZTb2yb4g
 
This is a cover version of a song called "Only Ever After You," written by British songwriter Mark Longworth; he's given me permission to post it (thanks Mark). The bass doesn't come in until about 1:30, but it sounds pretty cool in context...I wanted to hear a big, defined bass sound in the production.
 
The guitar parts I played were all Gibson LPX, in case anyone wonders. The entire song was recorded in Pro Tools (kidding!!!!!!!!). The sound effects were created by Romanian DJ Sunny LAX.
 
BTW this is an unlisted URL, but feel free to share it if you want. It will go public at some point anyway. I just wanted to make sure y'all had an opportunity to hear the bass sound in context  if you're interested.

Fog

grumbleweed4162
Just downloading now. It'll be nice to be able to use bass sounds in Sonar rather than having to boot up Propellerhead Reason to use the Reason Bass Refill each time I make a track!
 
Grum.

but as you know, yaself.. props excell at sampling stuff..

But I have a low B now!
I haven't had much time to really get into this new Pack but I like what I've heard so far.

Grum.

konradh
The audio examples are phenomenal and the prices is extremely reasonable.  Is the process for installing a new instrument in Dim Pro explained somewhere (perhaps in a READ ME that comes with the download)?

Here's the text for the read me included with the pack.
 
GIBSON EB 5-STRING BASS EXPANSION PACK

Highlights

* 644MB of 44.1kHz/24-bit mono samples (unlooped)
* Each note sampled individually
* Covers the entire EB 5-string range
* 8 bass instrument sounds
* 16 programs (8 pure, 8 "growl")
* Each instrument includes ten slides and one FX sound
* Mod wheel "tone control"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

INSTALLING THE EB5 SAMPLES AND PROGRAMS

Copy the folder "50 - Gibson EB5 Bass" into:

C:\Program Files\Cakewalk\Dimension Pro\Multisamples

(If you moved the Multisamples folder from its default, copy the folder "50 - Gibson EB5 Bass" into wherever the Dimension Pro\Multisamples file is located.)

Then copy the folders "Gibson EB5 Bass Pure" and "Gibson EB5 Bass Growl" into:

C:\ProgramData\Cakewalk\Dimension Pro\Programs\03 - Real Basses

Note: The ProgramData folder defaults to being a "hidden" folder. If it isn't visible, in Windows 7 with the C: drive window open, click on the "Organize" drop-down menu and select "Folder and search options." Click the "View" tab and under "Advanced Settings > Hidden Files and Folders," click "Show hidden files, folders, and drives." Click on "Apply to Folders" and then click "OK."

SELECTING AND PLAYING THE PROGRAMS

Open Dimension Pro. Click in the Program Browser field and press F5 to refresh the program list. This can take a while if you have lots of programs; be patient.

In the "03 - Real Basses" category, you'll now find the "Gibson EB5 Bass Pure" and "Gibson EB5 Bass Growl" folders. Expand them to access the individual patches.

TROUBLESHOOTING
 
If your Dim Pro folders are not located in the defaults or have been moved, you might receive an error message saying on or more .sfz files can't be found. Note the .sfz file name shown in the error message, then click OK to dismiss it.

After the program has loaded, click the E1 (Element 1 select) button, then click in the Load Multisample field (just below the four Element select buttons), navigate to the "50 – Gibson EB5 Bass" folder, click on the missing .sfz file, then click open. Save the program so it will remember the correct .sfz file location in the future.