And in no time, aspiring acid house musicians began clamoring for the machines that produced those wonderful buzzing bleeps and booms. Propellerhead Software's aptly named ReBirth is an emulation of the 303 bass synth and the 808 and 909 drum machines, which has caught on with people around the planet. And a devoted community of musical hackers has created thousands of alternative sounds that can be played with software. I was overwhelmed by the sounds that I was making with this software five minutes after downloading and have been hooked since. When I see this much creative potential delivered to this much talent in a supportive community where that talent can invent purely for art's sake, it makes me happy to be alive at the end of the 20th century.
Some mods duplicate the wails of famous divas or other soundbites from the early days of acid house.
Far from being slapdash amateur hacks, most of the ReBirth mods are remarkably slick productions, with tight, clean samples and elegant graphic interfaces that are often a considerable improvement over the relatively straightforward original, which is designed to more or less faithfully reproduce the look of the real-world Roland boxes. According to Kurt Kurasaki, a skilled and energetic mod-maker who goes by the nom de Net of Peff, the toughest thing about mod making is getting the animations of the knobs to work correctly. In age, in geography, in musical tastes, in lifestyle, in professions, in food preferences, in philosophical standpoints. The range is as wide as music's appeal to people around the world. Naturally, we're happy about the fact that so many musicians all over the planet have chosen our creation.