Here it is – the Vangelis Blade Runner cover that will make you weep.
This is the first time I’ve seen someone really nail the lushness and quirkiness of Vangelis’ soundtrack for Blade Runner. It’s not an exact sonic match, but it’s extremely close, it’s live, it sounds great and and it’s a very musical performance, too.
Give it a listen, crank it up and let me know what you think!
Gear-geek details below.
via mik300z:
The Stars of this video are the ESQ 1 for the Cs80 brass leads and the Juno 6 for it’s authentic sounding electronic beeps. The bells and percussion from the Korg x5 and Juno G. Microkorg on strings.
Really enjoyed this and amazing how a few affordable synths can re-create the unique bladerunner sound.
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Tags: Blade Runner, covers, Ensoniq, ESQ-1, Juno, MicroKorg, Roland, soundtrack, synthesizer, vangelis
12 Responses to “The Vangelis Blade Runner Cover That Will Make You Weep”
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I totally agree. It's not a slavish copy of the melody or the sounds, but a demonstration of someone really understanding the nature of Vangelis' musical processes and intentions and the atmospheres created by that. The underpinning attitude towards the creation of sonic space means that he only needs to give a few exactly emulative cues for the identification with the Bladerunner score to be immediate and convincing. Very musical. Very 'real'.
Yes! I'd like to hear him do more improvisations with this palette of sounds.
REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's continued knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
OMG he's done John Carpenter too? If he does the classic Goblin themes I'm gonna die. XD
[youtube cw1kDPp22K0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw1kDPp22K0 youtube]REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's continued knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
OMG he's done John Carpenter too? If he does the classic Goblin themes I'm gonna die. XD
[youtube cw1kDPp22K0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw1kDPp22K0 youtube]REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's continued knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
OMG he's done John Carpenter too? If he does the classic Goblin themes I'm gonna die. XD
[youtube cw1kDPp22K0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw1kDPp22K0 youtube]REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's continued knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
OMG he's done John Carpenter too? If he does the classic Goblin themes I'm gonna die. XD
[youtube cw1kDPp22K0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw1kDPp22K0 youtube]REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's continued knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
OMG he's done John Carpenter too? If he does the classic Goblin themes I'm gonna die. XD
[youtube cw1kDPp22K0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw1kDPp22K0 youtube]REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's continued knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
OMG he's done John Carpenter too? If he does the classic Goblin themes I'm gonna die. XD
[youtube cw1kDPp22K0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw1kDPp22K0 youtube]REPLICANT GOLD! He's the equivalent of those artful Trekkies who study the set design so much that they build a replica Enterprise deck in their home, then are later consulted on by the "real" Star Trek producers for accuracy and canon!
Not only does this closely represent the Vangelis' sound (I hardly ever hear the chimes and bleeps also being done well), watching mik300z hunched over the keyboard with glasses, beard, and banks of synths (mostly affordable modern ones as he puts it) is also visually very similar to Vangy's performance spirit.
mik300z has been answering various comments on YouTube and I hope he puts together some more tutorials (he's video'ed some how-tos on his YouTube channel) — mik300z's continued knowledge in reverse-engineering Vangelis would be a tremendous resource to learn from!
OMG he's done John Carpenter too? If he does the classic Goblin themes I'm gonna die. XD
[youtube cw1kDPp22K0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cw1kDPp22K0 youtube]Thankyou Synthtopia for linking the video here. And thankyou Gordon for your intellegent (and very flattering!) comments. To be honest I was intending to do a "slavish copy" of the original, but when I suddenly had all the keyboards connecting with the right atmosphere, I decided to play a live piece instead. Much more enjoyable.
Looking forward to more of your synth jams!