Karoryfer Lecolds

String Cyborgs


String Cyborgs



I need the bullets for this gun. The humans are coming, and I want that treasure.
- Blackheart
Humans... my God.
- Zinc

Part violin family, part machine. The three String Cyborgs - Zinc, Blackheart and Ironface - use the processed and looped sounds of bowed strings (cello and double bass) as oscillators, and place them in a synthesizer architecture with unison, detune, filters and even some humanization parameters. Hide your humans.

They are named after the three Roms from Albert Pyun's movie Omega Doom - vicious, very advanced and even more fashionable killer droids. The sound (we like to think it's a very advanced and even more fashionable killer sound) is basically a very organic version of a virtual analog synthesizer. They are capable of many kinds of basses, from plucks to wobbles, as well as drones, pads, organs, evolving textures, various kinds of leads and of course string sounds. There is even a closed hi-hat preset.

Don't confuse me with logic.
- Ironface
What is this, your intuition?
- Omega Doom

Each of the three is somewhat different. Zinc is made from samples of a double bass being bowed hard with a lot of rosin on the bow, has a larger number of source samples which gives the additional ability to select how far the extra unison voices are shifted, and also includes a four-voice noise oscillator made from bow screech samples. Blackheart originated as samples of a cello, has a higher range, and includes a three-voice noise oscillator created by filtering some notes so that only unpitched screech remained. Ironface is made from quieter and warmer double bass samples, and instead of a noise oscillator includes a blendable set of distorted samples.

The 60 MB download includes 224 WAV files and 43 presets.

Drones like this bartender are basically weak. They're always thinking that someone good like you is gonna come save them from someone bad like me. Except I'm pretty much pure evil. I want all drones to know - good just doesn't exist anymore. That's my mission in life.
- Blackheart

This demo shows off the string, drone and pad sounds that the String Cyborgs excel at. Drums are from other sources.

Who's left to kill, anyway? We don't even know the humans exist.
- Zinc