Panu M Savolainen – Mindfields

This album was recorded in several studios in Kokkola and Syri. At that time I had real problems with PC, sound card and MIDI drivers.

Mad About is a bit hard to remember how I made it. The bass came from a Yamaha FS1R, which is surprising as it sounds like an acoustic bass. The lead was done with Novation Nova. LFO/filter fx came from Waldorf Pulse. Pads came from Yamaha AN1x and Roland JV-1080. Commodore 64 style arpeggios are from Elektron Sidstation. Other sounds are from Roland JV-1080 including drums.

Acid Rain was built around a sequence of Waldorf Pulse (cross mod sound). TB type sound came from Yamaha AN1x. Bass was from Novation Nova. Pad was created using Waldorf Micro-Q.

Afterlife was more atmospheric stuff combined with beats. Drums were Elektron Machinedrum, Quasimidi Sirius and Roland JV-1080. Repetitive synth line was Waldorf Pulse. Solo with high resonance filter and some distortion was from Novation Nova and Mellotron flute from Roland JD-990 Vintage expansion. Pads are from Roland JV-1080 and bass is from Yamaha AN1x.

Eternal Sleep was one of the favourites. Drums were again Quasimidi Sirius and Roland JV-1080. Pads were Roland JV-1080 and Roland JD-990. The LFO-filter-oscsync sound at the beginning and the bass were from Waldorf Pulse. Synth sequence background and lead were from Novation Nova.

Confusion was a rather repetitive dance track. The main synth was a Roland JD-990, which did the lead synth type in the first part and a funky clavinet type sound in the second part. The bass was a Waldorf Microwave XT. Pads were Yamaha AN1x and Roland JV-1080.

Warped Ambience Warped Ambience was a longer track and was quite experimental compared to the other songs. It’s probably the only released track where I used Roland Juno-106 and Roland Jupiter-6 together. These were quite difficult to mix because I didn’t have any good effects. The Jupiter did the LFO filter sound and the Juno did the lead sound. I also used Yamaha AN1x, Yamaha FS1r and XV-3080 for various sounds.

By The Light had a lot going on in the background. MIDI was struggling and there were some MIDI sync issues as you can hear from the track. Bass was from Waldorf Pulse, flute from Roland JD-990 Vintage expansion and lots of sounds from Novation Nova. Panned synth sequence was from Elektron Sidstation running through Nova FX. Drums are from Quasimidi Sirius and Roland XV-3080.

Cry Of Distress was created using Yamaha AN1x (squelch tb-type synth), Roland JV-1080 (synths, drums, pads), Waldorf Microwave XT (bass) and Roland Jupiter-6 (main lead).

Slow Down was mostly Roland XV-3080 with JV expansions. Bass was Novation Nova, synth sounds were Yamaha AN1x, Waldorf Micro Q and Waldorf Microwave XT.

Mindfields was the longest track (11:06) with few different parts. The drums came from several synths: Roland JV-1080, Quasimidi Sirius and Jomox Airbase99. Many of the synth sounds were from Novation Nova and Waldorf Micro Q. Other synths were Waldorf Pulse, Waldorf Microwave XT and Yamaha AN1x.

Dead End was made with the favourite duo of Yamaha AN1x and Waldorf Pulse. I can’t remember for sure if there was a little Roland JV-1080 in the background, but those were the main synths. The Pulse produced Crossmod monosynths and AN1x pads.