Okay, so I was digging around the internet the other day, trying to find some cool new sounds for my music. I stumbled upon this thing called HG Fortune synths. Apparently, this guy Günther, who sadly passed away, made a bunch of VST synths that are now free. Free is always good, right?
So, I found this site with a whole bunch of these synths. I decided to start with one called STS-17. It says it uses something called “Wave-Transition” which, honestly, I don’t really get, but it sounded fancy. And it looked pretty straightforward, with a few buttons labeled “Lazy” – my kind of interface! Those Lazy buttons are supposed to just randomly change a bunch of settings, which is pretty neat for getting new sounds without having to know what you’re doing.
The process was super simple, really.
- First, I downloaded the STS-17 synth from the website. It was just a zip file, nothing complicated.
- Then I extracted the zip file which contained a .dll file.
- I copied the .dll file to my VST plugins folder.
- After that, I opened up my DAW (I use Reaper, by the way), and scanned for new plugins.
- Boom, there it was – STS-17 showed up in my list of instruments.
I loaded it up and started messing around. The sound is kinda hard to describe… it’s definitely not your typical synth sound. Very spacey, very textural. I hit those Lazy buttons a few times, and each time it gave me something completely different. Some sounds were really weird, some were kinda cool, some were just plain crazy. But it was all usable in some way, you know?
My First Track with STS-17
I ended up using one of the sounds in a new track I’m working on. It’s an ambient piece, and the STS-17 sound just fit perfectly. It’s like the background texture, all floaty and weird.
I wouldn’t say I’m a pro at using this thing yet, but it’s definitely fun to play with. And it’s free, so you can’t really go wrong, right? I’ll probably download some more of these HG Fortune synths later and see what other weird sounds I can get out of them. It’s a nice way to remember Günther and keep his work alive, too. If you’re into making any kind of electronic music, especially if you like ambient or experimental stuff, you should definitely check these out.