Today I’m checking out another instrument Big Fish sent over, from Vir2.
Ever since I got it I’ve been playing with it, it’s a dedicated horn instrument called Mojo.
Every time I used to buy a new keyboard workstation, I would always checkout the brass/horns. Some of them had great sounding brass sections, and others were okay.
In the digital realm with all the samples available, you would think a great horn instrument would be easy to find, but it’s not.
Many of the brass sample available are either loops, or geared towards orchestral brass…nothing for that jazzy, funky, rnb style of music.
Until Mojo….
What is Mojo?
Mojo is a dedicated, versatile, and innovative horn section instrument. This means it’s dedicated to the same type of horn sounds you would use for funk, jazz, soul, rnb, etc.
These are instruments, not just a dvd full of loops, so they respond to your playing and give you access to a huge and authentic collection of horn and brass sounds.
The instruments covered in the instrument are: Trumpet, Trombone, Trumpet Muted, Trombone Muted, Piccolo Trumpet, Bass Trombone, Soprano Sax, Alto Sax, Tenor Sax, Bari Sax, Clarinet, and Flugelhorn
It’s easy to control every aspect of the instrument from the instruments panel.
You can adjust it from solo to 10 players, right in the interface…allowing you to create an instant section of instruments.
You also have control over the various articulations like crescendo, trill, sustain, swell, stab, staccato, doit, etc.
There is a built in fx section for you to get your tweak on, including an “ez room” section that has multiple reverb space presets. it also has saturation, distortion, chorus, limiter, delay, eq, and reverb.
Quick Specs
- Content: 15gb of 24bit stereo samples
- Format: Kontakt powered virtual instrument
- Price: $499
How real does Mojo sound?
I’m not a sax player, or any type of brass instrument, but I’m always looking for the best and most realistic sounding to my ears.
The recording and production of these instruments is incredible, not to mention it’s easy to tweak them and just plain fun to play them.
You can load one of the core instruments, and it will load all articulations for that instrument, which are all keyswitchable.
In addition, you get premade ensambles, as well as some instrument special fx.
Another dope feature is that it comes with over 1600 riffs mapped across the keys. The riff instruments are labeled by instrument type, tempo, and key. And they are amazing.
There is also a folder of instruments labeled “wind controller” which work with midi wind controllers.
You can also go very deep tweaking the instrument with micro tuning, changing the vibrato, pretty much every characteristic of the sound can be altered to your liking.
So what’s the final verdict on Mojo?
Mojo delivers the goods and has become my favorite instrument from Vir2 to date. I love how real the sound, the quality is fantastic, but even more…it’s really just fun to play these sounds. It’s fun to pretend you have the chops to play these amazing brass instruments and being able to add convincing horn sections to your music is creatively inspiring.
It comes in Kontakt player format, so even if you don’t have the full version of Kontakt you can still use this product, which I like.
Mojo gets a 5 out of 5 subs from me, I just love it!
It’s high quality, easy to use, fun to use, and easy to tweak. It’s sounds super realistic and doesn’t lean towards “orchestral brass” like most libraries I’ve come across, which is a good thing, as there are many of those types of libraries available.
Bottom line is this: no Mojo isn’t cheap, but the quality speaks for itself. If you really like to add realistic brass and horn sections to your music, I can’t see any other instrument outshining Mojo.
They way the instrument’s built in humanization responds to your playing and the ease at which you can access various articulations, riffs, sound fx, and playing styles is simply unmatched by any brass instrument I’ve come across to date.
I suggest you check it out, if you love brass and have been looking for an ultimate horn section library, look no further.
Go listen to the demos: Mojo Horn Section
leave me a comment below, let me know what you think.
Hey, good little tip with brass to get the realism up in recording is to just slap a tiny bit of reverb, just a splash, to put it into a ‘room’. It gives them the space they need, and by bleeding the sound into each other a bit, when sitting with a mix it knocks out the unnatural transitions between notes and makes it sound a little more natural.
This kit does sound pretty ace however, and I might have to investigate it when my finances are a little less dismal (real dismal. between jobs alas) , cos I’m jamming keys in a ska outfit at the moment, and some good brass tones might be real damn useful, especially with some of the old 2tone kinda tunes.
no doubt man, they put the fx in there so you can def get your tweak on, it’s a great library I love playing it man.
thanks joe great review those are some nice sounding horns but i did,nt think it would cost so much you know what they say you get what you pay for and in this case you sure do.
Yeah man, some of these libraries can get pretty pricey, and are really geared towards those actually doing this as a profession. At least that’s how I look at it. I always look at things compared to what it would have cost for a hardware alternative, it allows the prices to not seem so high.
But I agree, this one isn’t cheap, I’ve come across various types of instruments that are $1000+, it really just depends on what you want. Especially strings lol..those can get crazy!
But the sound in this instrument is pretty sick, for the folks that really want a great horn section it’s a good look. If a person just wants a decent horn section you can get that in some of the multi purpose instruments like kontakt, vi one, sampletank, etc.
