The Sound of Love Lost - a Kontakt/NKS instrument by Sam Thomas (licence key purchase to enable download from Native Access)

The Sound of Love Lost is a sound like no other. A pitched, synth/guitar hybrid that plays like an organ: utilising digital and analogue processing to create an effortlessly huge and harmonically encompassing field of force.

It features in the climax of the song ‘Love Lost’ by Isamaya Ffrench and Sam Thomas, as well as across their album 'Mantle' and Sam Thomas’ other work. It started life as the dirtiest bass sound that kept creeping further and further up the fretboard. It's been tweaked and refined by Sam over nearly two decades and has now been meticulously sampled (13 times per note and across a full 88 keys/7 octaves) to take full advantage of all the harmonics that can be generated by the velocity-sensitive (or fixed), integrated wah effect. Each note has 20 seconds of natural sustain, achieved with just the force of the sound itself or by utilising an EBow or sustain pedal: the result being a no-compromise, musical hold and natural tail at every velocity. Each note was recorded on a max-character guitar, with guitar/pickup decision appropriate to pitch of note. After leaving Sam’s distinct pedal configuration it would pass through a blend of choice guitar and bass amps before undergoing yet more harmonic enrichment: through hand-picked outboard EQ’s and saturation/tape effects. As a final stage the full spectrum was EQ’d, widened and optimised/blessed by Sam and mastering engineer/audio priestess, Anni Abigail.

It stretches from a grounded lo-fi organ-ish sound (Love) to a face-melting, unrelentingly beautiful wall of sound (Lost), perfect for huge ambient drones but versatile too. It is HEAVY when needed, but can also be made sweeter and more ethereal: focusing on the lower velocities/upper registers and/or making use of the onboard space sliders.

V1 of TSOLL has been kept clean and simple so as not to detract from the purity of the sound itself, however there are plans for a V2 update with a separate sequencer page. This would rhythmically vary the velocity (and therefore the notch-wah value) of multiple instances of the same note, forming dynamic rhythmic sequences. In the meantime, hooking it up to a drum pad can also achieve a similar effect. Alternatively for other uses, if the expression of the velocity-sensitive wah isn’t wanted it can be fixed at a preferred notch value (13 being all balls to the wall).

An unusual feature of Love Lost (the song) is that it begins in standard A440 tuning and ends with a blend of A440 and A432 to achieve a ‘sinking feeling’ wide phase effect. This effect is included ‘on tap’ in the instrument: an A432 slider mirrors the A440 option with the lower tuning plus inverted stereo field: automate it in to give the wall some Escher-like energy.

TSOLL is compatible with the full version of Kontakt 6.8.0 and above, as well as the free Kontakt Player. TSOLL is available to purchase from samthomasmusic.com/the-sound-of-love-lost