Live sound banks
Notes
In 2011, former Depeche Mode member Alan Wilder announced the Alan Wilder / Depeche Mode Collection, an historic equipment, vinyl, and memorabilia auction organized in partnership with Omega Auctions. Held at the Manchester Zion Arts Centre, the auction put $329,600+[1] worth of Depeche Mode and Recoil memorabilia under the hammer, serving bidders both in-person and online.
General information
Among the items sold were twenty Zip Discs personally numbered and signed by Alan. Each disc contained a collection of sound banks as originally programmed by Alan for the EMU EMAX and EMAX II sampling keyboards during for the 1987-1988 Music For The Masses Tour and 1993 Devotional Tour[2]. Each bank contains an array of sounds allocated across the keyboard for live performances. In nearly all cases, the samples were sourced from the original multitrack recordings.[2] Among these banks are sounds for song versions which were only ever performed live, plus songs which never made the final tour set list.
Copied from the original auction listing[2]:
The Zip discs will work in any suitable Zip drive and connect to the Emax via a scuzi[3] cable. Despite our best efforts, we were unable to transfer everything absolutely perfectly from the original floppies. The vast majority of sounds are fully in tact[sic] but one or two have small corruptions at the end of notes. The good news is that, with a bit of careful editing, these glitches can be removed. (Thanks goes to Tom[4] & Simon for their help).
The sound banks included on the zip discs were not the only banks made available at the auction. Certain pieces of equipment, such as Alan's EMU Emulator II, were listed as including unlisted Depeche Mode and Recoil sound banks, plus a large collection of various Emulator II sample library banks. If you possess these unlisted Depeche Mode or Recoil sound banks, please reach out to [email protected].
Alan's Comments
Copied from the original auction listing[2]:
I spent many hours (days!) programming each member’s keyboards for the tours, painstakingly trying to recreate as accurately as possible the sounds we formulated and used on the records. The Emax was a perfect tool for the live re-creations. This collection covers most of my own sounds for the two tours, although I did play live drums on some songs. I tried all these out recently and discovered how much fun it is to work out the various parts we all used to play. I even found some guide sounds which weren’t actually performed live but were used to demonstrate parts to others. For example, I discovered some guide vocals for Condemnation which were sampled to help routine our girl backing vocalists during the rehearsals.[5]
Sound Banks
This table lists the sound banks as described on the auction page, with some additional information not present there.
Sequences
A couple tracks have sequences that originate from Alan Wilder's setup; one track is sourced from an Emax II ZIP disc, the other from an Emulator II floppy disc. Neither of these are from the 2011 auction.
Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth
The sequence for Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth was present on one of Alan Wilder's Emax II ZIP discs, as told to me directly from an anonymous source who worked with Alan during his 2011 auction. The quality is somewhat degraded due to age of the ZIP discs[2] and lossy audio compression used for this track. The pops and clicks in the middle section specifically are the most obvious audible result of the degradation due to age. ZIP discs are notorious for their poor reliability, so this situation certainly makes sense. This track was previously thought to be a well-made fan cover, but I believe it is a legitimate sequence that was used during the tour. This information also appears on the 1987 - 1988 Music For The Masses Tour Backing Tapes page.
- Listen to the sequence of Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth:
Christmas Island
A sequence of Christmas Island sourced from one of Alan's Emulator II floppy discs was sent to me by an anonymous source. The quality is significantly better compared to the sequence of Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth above, which is sourced from degraded Emax II ZIP discs.
- Christmas Island (Emulator II Sequence):
If you listen closely towards the end of Alan Wilder's Emulator II demonstration video below, it seems that this sequence was the one he played over.
References
- ↑ Auction results (JustCollecting.com)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 The Alan Wilder / Depeche Mode Collection: 20 x AW / DM sound sample ZIP discs
- ↑ Pronunciation of SCSI, "Small Computer System Interface" (Wikipedia)
- ↑ Tom Carpenter of Analogue Solutions
- ↑ The Alan Wilder / Depeche Mode Collection: 20 x AW / DM sound sample ZIP discs
- ↑ Strangelove was also rehearsed for the 1993 Devotional Tour, but ultimately was never performed.
- ↑ Strangely, Black Celebration's sound bank is not listed on the auction page, despite a sound bank existing for the song on the zip drives sold at auction.
- ↑ Strangely, Master And Servant's sound bank is not listed on the auction page, despite a sound bank existing for the song on the zip drives sold at auction.
- ↑ This sound bank includes one-shot percussion hits for multiple songs, including People Are People, Master And Servant, and Stripped. The sound bank was available to all three keyboardists loaded via Emax samplers and were triggered via onstage drum-pads.
- ↑ Though not explicitly mentioned on the auction page, some tracks were also played during the 1994 Exotic Tour, with the Waiting For The Night and I Want You Now exclusively during that tour.
- ↑ Nothing was rehearsed, but was never performed during the 1993 Devotional Tour or 1994 Exotic Tour.
- ↑ Something To Do was only performed once during the 1993 Devotional Tour, on 1993-05-25 Forest National Stadium, Brussels, Belgium; it replaced Fly On The Windscreen in the typical concert set list.
- ↑ Leave In Silence was rehearsed, but was never performed during the 1993 Devotional Tour or 1994 Exotic Tour.
- ↑ Waiting For The Night was played at least a couple times at the start of the 1994 Exotic Tour.