Yeah, man those are some realistic sounding instruments. Good job Joe.
thanks for checking it out man, they sound pretty good.
i need those..dope preview homie.
thanks for checkin it out fam, they are some dope horn sounds
whats good Joe? another dope review… big up on this one homie!
whasup Carlos man! thanks for the love yo! I just try to keep em coming man!
Yo man great review . How does this compare to saxlab from linplug?
I haven’t tried saxlab personally, so I can’t directly compare the two.
Nice review Joe, this plugin seems real legit.
I love the option to add up to 10 players on any instrument.
no doubt fam, it’s real easy to tweak it, and the sound quality is dope.
Nice preview man, I’ve had Mojo for a while and they are some very nice sounding horns I use them off and on depending on what I’m trying to do. I’m not sure if you had a chance to check out what I told you about the Chris Heins Horns but I put the link below. Check out the audio demo (they give a rich sound…I know the demos are more focused on Jazz, Funk, Orchestral but they’ll work for anything type of music) they use key switching as well. Very similar setup as Mojo so if you are using to Mojo there would really be no learning curve. I have CH Volume 1 but Chris Horns are up to Volume 4 so far on the type of horns they have. They go deep when it comes to sound and the genre you can use them for and yeah they are kinda of expensive compared to Mojo if you were to buy all 4 volumes that is but Volume 1 & 2 for me would be enough. You can’t ever have enough horns.
Link:
http://www.chrishein.net/
yeah no doubt, I’ve messed with CH horns before, even the akai format was pretty nice, they always seemed more “hype” sounding to me…whereas I think mojo can get really smooth.
I agree though CH are some good horns as well, it’s dope they are in Kontakt format now.
I think if you you asked most beatmaker/producer cats what’s the one hole in your library, the answer would be horns. I like to let friends (non-producer heads) fool around with my DAW, just so they can see how fun and accessible it’s all become. We’re all between 35 and 50 years old, so they always ask ‘whatup with the horns?'(they love the Pete Rock/Diamond type horns). Of course my answer is usually lemmee show you how to sample (haha). So yeah, this is prolly the perfect solution. Expensive? Yeah, but you’ll be sorted forever. I’ll be copping this one.
Keep ’em coming Joe, you’re like the CNN of sound.
Yeah fam…that’s what it is! Being able to lay your own horn parts, that sound REAL!!! I know some folk out there feel my excitement lol. They also put tons of riffs in there, just like the riffs folks love to sample lol.
Through a vinyl effect on them joints and man…classic hip hop lol.
Hey Joe, I just got my Chris Hein Horns Volume 2 today. I’m about to start installing it. I’ll let you know how it sounds after I get a chance to play with it. It’s over 14 Gigs so it’ll take a while to install on my system.
keep me posted fam, I had a listen to the solo joints “vol 1” and I like. I think I have one of the later volumes, it was like maybe the sections or something in akai format?
I’ll want to get this one, for sure!! Here’s a tip for realistic pop and funk brass for any library: When a live group of any size does a run up or down to a sustained note, they really only have time to adjust their pitch on the sustained note. During the run, some players will be flat or sharp on different notes in the run. If you’re using MIDI to play a brass section, try using separate instruments and throwing some pitchbends between notes, sometimes up, sometimes down. Also let the initial attack of the sustain note “Fade” into tune quickly.
I suspect that MoJo Horns may have that idea built in to short notes.
@kybrdmn, awesome tip man! thanks for sharing….really gives us an illustration of brass sections and how they play
good stuff
Hi SJ. Thanks for all the great reviews. Your videos are some of my favorites on the web. I’m just wondering, how would you compare the sounds of mojo to CHH compact? You mentioned above that they are more “hype sounding”. Do you still find that to be the case? I’m leaning toward CHH Compact mainly b/c I like the interface and the larger assortment of horns. Thanks!
yeah Mojo is more smooth/intimate. When I want live/hype brass I use CHH, but when I want something that just sounds super realistic and for solo work, I usually grab Mojo. Interface in CHH is great for building up sections and such though, love it for that.
Cool, thanks. I went with CHH Compact for now, mainly b/c it seems like they make it easy for you to take control of the horns. The reviews I’ve seen of Mojo seem like they set it up for you (with riffs, sections, etc). Also, CHH Compact has more instruments than Mojo. I’m hoping CH will allow us to upgrade to better sounds while keeping the same interface for Compact.
yeah the interface and control is what I really love about CHH, it’s a good library for sure
I gotta say this site is a gold mine. I had been looking for some realistic sounding brass that wasn’t on the more orchestral side for the last 6 months. I found this on your site in 2 minutes flat!
Glad to help fam! You may also want to checkout Sample Modeling, they have some great brass.
Thanks!. I’ll definitely check them out too. I don’t really use brass too often but when I do I want it to sound real and sampling vinyl doesn’t always work in every situation. I think one or two good libraries will be enough brass for me.
I know what you mean man!