Erasure • Features • Private Ear

As you'll have read elsewhere in this Issue, 'Lucky Bastard' is the name of Vlnce's new sample CD, released this month by AMG. Apart from featuring over 1,000 individual sounds and effects, all programmed specially by Vince on his collection of classic analogue keyboards.

It also features a complete track at the start of the CD, demoing some of the sounds in context. 'Enchanted' are the mysterious young duo who have written and produced the track. called 'V.C.A.' - which only uses sounds taken from the CD itself.

It sounds like an Erasure fan's ultimate dream - to be able to take Vince's sounds and turn them into another track to appear on a Clarke CD. So Private Ear decided to investigate further. Although their identities remain a closely-guarded secret, the boys behind Enchanted admit they "were born in 1973, despise rock music, and look fabulous in diamante." Er...

So how did you get involved with 'Lucky Bastard'?

"AMG knew we were heavily into analogue synths, sampling and production, and basically asked us out of the blue if we'd like to write a track for the CD. We were gob smacked, really - the idea of paying homage to the power of analogue using sounds that Vince actually programmed was incredible."

Are you big Erasure fans, then?

"We grew up in a nasty, traditional grammar school where 148 out of a form of 150 were obsessed with rock music - we were force fed U2, The Wonderstuff, REM and so on because that's what the 'popular' rugger boys liked. You're nobody unless you're into that kind of 'cool' music, and wanted to be Jimi Hendrix or Eric Clapton."

"But because we loved disco, dance, electronic and pop stuff, we tended to look to groups like Erasure, Depeche, Kraflwerk and PSB for enjoyment - which unfortunately put us in a rebellious minority. Ironic, isn't it? It's probably something which happens to quite a few electro-music: fans. So we wrote songs. One was called 'Rugby Boys' and had a chorus that went 'Rugby Boys / They're not very scary at all / Rugby Boys / There's probably more brains in the ball'" [they break into peals of laughter].

"Anyway, we swore we'd get our revenge by having one of our own synth-based tracks released before any of the rugger lads could inflict misery on the world with their electric guitars and Marshall amps. And now we have! In a funny sort of way, it's thanks to Vince - he's helped pop score yet another smal1 victory by doing this CD. Cheers, Vince..."

How easy was it to put the track together from Vince's sounds?

The process involved was actually quite simple, it a little time-consuming. AMG sent us a DAT copy of the sounds that were to appear on the CD, which we listened to several times before picking out a selection that would work together. Because we could only use Vince's sounds, we had to find ones that could be employed as kick drums, snares, cymbals, basses... but the real problem was picking the best, as all the samples are excellent."

"Then all the sounds were individually sampled into an Akai 83000 sampler, with 10meg of memory, in the same way that anyone buying the finished CD would use them."

"By controlling the sampler from a MIDI keyboard and Atari computer, we were able to build up, sound by sound, a complete track, which was then mixed on a fairly standard mixing desk and recorded back to DAT."

"As we said, it sounds simple, but it took a whole weekend just to get the various sounds - around forty different ones are in the final track - sampled and edited on the Akai. It's strange that analogue sounds end up being used like that - having all of Vince's keyboards would still be our first choice - but it works well."

"At the end of the day, his CD offers makes all those distinctive erasure sounds available to anyone with a modest sampler and MIDI system, and thats priceless."

A real bonus on the CD is the selection of sounds Vince used to program the drums and effects for the 'Phantasmagorical Entertainment', all taken from the actual Akai MPC60 installed in his Tank. If you listen to our track, you can hear the siren noise that started the concert by shaking you out of your seat before Andy came on; you can also hear the thunder used at the start of Home. You might not be able to recognise them, but the hi-hats are from the Abba-esque section, and the snares are from Love To Hate You and Who Needs Love. It was like working with gold dust."

What's the finished track like? Would Vince and Andy like it?

"We hope they do. The bassline is typically Hi-NRG, like Donna Summer, and there are some ravey sounds in there as well, and a massive dance kick drum, courtesy of Vince's System 100 synth."

"It's all completely camp and OTT. The only thing missing is Vince rapping over the top [more inexplicable laughter]. However, because time on the CD is precious, it's only two minutes long. Of course, it's nowhere near as good as anything they've done. But since Vince programmed all the synth sounds we used, you could say it was already partly an Erasure track! It's like he's there in spirit. Spooky..."