What makes sound interesting? What makes it grab our attention?
When we started this project, we spent a lot of time talking about order versus chaos, why some old noisy equipment sounds so pleasing to the ears and why vintage analog synths are just so much fun. What is the secret ingredient?
We had a hunch that in this modern digital precise world there is a certain attraction in non-linearity and unpredictability. What may once have been seen as undesired imperfection now feels organic and soothing. The wall-of-noise of yesteryear's cassettes, that wobbly VHS sound. The distortion, the fizzle, the less than perfect frequency response. Even the unpredictability of equipment due to temperature, humidity, vibrations, or where the planets are in the sky.
Magic seems to happen when something comes alive all on its own, without you planning it out beforehand.
But how do you put all this into a product?
We played around in the lab with all kinds of source material and algorithms to figure out what worked. And - out of the smoke - RC-20 Retro Color was born. Finally our love of recording artifacts like noise, distortion, tape wow & flutter, the grittiness of early sampling and more fun stuff has taken (almost) physical form!
RC-20 has six main FX Modules, each providing one piece of the puzzle. For each module, our custom Flux Engine replicates the randomness of the known universe, and adds life, texture and analog goodness to the sound.
The included presets cover a wide variety of use cases, from individual instruments to full mixes and post production. As always, we hope the functionality to a large extent is self explanatory and invites experimentation.
Thanks for choosing RC-20 Retro Color!