Looper's Delight Archive Top (Search)
Date Index
Thread Index
Author Index
Looper's Delight Home
Mailing List Info

[Date Prev][Date Next]   [Thread Prev][Thread Next]   [Date Index][Thread Index][Author Index]

Re: Re[2]: Vortex Applications Notes



John writes:
>So, tell us, Jon, if you can:  Is there really some exotic and expensive
>DSP deep mojo in the Vortex, to justify the list price?  Or did the
>Lexfolk simply misguess the desirability of morphing along with the
>need to explain Bleen?

How much time've you gotz? OK, DSP-wise there's a cute little chip the 
likes of
which had never shown it's face 'round the Lex parts. Generally, since the
advent of the Lexichip (the DSP engine which powers all Lex processors from
'88-forward) the engineering staff snickered at the concept of using some
"generic" dsp chip. Eventually, some smart person put his hands on a new 
(at the
time) 2105 chip (manufacturer escapes me temporarily, sorry) and began
experimenting. He discovered some serious mind-altering delay modulation 
stuff
which simply couldn't be done within a Lexichip. (Now, understand, we're 
looking
at the other half of the PCM -42 equation here, JamMan being the straight 
delay
part, but you couldn't wobulate it. So...) Now, everyone agreed that a
modulating delay would be cool. Then somebody stumbled into the morphing 
thing,
and a whole new set of doors opened up. 

What we started to hear were a whole new category of effects. Think about 
how
long it's been since somebody had a "new" effect. Remember the first wah,
phasor, flanger, chorus? Well, now we had the first Bleen. Well, OK another
example might be better, but maybe not. We kept looking for unusual ways 
to go
about things. The reasoning behind the names was that, even though "Choir" 
is a
chorus and "orbits" is a leslie, they work really differently from their 
normal
effectoid counterparts. The envelope control was a big part of that, as 
well as
pedal control. And the more outside stuff (Bleen, Fractal) gave us a 
chance to
really get something shocking into the box to compliment the more "useable"
effects.

Morphing: OK, it was "an idea who's time had come", but I will say this.
Morphing is the primary reason I use the box. I use it all the time, to 
either
swell in delays, fast pedal detunes, slow ring-mod to
flangin/panning/looping--fractal, or sometimes leave the pedal somewhere 
in the
middle for horribly nasty beauty. (This is how Torn uses Vortex--the goo 
in the
middle.) 

As you can see, this box has so much it's hard to imagine people not 
getting it.
And I distinctly remember the first time we trotted it out to the LA/NY 
sales
guys. We had to clean their seats after our demo. "This is the home run 
box!"
"This one's gonna break us in MI". Well, kids, what happened?

BTW: The GC blow-out deal makes Lexicon $0 per unit. GC bought them at 
Lex's
cost to remove them from inventory. GC makes about $20/unit. Good profit, 
huh?
By 'em while you can, gang, 'cuz you'll never see anything like it again. 
From
anyone. (I can still hear the dirisive laughter from my friends at 
Digidreck.)
Then, 20 years from now, you'll be able to sell it for $1200 as a classic,
vintage, whatever...