XLN Audio Addictive Keys

Verdict
For Pick what you need with some
great bundles
Great playing and composing features
A lot of fun
Simply loads of genres to dig into
Against There are better modelled
pianos out there
A huge and brilliant collection of
instruments and MIDI ile packs to help
you home in on a speciic sound and
playing style
9/10
Verdict
For Great sound and mic options
Flexible channel editing and processing
Sensible cross mod implementation
Small disk footprint and quick loading
Against Unnecessarily graphics-rich
No library of MIDI parts
Addictive Keys successfully brings
quality keyboard tones to the mid-budget
software studio
8/10
virtual pianos roundup / reviews <
October 2022 / COMPUTER MUSIC / 79
EZKeys is Toontrack’s keyboard
ecosphere that the company
might say is a way of life rather
than a single instrument! It
consists of instrument packs
dedicated to just about every
keyboard out there, with
multisampled recreations of
classic and contemporary
models. These include some 16
titles covering everything from
Mellotron to grand, upright to
pipe organ.
You get MIDI iles and
chordal features thrown in with
each of these titles to help your
playing and composing plus
efects for a varied sound. There
are also additional MIDI packs to
help you home in on more
speciic playing styles, more
than 70 titles covering more
genres like Prog, Synth Pop and
even (our personal favourite)
Goth Rock.
Some of the sound pack
highlights include Studio Grand
(a sampled Steinway B211
recorded at OAL Studio,
Sweden); the Grand Piano (a
Steinway Model D which we
described as “lexible enough to
bend to your creative will”);
Upright Piano (sampled from
an Östlind & Almquist); and one
of our favourites, Dream
Machines (a Rhodes Mk 7 and a
Celeste we described as having
The Addictive Keys range comes
in three lexible bundle options –
Complete €199.95, Trio €179.95
and Duo €149.95 – so you can
choose two, three or all four
classic multisampled keyboards
(each of which usually costs
€89.95). These are a Fender
Rhodes Mark I, Yamaha U3
Upright Piano, Steinway Model D
Concert Grand and Yamaha
CP80 Electric Grand, so these
are based on some of the best
keyboards available.
The aim is to provide
excellent source sounds with
plenty of customisation (EQ,
dynamics, efects and so on), but
with a small disk footprint (under
8GB for the whole lot). Each
instrument has been captured
using a number of mics in a
number of positions, enabling
you to mix and match three
stereo channels, complete
with combined panning and
width controls.
You get a decent number of
edit features including pitch, ilter
and volume envelopes, as well
as per-mic insert processing (EQ,
chorus, compression) and two
‘Delerb’ (delay plus reverb) send
efects. Other efects include
seven lavours of noise (eg, tape
and vinyl), ive types of distortion
and three modulation efects
(chorus, phaser and tremolo).
TYPE: Multiple sampled instrument and MIDI ile packs | PRICE: MIDI packs from
€29; instrument packs from €75; bundles from €99 | KEY FEATURES: Extensive
sound and MIDI libraries; drag and drop the included MIDI straight to the built-in
song track and onto your DAW; all major styles covered (Pop/Rock, Soul/R&B,
Country, Gospel, Jazz, Blues, Boogie, Funk); extensive chord creation and song
writing features | SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS: Audio Unit, VST or AAX host; macOS
10.13 macOS 10.10 or higher (64-bit), Intel or Apple silicon processor; Windows
7 or newer, Intel or Athlon processor; 2GB RAM, from 600MB hard drive space
(minimum)
TYPE: Multisampled keyboards | PRICE: £199.95 for Complete | KEY FEATURES:
Pitch and Formant, three Mode options (Transpose, Quantize and Robot) and Drive
and Mix | SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS: AAX Native, AAX AudioSuite, VST 2, and Audio
Units 64-bit only; macOS X 10.10 or later; Windows 7 or later
Toontrack
EZKeys From €29 to
€155
XLN Audio
Addictive Keys €199.95
“efortless sound shaping, great
playability and silky sonics that
has us beaming”).
To be honest there’s a vast
choice here but with Toontrack’s
rep you can be assured that the
sampling is right up there –
although perhaps not as
meticulous as other piano
emulations here – and the MIDI
side of things is amply covered.
Not only is your instrument
taken care of, then, but so is your
playing style and composing.
You’ll also want to take
advantage of the ecosphere vibe
where once you buy into
Toontrack’s EZKeys, you get
other titles at heavy (usually half
price) discounts.
toontrack.com
AK’s core sounds tick all the
right boxes, and although you’re
limited to the tonality of the
source instruments, the mic
options provide an enormous
palette even before you touch
the EQ. XLN have put a lot of
work into creative patch design.
The likes of Prepared Horror
(grand), Reverse Attacks
(upright), and Glow Sticks
(electric piano) show of the
insert efects as much as the
source samples, to great efect.
Addictive Keys successfully
sidesteps the complexity of
more detailed piano libraries,
delivering a genuinely useful
palette of core sounds and
excellent processing.
xlnaudio.com
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