Brett Kingman | 2 years ago

https://catalinbread.com
Fans of UK band, Slowdive, will probably know that their second album, 'Souvlaki', a collaboration with Brian Eno, leaned quite heavily on a preset called 'Soft Focus' found in the Yamaha FX500, a half-rack sized effects generator that is now a prized find on the used market. Soft Focus was a mix of modulation, reverb and delay. You could use it totally wet and get the big synth-like smears of sound, and make the final result even more dramatic by placing some sort of dirt in front of it. Catalinbread have re-created that sound with their own Soft Focus. You'll enjoy a much better bypass signal than the original along with Mix, Symph(onic) and Mod controls and a little Easter egg that I've found, commonly known as 'overdrive' (just wind the Mix back and gun the Volume). The Soft Focus is good fun, bound to inspire and if you wish you can use it as a good old modulated reverb too. Add some delay and dirt and you'll be in interstellar space fairly quickly. Enjoy. Nice one, Catalinbread!

Today's tools:

Guitar: 2008 MIM Fender Cabronita with Seymour Duncan Psyclone Vintage Hot Pickups
Amp: Axe-FX III MKII running Cygnus FW 20.04. JC120 model + Crunch Box + stereo dual delay (250ms + 380ms)
Cables: BOSS
Strings: Ernie Ball Slinky or Paradigm 10-46
Mic: DPA 4166-OC-F-F00-ME Headset Mic (https://www.dpamicrophones.com) with Sennheiser EWD Transmitter/Receiver (https://en-us.sennheiser.com/ew-d)
Camera: GoPro HERO10 Black and Canon D60
Soundcard: PreSonus Quantum & Fractal Audio Systems Axe-FX III MKII (guitar, mixing and bouncing).
Desktop Monitors: PreSonus R80 R-Series Active AMT Studio Monitors (https://www.presonus.com)
Computer: 2017 Apple iMac Pro, 2.5 GHz 14-Core Intel Xeon W, 64 GB 2666 MHz DDR4, Radeon Pro Vega 64X 16 GB