Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ 4/5 Stars
Supporting all the main plug‑in formats, Bloom Aether Vocal from Excite Audio is based on samples of short vocal phrases, both male and female, that can be manipulated in creative ways. The instrument comes with 250 presets based on 112 samples. On opening the plug‑in, the window shows a preset selector and four macro controls: Warmer (saturation), Speaker (radio‑type sounds), Doubler (stereo ADT) and the Etherial delay/reverb effect. A 3D wave graphic appears in the centre. At the bottom of the window you can see where the samples are loaded, these covering two octaves of the controller keyboard.
The white keys play the samples, and the first five black keys bring in effects while the second five introduce sequenced phrases. The effects keys control playback speed, which can be halved or doubled without changing pitch; they can reverse playback or transpose up or down by an octave. The sequenced effect takes existing samples and manipulates them in volume and/or pitch to produce something new. To ensure the samples fit into any composition, the key can be transposed to any major or minor key.
A dice button allows random samples to be loaded while keeping the sequencing settings the same. Clicking the knob to the right of the dice opens knobs for Delay, Mod, Reverb, Lo‑cut and Hi‑cut. Clicking the icon to the right of the transpose section opens up the sample banks with drag‑and‑drop loading.
In the Edit view you see the waveforms, the phrases sequencer (up to 16 steps), envelope and pitch/formant controls as well as controls for the individual effects, the master output and playback speed. The start and stop location of each sample can be adjusted with snap to transients, grid or off. Looping and reverse can also be set here along with a choice of trigger modes.
Overall a flexible and fun way to generate atmospheric vocal sounds, whether simply picking presets or diving in and creating your own patches.
Now the important bit — the sounds. The vocal phrases are mainly vowel sounds spanning just a handful of notes, making it easy to fit them into your own composition. They can sound quite natural or come over as processed and otherworldly depending on how they are pitched and whether or not the playback speed is changed, The sequences can also have an endearingly unreal quality to them. In some respects, the way the sounds are controlled draws some parallels with Output’s Arcade, though these are very different products in other respects. Add a generous helping of reverb and doubling to a voice and it takes on a very ethereal quality, and if you want that far‑away transistor radio sound, the Speaker knob will do that for you. Overall a flexible and fun way to generate atmospheric vocal sounds, whether simply picking presets or diving in and creating your own patches.
£49
$59