Everyone loves the Rhodes, and some of the greatest practitioners on those vibey keys have never even touched one in real life. The real Rhodes company has been rebooted a couple of times and is currently rolling out customized new models from the UK at a price of $10,000 each. Vintage Rhodes aren’t much more accessible either. Most acolytes have a favorite keyboard with a Rhodes preset or a plugin that does the trick. If you don’t, Magic Tines may be yours.

The plugin is named after the “tine,” the rod and tuning fork that emit that rich Rhodes sound. Magic Tines is based not on sampling or synthesis but sampling AND synthesis, in which “all attack and release transients come from recordings of real life electric pianos, and the body of each note is created by a special synthesizer that uses math functions to simulate the exact behavior of a steel tine being struck by a rubber hammer tip… In other words, the best of both worlds.”

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It’s my lying ears or science, but this hybrid approach DOES seem to create a natural-sounding tone, rich as a real hammer hitting a real rod but which can be manipulated effectively based on a multitude of fine adjustments. Magic Tines has parameters for adjusting both the sampled part and the synthesized part of each note, an amp simulator with multiple variations, tube overdrive, phaser, stereo delay and stereo reverb effects a user-programmable velocity curve.

Magic Tines is available from GSi as a plugin for macOS and Windows for €50 or as an iOS app for $19.99.

 

⚪️ more music making apps and plugins /

⚙  AudioThing RES-09 emulates the warm strings of the Roland RS-09
⚙  Hands-on looping with Audio Damage’s Circa
⚙  Download ReCycle and sample like it’s 1994 again
⚙  Lo-Fi & downtempo by design: adventures with Orange Dreams
⚙  Adding space, texture and ambiance to your music with Airspace
⚙  Funding Yourself To Death: The Strange Story of Aodyo

 

5 Mag Issue 220
Out Now

MADE IN CHICAGO: First published in 5 Mag Issue #220 featuring Jamie 3:26, Ryan Sadorus, Alexander Flood, James Duncan on Canada’s Collective Rhythm Network and more. Become a member for $2/month and get every issue in your inbox right now…