UJAM Grit Piano Release/Intro

[Brian]

$59 Intro ($49 “Loyalty”)  Assume the “regular price” will be $129

Uh-oh @Peter…. it’s a Wurli!

 

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[Brian]

Heads up if you bought the “UJAM complete” during the BF sale-  The fine print on the UJAM site says you are entitled to all new releases for the 30 days following purchase. Yay for me, I get this free 🙂

https://support.ujam.com/hc/en-us/articles/16101942298396-Grace-Period-for-UJAM-Software-Purchases

 

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[LinkedMusicians]

@bluescat I did catch the UJAM announcement of their Wurly plugin. Of course, that got my attention — you are correct, sir! Right now I have several Wurly Kontakt libraries, Sampletank libraries, two Wurly sample-based plugins. But the reality is, not many of them capture the great dynamics of a real Wurly very well and I wonder if UJAM is capable of doing that. They create sampled instruments with really cool sound, but capturing the dynamics of the Wurly would require a level of detail and scripting I’m not sure that UJAM will pull off.

That said, when this goes cheap, I’ll pick it up. But I’m going to be very pragmatic about my expectations. There’s nothing in that video demonstration that shows off the dynamics — the sweet tone when you play it softly and the bark when you really hit down on the keys.

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[Fleer]

Pretty sweet Wurly. In da house!

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[Peter DeLegge]

@bluescat and @fleer When you guys get it, please post your thoughts. As hard as it is for me to do for a Wurly, I’m not going to get it until I see a killer deal.

LinkedMusicians Founder. Your friend who keeps the beat.

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[Fleer]

It’s $49 if you’ve got their other piano(s). I love it. Dirty and gritty indeed.

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[Brian]

 

Guitar is my main instrument, so my piano impressions are gonna be worth… less?  If you have any of the UJAM pianos, it has the five “Character” choices on the performance page, which I assume are the available sample sets.  You need to mute the Finisher effects to hear them “raw”. As with all UJAM instruments, a lot of the “sound” from presets is heavily influenced by them.  That is NOT a criticism- just a reminder that if something sounds “off”, you might well be able to tweak it to your liking with those controls. OR- Consider disabling them and use a custom fx chain.

It sounds good to me, and it sounds like  a Wurly 😛  I hear dynamic layers and even a bit of unique noise on some of the keys, so I suspect they put some effort into building the multisamples.  You will have to try the free trial out and see what you think (only a week though).

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[LinkedMusicians]

@bluescat Thanks for posting those insights. It is interesting how many guitarists we have.

And, gosh, I completely forgot about doing a demo, I absolutely need to do a demo of this. The reality is, even if I love it, I’d still wait until there was a super great deal to buy it. We all know UJAM deep discounts just about everything (although, they deep discount with their guitars, basses, drums, pianos, and electric pianos, and not their strings, I’ve noticed — at least they don’t discount their strings anywhere near how much they discount those other instruments).  I’m guessing even if I don’t find that they nailed the bark of the Wurly to my liking, UJAM, IMO, is great at creating really inspiring presets for their sampled instruments. Their Vibe electric piano is a very good example of that. I have more detailed sample Rhodes — like The Famous E — but Vibe has a really unique set of presets that I really enjoy.

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[LinkedMusicians]

This preset demo video of GRIT patches confirms my expectations. Lots of creative patches that sound cool, but nothing that shows me that they spent time, effort, and scripting to capture the dynamics that make a Wurly so special. Being super candid, I wouldn’t spend more than $15 for this. When they have a killer deal on it, I’ll pick it up, but I feel certain it’s not going to be anywhere near the level of realism as you’ll find with Wurly libraries from Skybox Audio,. SonicCouture, AcousticSamples, or e-instruments.

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[LinkedMusicians]

CRITICAL MINI-REVIEW INCOMING….+

I just went through this and I can say that even if this was $15, I’m not sure I’d get it. It’s not even as good as what I hoped, and my expectations weren’t high.

UJAM pianos are nowhere near the level of a really good, detailed Kontakt library. You can’t compare their acoustic pianos to a detailed Kontakt library.  But UJAM aims at hobbyists and isn’t attempting to sell to the ultra-demanding serious amateur who is looking at deep-sampled instruments. I think anyone experienced playing electric pianos, and especially those experienced with Wurlys will be very disappointed in the way their library responds and the lack of authentic dynamics, which really are part of the fundamental essence of the Wurly. It’s gorgeous when you’re gentle with it, and when you slam it like Ray Charles did, it barks. They have a “bark” version in here and the effects treatment make it not even easy to identify as an authentic Wurly. It sounds like it’s from some knock-off electric piano; it’s so buried in effects, it losses the character that makes it so special .

I can’t imagine that this sample library has more than 3 velocity layers. It’s really not comparable to good Kontakt Wurly libraries from developers like e-instruments, SonicCouture, and Skybox Audio or the excellent UVI Wurly library from AcousticSamples. Those are all in a different league. As a huge Wurly fan, I have to acknowledge that UJAM really missed the mark on this one, by a lot. If this were a $5 special at Plugin Boutique or Audio Deluxe, I’d grab it. But I’m not sure that I’d pay more than that. Because I would only find it interesting for the sound design patches.

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