BPB 64 Is A FREE Commodore 64 Synthesizer VST Plugin

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Bedroom Producers Blog releases BPB 64, a freeware Commodore 64 virtual synthesizer for Windows and macOS.

BPB 64 is a sample-based virtual synthesizer that brings the sounds of the legendary Commodore 64 home computer to your DAW. The included patches were sampled directly from three different Commodore 64 units, all boasting different SID chips. I used the MSSIAH cartridge to program the patches and trigger the Commodore 64 via MIDI.

If you used BPB’s free Commodore 64 Synthesizer Sessions DELUXE library for Kontakt, you’d already be familiar with these sounds. However, the BPB 64 plugin takes the included patches one step further, with built-in effects and some clever Maize Sampler programming by SampleScience.

The sounds and the GUI design were handled by Bedroom Producers Blog, while SampleScience took care of turning the concept into a usable VST/AU plugin.

BPB 64 includes 37 multi-sampled patches, covering bass sounds, pads, leads, and the inevitable fast-paced arpeggios that make the SID chip so legendary. All sounds were captured raw, directly from the SID chip, so you’re getting the same infamous grit and lo-fi crunch that you’d get if you hooked up a C64 directly to your audio interface.

For those unfamiliar, the SID chip is Commodore 64’s audio chip. Unlike today’s sound cards and audio interfaces, the SID chip is a monophonic synthesizer with digital oscillators and an analog filter. The goal of this project was to use the SID chip to recreate some classic synth sounds as well as to sample iconic C64 leads and arpeggios.

That said, BPB 64 lets you tweak the included raw Commodore 64 presets to your liking. It includes a low-pass filter, an ADSR envelope, four built-in effects (delay, reverb, distortion, and chorus), and modulation. The modulation wheel controls the pitch modulation amount.

Use small amounts of pitch modulation to get the classic SID chip sound. Or, experiment with the built-in effects and modulation to customize the presets.

BPB 64 is available in VST and AU plugin formats for 64-bit digital audio workstations on Windows and macOS. You can download it for free by entering $0 at checkout (or donate any other amount to help BPB develop more plugins).

Download: BPB 64

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About Author

Tomislav is a music producer and sound designer from Belgrade, Serbia. He is also the founder and editor-in-chief at Bedroom Producers Blog.

41 Comments

  1. Thanks, will check it out :-)

    Rhythmic Robot has set Test Unit Kontakt synth free during christmas
    rhythmicrobot.com/product/test-unit-kontakt-synth

  2. Klavir, a Czech-made Petrof upright piano offered for free, to be used within the MNDALA 2 engine
    mntra.io/product/klavir/

    • From a kvr thread

      on

      Numanoid, that has to be the most confusing plugin site that you have ever sent me to in my 11 years on the internet. I’ll have another go on another day perhaps.

      In the meantime Happy New Year to you and of course to Tomislav.

  3. Wow nice work Tomislav, BPB and SampleScience and thanks so much, i want to try this, the sounds in the video demo take me back, but the plugin also still sound kind of futuristic.
    much love and appreciation for everything Tomislav, BPB and well done, happy xmas to you and yours and all 🙏😊☘️❤️.

  4. Sounds great, very quick to get what you want. Toss a good reverb on there and bam, sounds very modern and lush.

    I will say it seems pretty easy to overload itself internally and create distortion, especially with polyphonic playing. Turning down the plugins volume fixes it.

  5. Thank you so much for this! Probably BPB’s best and most ambitious plugin so far!
    Awesome sounds and presets. Instant disasterpeace vibes.

  6. Thanks BPB for the ongoing freebies! Is this one Universal Binary 2 for native M1? Will any of your past releases be updated to UB2?

  7. BPD, Tomislav, and SampleScience thank you so so much for this! It sounds amazing. Happy holidays and thank you so much for what you do for the community!

    • Agreed, would be great to automate the knobs! Doesn’t work in FL Studio either.

      Would also be nice to connect them to external MIDI controllers.

        • Tomislav Zlatic

          on

          Great workaround! The current limitations are due to the platform we are using for development (Maize Sampler). Hopefully this will be fixed in future updates.

          • oooooh its sampled?. that’s why you can’t do pulse width. that was the whole point of the c64 surely. Samples are never gonna do a SID justice sorry, I think that was a bad decision.

      • I think it is an issue with the Maize sampler format, that parameters can’t easily be MIDI learnt. I hope that is something the Maize sampler developer think about updating.

    • was just about to type that. And the whole point of the SID was the pulse width modulation. With a simple sampled approach like this it can never sound like one (or certainly move like one) anyway.

  8. The whole unique vibe of the SID was because it had pulse width modulation. This doesn’t! It misses the entire reason you would use it! its just baked into the presets statically. And the C64 certainly didn’t have delay etc. Anyone can add those later if they wanted, those knobs could have been used to give more accurate control over the sound like a real C64.
    I might as well just use square or saw in vital, at least I would have the same variable control over PWM the sound as an actual SID.

  9. Bastiaan de Jong

    on

    I grew up with the c64 and love to listen to those tunes. I was looking into the specifications and also watched a few video’s using TherapSID which is very helpful. After that I started searching for software synthesizers which can sync an oscillator with another oscillator. Most have softsync and hardsync without being controlled by another source. This is very interesting on the SID, especially because another oscillator can change all the time during a song.

    I’d like to achieve something as the main lead of ‘Aufwiedersehen monty’. It’s a PWM sound which sounds dirtyer when they turn on sync. They keep turning it on and off in this track (listen from 3:15). I did something similar using Phase modulation from another osc which is available on several softsynths. I’d love to hear about any (free) softsynth which has the possibility to sync with another oscillator.

  10. I can not install it on mac, I copied the vst3 file on the vst3 folder, I do not know where to copy the .instruments, I do not see the plugin on ableton

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