What is the best Electric Guitar for the Roli Seaboard

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What is the best Electric Guitar for the Roli Seaboard

Post by ms54321 »

Hi all, I have a Roli Seaboard Rise and certain instruments like the SWAM sax and trumpet sound incredible on it and take full expressional advantage of the MPE / 5 dimensions of touch. I have been searching for an equivalent electric guitar for it for some time. Marco Parisi has several well known youtube videos where he uses a killer electric guitar on it (Little Wing, Purple Rain etc) - but he is notoriously secretive about which vst/plugins etc he's using to get that.

So does anybody know 1) what he's using exactly or 2) what is the best electric guitar you can get for the seaboard to take full advantage of it.

Thanks!
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Re: What is the best Electric Guitar for the Roli Seaboard

Post by BJG145 »

I don't have a Roli, but I just checked out his version of Little Wing at Musikmesse 2016. :thumbup:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jh-hzbG5FzI

(According to this he explains it here, though I haven't checked.)

In general, I'm a fan of physically modelled instruments (like the SWAM products you mention) in terms of MIDI expression potential. It's an approach that allows you to mould sounds while playing them in a more realistic and organic way than you can can achieve with samples. I did a quick search for physically modelled electric guitars and AAS seem to do one which might be worth a look.

https://www.applied-acoustics.com/strum-gs-2/

Electri6ity is a respectable Kontakt guitar. There's also Session Guitarist, Orange Tree and Shreddage among others.
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Re: What is the best Electric Guitar for the Roli Seaboard

Post by ms54321 »

BJG145 wrote: Tue Sep 28, 2021 8:32 am I don't have a Roli, but I just checked out his version of Little Wing at Musikmesse 2016. :thumbup:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jh-hzbG5FzI

(According to this he explains it here, though I haven't checked.)

In general, I'm a fan of physically modelled instruments (like the SWAM products you mention) in terms of MIDI expression potential. It's an approach that allows you to mould sounds while playing them in a more realistic and organic way than you can can achieve with samples. I did a quick search for physically modelled electric guitars and AAS seem to do one which might be worth a look.

https://www.applied-acoustics.com/strum-gs-2/

Nice finds. Thanks!
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Re: What is the best Electric Guitar for the Roli Seaboard

Post by The Elf »

Firstly you will need a sample player - I use Kontakt.

I like the Orange Tree guitars, though I've also had great results from such as the stock Kontakt library guitars. The more of an over-driven/distorted sound you're going for, the less the source samples matter, but if you're after something clean then it will be worth trying a number of options. You may need to do a little editing to get the appropriate response. Sometimes you may need to use the old MPE trick of multiplying the instances of the Instrument up to allow for multi-channel pitch bend, if that's important to the part being played. For lead solos this is not so important, but for chordal work it can make a significant difference.

It is critical to get the amp/cab sounding right. I rarely find guitar sample libraries do this well at source, so I remove such processing; instead I use Line 6 Helix - either the real hardware, or Helix Native, dending on requirements. With a bit of grit and dirt going those fake-sounding samples will begin to take on a new life. If you're using multiple instruments for MPE then it also brings them together again as one instrument. Add a bit of delay/reverb and the illusion can be pretty amazing.

After that it's all in how you play it. The more guitar-ish random elements you can throw in, the more convincing it will be. Master this and 80% of listeners will have no idea it isn't a real guitar.
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Re: What is the best Electric Guitar for the Roli Seaboard

Post by ms54321 »

The Elf wrote: Tue Sep 28, 2021 8:56 am Firstly you will need a sample player - I use Kontakt.

I like the Orange Tree guitars, though I've also had great results from such as the stock Kontakt library guitars. The more of an over-driven/distorted sound you're going for, the less the source samples matter, but if you're after something clean then it will be worth trying a number of options. You may need to do a little editing to get the appropriate response. Sometimes you may need to use the old MPE trick of multiplying the instances of the Instrument up to allow for multi-channel pitch bend, if that's important to the part being played. For lead solos this is not so important, but for chordal work it can make a significant difference.

It is critical to get the amp/cab sounding right. I rarely find guitar sample libraries do this well at source, so I remove such processing; instead I use Line 6 Helix - either the real hardware, or Helix Native, dending on requirements. With a bit of grit and dirt going those fake-sounding samples will begin to take on a new life. If you're using multiple instruments for MPE then it also brings them together again as one instrument. Add a bit of delay/reverb and the illusion can be pretty amazing.

After that it's all in how you play it. The more guitar-ish random elements you can throw in, the more convincing it will be. Master this and 80% of listeners will have no idea it isn't a real guitar.

Good info, thanks! I don't have a lot of money right now so I was wondering - in terms of the effects if Kontakt Guitar Rig free version would be any use at all - is it worth a look or is it too stripped down?
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Re: What is the best Electric Guitar for the Roli Seaboard

Post by The Elf »

I never used the free version of GR. Given that it's free it would seem the obvious thing to do would be to download it and try it for yourself.

I used to use the full version of GR, but I was never completely happy with what I got from it, despite lots of careful tweaking. Helix Native just sounded fabulous to me, as soon as I fired it up.

If you know anyone who has bought a piece of Helix/HX hardware it would cost them $99.99 for Native...

I also very much like Overloud's TH-U. That would be my second choice.
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