"Asian DreamZ" - A small but useful Ethno VST!

Of cause, this absolutely free VST can not compete with the big ethno sample libraries, but it is free ;). The sound is more than ok, but the number of samples is rather small. Available are: Pipa (single shot and tremolo), Luan, Guzhen, Erhu and a complete set of asian percussion. You never heared about some or all of the instruments mentioned? Exactly this is the reason why this VST should not be missing in the VST collection of artists who use ethno sounds from time to time. There really is no abundance of free ethno VSTs, and if you are looking for sounds of rare and/or not very well known instrument, you find them, if at all, only in high priced commercial products.

The GUI of "Asian DreamZ" is, as expected quite spartanic. But you don't need more:

• At the left you see a picture of the currently selected instrument. IMPORTANT: Many users do not know first, how to change the current instrument. You do this by clicking on the picture. It then switches to the next instrument.
• In the middle you find the settings for a typical ADSR envelope. You can achieve some pretty interesting effects by using it, because the original instruments of cause have no envelope generator ;).
• Also made for experimental fun is the filter section on the right. You can choose between a highpass and a lowpass filter and there are sliders for setting the cutoff and resonance values.

Quality: The samples are, in my opinion, high quality, but they sound rather flat without using external effects. I personally prefer such dry samples, because they bring less or no own reverb and cause less problems when putting own effects on them. On the other hand I heared about people who were scared away from "Asian DreamZ" because of the rather flat sound it presents to novice users. The builtin filter section is... well... usable. For simple experiments or LoFi oriented projects it is just right.

Conclusion:

• rare and (to most) unknown instruments
• high sample quality
• flexibility because of the dry samples
• absolutely low CPU and RAM load
• easy and well structured GUI
• stable and multi instance capable (FL Studio)

DOWNLOAD ASIANDREAMZ FOR FREE (CLICK HERE)

On my own behalf, March 23rd 2013

Dear readers of the Audio Arsenal, I am excited about all the public interest in that blog. first I thought, that I could abandon this blog quite quickly, because there are so many blogs out there on the topic and I am also not one of the most busiest bloggers in the blogosphere. The success told me a different story. Out of all blogs, including those of my music projects, the statistics of the Audio Arsenal are the best ones.

To reflect that success and to reward your loyality, I decided to enhance, extend and generally improve this blog. Of great help in this task is your feedback and the many inspiring mails I received. One of the most stated wishes is, that I should incorporate even more personal tips for VSTs, such as prefered parameter settings etc. This will take place in the future wherever possible. You will understand, that this will be allmost mission impossible with a VST with x-thousand parameters. But wherever possible, I will tell you my prefered settings from now on. The same goes for the detailed description of the components of the graphical user interface of a particular VST. In the case of a small plugin with a handfull of parameters, I will with pleasure describe to you what all of the knobs do. This can, as demanded by not just a few of you, lead to a complete handbook/manual for a particular VST. But if a VST has more than, let's say, 100 parameters, it is not very probably, that I want to describe them all. I know that most free VSTs come with no manual at all, which makes them close to unusable for novice VST users. I want to help you there wherever possible, but please understand that it can be just too much to cover.

Another request is for tutorials, especially video tutorials. Know what? This is allready on my agenda. Because most of the readers of this blog are FL Studio users at all, I do not have to think about people not being able to follow my tutorials because of a different DAW. The planned tutorials will be dealing with different core aspects of digital music production, partly FL Studio specific and partly not. Using these tutorials, I will give you a even deeper glimpse into my everyday studio work and also share one or the other "secret tip".

You see: It goes on. Thanks for your confidence and interest. I will not disapoint you :)