Reply To: Wutlitzer By Rhodes Electric Piano Plugin – $49.95 (reg. $ 129.95)

[LinkedMusicians]

Okay, this Wurlitzer-related mega post is only for those with a hardcore interest in Wurlys (and know that is the proper spelling of the original trademark).

Sure enough, for those following along, some possibly distant relatives of the founder of Wurlitzer, who moved to the US in the late 1800s to start Wurlitzer in Ohio, got a German trademark for the name Wurlitzer and claim to be the heirs to the company. They have gone around demanding companies who use any Wurlitzer-related names for their products pay them a licensing fee. These folks put out a press release a couple of years ago that got picked up by a couple of music magazines that claimed these folks were going to release a new Wurly electric piano. When I looked things up, it was one person with the last name Wurlitzer, a woman with a marketing and product management background out of Germany. It looked A LOT like a scheme to make money from companies using any Wurlitzer-related names, that these folks really had no intention of producing any product, but just had an idea to make money from shaking down businesses for licensing fees with the claim that they were the heirs to the Wurlitzer company. I wonder if they’re even related to the  founder or just have the same last name.  In any event, because the Wurlitzer Company was purchased by Baldwin in 1998. Baldwin went bankrupt and its assets were bought by Gibson in 2001.  Gibson stopped using the Wurlitzer brand name in 2009. So, these people claiming to be the heirs of a company that was long ago purchased by another company, whose assets were purchased by another company, does not exactly hold up. From Rhodes’ press release:

“We are proud to see the Wurlitzer sound brought to life so beautifully by the Rhodes team. It is the most faithful recreation yet. Together, we have created what we believe is the finest Wurlitzer plug-in, one that truly captures the soul of the instrument,” said Luise Wurlitzer, speaking on behalf of the Wurlitzer family.

 

Do the Rhodes folks know this, or did they just pay these folks a licensing fee without due diligence? This excerpt from Rhodes press release makes me think that they paid the Wurlitzer folks looking for licensing fees some money to use them in their promotions. Now, I’m an affiliate partner for Rhodes, but I’m too much of a Wurlitzer history buff to not share this information. Now, I’ll try out the demo and give my thoughts on it later — but I probably won’t have time until next week. Being super candid, my hot take is that the demos I listened to did not show any hint of the clank of felt-tipped hammers striking the reeds that I find to be critical to the Wurly sound.

This is exactly why, as developers are now regularly asking about sending me NFRs of their products due to LM and my doing affiliate relationships, that I state that I am not an influencer and have no intent on being one, because I will not hype up a product to make money. I was asked about making a YouTube video for a product just last week. I told the person who asked that I have neither the time nor interest in becoming an influencer. When I really like a product or think a product is really poor, I will share that. But I am not wired to lie and hype products as influencers do. Full stop. One of the things LinkedMusicians was intended to be is a place where everyone can freely share their honest opinions and experiences (in a civil manner, of course) with sample libraries, plugins, software, and any tools we use without a concern for being attacked or censored.  When I really like something, I enjoy sharing that. If I find something really misses the mark or the developer’s service is poor, I feel compelled to share that. Influencers don’t share that. That’s not how the grift works. They’re their to hype products — that’s why companies pay them, not to give honest reviews.

So, I would love to get hold of every Wurly sample and plugin library and I have an affiliate relationship with Rhodes. But I can tell you something from listening to those audio demos. I don’t hear that clank that I believe is essential to a great Wurly sample library / plugin. I also can’t be certain, but I don’t hear any examples that illustrate the kind of dynamics that Wurly’s are great at. So, I want to spend some time with their 14 day demo and check this out.  I own around a dozen paid commercial Wurly sample libraries and plugins. The two I own that I find do a good job of capturing the clank, tone and dynamics of a Wurly are the e-instruments W — which is good — and the Skybox Audio 145B — which is very good. I don’t own the SonicCoture’s Broken Wurly or AcousticSamples Wurlie, but I wish I did. Based on their audio demos, they appear to be the best-sounding Wurly sample libraries I’ve heard to date with the clank and dynamics that make a Wurly library great.

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