All In the tests

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With such a name, can there be any doubt? EW has enlisted Ken Scott (sound engineer on the White Album and Magical Mystery Tour), Laurence Juber (Wings) and Denny Seidwell (drummer on three McCartney records). In searching for authentic sounds, the editor has assembled almost all the instruments, amplifiers, mics and outboards used in that period on these wonderful records. Vintage noise and artifacts are guaranteed, but they’re perfectly controlled, never making an instrument unusable. Thus you’ll have, under your fingertips, the sound of a 63 Hofner and a 64 Rickenbacker bass, a superb Ludwig drum kit, a 56 Epiphone and Strat, a 57 Les Paul, a 51 Tele, Gretsch, Rickenbacker guitars, etc. And some very rare keyboards, such as a Clavioline (a Selmer model?), a Baldwin electric harpsichord or a Lowrey Heritage Deluxe organ. Some tablas, percussion, sitars and screaming girls(!) complete a rich « instrumentarium » (13 GB of samples).

The question to be asked: is Fab Four only useful for Beatles covers or can it be used in other musical styles?  The keyboards, guitars and basses can be used in pop-rock or acoustic oriented music without any problem. The round bass sounds will sit perfectly inside a mix, their various articulations allowing realistic programming. The keyboards are amazing, even if the Madonna Piano could have used more layers. Also the harmonium, which has a great sound, could have used looped samples, since some notes are really short (some re-sampling?). Other great instruments: the Within A Sitar and its six articulations, which works perfectly in videos or movies, or the percussion with a quite rare set of real handclaps.

As for guitars, EW has sampled the chords according to the harmonic progression of particular songs, and also each note of these guitars. The Chords will no doubt let you do perfect covers of the song they refer to, thanks to the exact strumming, up-down strokes, effects, etc. On the other hand, it will be a bit difficult to use them to build completely new songs.

As for the chromatically sampled guitars, the sounds are definitely dated, without a lot of “body”, but this is what makes them interesting. You can easily twist them to make nice backgrounds by tweaking the reverb, pan and delay. Or make any kind of part, since you once again have numerous articulations for each instrument (slide, hammer, pull-off, mute, etc.). And it’s true for electric as well as for acoustic guitars: (••001-bluebird.mp3••) can also do (••02-modern.mp3••). Or if you blend this guitar (••03-roll.mp3••) with the harmonics of this one (••04-withoutalittle.mp3••) and with this bass (••05-come.mp3••), you can get this (••06-surprises.mp3••).

Let’s talk about the drums. First comment: it’s great having right/left hand and alternate (Round Robin) samples. Sound-wise, EW has faithfully reproduced every typical sound of Starr’s drum sets: dull sounding toms (the “cardboard sound”...), heavily compressed cymbals, short snares but with a lot of wires, etc. Hi-hats have a really pleasant response when played on the keyboard. You won’t be able to use every sound in all contexts because they have been recorded and produced (reverb, compression...) to reproduce the original sounds, but there are some real goodies to use here and there in modern production. Too bad you’re not able to pick various sounds and gather them within  personal presets.

Basically, Fab Four is a sound library that does exactly what it says, and that you can use in non-liverpudlian styles. However don’t buy it if you need a totally versatile instrument...