Reverb Machine is probably our favourite blog on the web. It’s an excellent resource for musicians – particularly keys players or producers – to access in-depth, easy(ish)-to-follow tutorials explaining the sounds of artists that you actually want to learn about – like Tame Impala or Mac Demarco.
One of their latest lessons is in the divine art of dream-pop à la Beach House – probably the most celebrated modern artist in the genre.
Learn the art of divine dream-pop synths à la Beach House with this insanely detailed tutorial from Reverb Machine.
The tutorial covers a range of Beach House mainstays, such as Walk In The Park and Lazuli – songs that exude that classic Beach House sound: vintage organs, cheap keyboards and lush string machines.
It discusses the importance of the Yamaha PS-20 to the Beach House sound: “…it was even their main touring keyboard (up until 2015), and they would run it through a Line 6 Echo Park delay and Boss Reverb pedal. It has 10 different sounds and a sustain button that gives each note a long release time, perfect for flowing arpeggio.”
The best part about these tutorials is that while the author often owns the hardware used by the artist (often vintage or hard-to-find gear), they go to great lengths explaining how to re-create the sounds using cheap, easy-to-access software. Fro example:
“As you can see, the PS-20 is quite a big part of the Beach House sound. I picked up mine from eBay for about £30, but if you don’t have the space to start collecting vintage keyboards then you can use plugins to get similar tones. A good place to start is Arturia Farfisa V or Vox Continental V, both based on legendary combo organs. Here’s a quick patch I came up with in Vox Continental V that has a similar vibe to the PS-20 organ, check the bottom of the article to download it!”
Such good stuff.
Read the full thing at Reverb Machine here.
