Spitfire Audio GAIKA - War Island

Expansive Industrial Soundscapes

A timely collaboration with innovative producer and composer GAIKA, War Island offers multidimensional, evolving sounds from the beating heart of London's industrial underground.

Featuring harsh bassy synth drones, tape-processed drums, pads, leads and warped vocal effects, these expansive sounds are abundantly complex by virtue of GAIKA's unique and sophisticated processing techniques - made accessible, intuitive and interactive through Spitfire Audio's dynamic, award-winning plug-in.

Inspired by the sounds of GAIKA's youth and developed over a number of years, these visceral, abstract environments are inundated with the distinctive buzz of an ever-changing and perceptibly dystopian London, offering a fresh creative lens not only for experimental producers, but composers looking for cutting edge sounds to enhance their scores.

Terrain of Tension

A sophisticated yet easy-to-use library of colossal range, these rich, complex sounds have been meticulously curated, deconstructed and developed from a range of analog synths, hardware and experimental processing techniques by GAIKA and producer and sound designer, Felix Lee.

The library offers eight controls, a key feature being the dynamics fader, taking you from the reverberant quality of the processed signal up to the immediate direct impact of the original recording, offering significant creative control.

To create this processed signal, every sample was played back through a massive sound system in a large acoustic space at London's Somerset House, and re-recorded, in order to create space and depth around each sound and provide a new expansive and cinematic perspective.

Capturing the intense, industrial quality of GAIKA's particular sonic world, this comprehensive toolkit is inspired by sounds GAIKA heard growing up in South London - conjuring its rich cultural backdrop of idiosyncratic musical styles, from gothic hip hop to soundsystem culture and classical tendencies as well as retro-futuristic influences, to produce a range of intense, abstract atmospheres resonating with earth-shattering depth - developed amidst the dystopian backdrop of London in lockdown and a result of being forced to reflect on the state of the city in the wider context of the world.

Features

• Presented in Spitfire Audio's award-winning, dedicated plugin - compatible with any DAW
• 8 controls, providing a wealth of complex sonic possibilities : Expression, Dynamics (processed signal), Reverb, Attack, Release, Chorus, Flanger and Phaser -  engineered to offer a wide range of detailed sound-sculpting possibilities within a single patch, so it sounds like you
• The dynamics slider controls an in-built processed signal, curated by GAIKA, starting with the space of the processed signal, and fading to the intensity of the original dry recording as you push the fader up
• Seven bespoke IR reverbs, from Kiln to Church Balcony
• Velocity sensitive for varying tones
• 2.1 GB

Patches

Pads

Moody, metallic, and heavy darkwave synth drones made from a range of analog synths including Matrix 6, Matrix 12, JP 8000, Lyra 6 and countless others.

• Big Smoke
• Clairvoyance
• Creepy Seventh
• Malevolence
• Opium

Basses

Known for massive, jaw-dropping, villainous bass, GAIKA provides a crunchy low-end to complement the nuance of this idiosyncratic sound domain.

• Chrome Bass
• Cyber Horn
• Degenerated
• Drill Head
• Gritty Bass 7th
• Maud
• Smog

Leads

Manipulated and processed tones conjure a dystopian backdrop whilst providing infinite capabilities for layering your unique sonic footprint.

• Badmon
• Chaos Mission
• Granular Steel
• Mr Majestic
• Planet
• Lambo Smoke
• Saw Hearts
• Space Odd 2021
• Stretch
• Tape Stab
• Scum Rain
• Smiley Face

Atmosphere

Capturing a unique air of disquiet and metropolitan malaise, these blissfully discordant offerings set up an unsettling atmosphere.

• 0101
• Mystical Malaise
• Smooth Hospital
• Reborn
• Sus Punished
• Sus Soft
• Taped Saturday

Drums

Punchy, layered drums made from old school drum machines with extensive processing, to create dance, rap and techno sensibilities within a classical framework to achieve vast rhythmic possibilities.

• Filter Snares
• FX
• Lethal Chops
• Machine Snares
• Vim Kicks
• Vim Noise

Vocals

Inspired by jungle music, these glitchy and melodic vocal samples capture the dystopian sound of a retro yet modern urban landscape.

• Drone
• Glitch
• Vocal Arp 1
• Vocal Arp 2
• Uh FX