Orchestral Tools Junkie XL Brass

Junkie XL Brass includes an extra-large 12-player trombone section. Ear plugs not included.

An A-list Hollywood composer joins forces with Orchestral Tools to create a major brass library.

The name Tom Holkenborg might not be as familiar in Hollywood film circles as that of Hans Zimmer, but based on the commotion Mr H has been generating in recent years, that may be about to change. Operating under the alias of Junkie  XL (occasionally shortened to JXL to avoid offending conservative sensibilities), this affable Dutch musician has stormed the film world with dramatic, atmospheric and massive-sounding scores for blockbusters such as Tomb Raider, Mortal Engines, The Dark Tower and Terminator: Dark Fate, as well as collaborating with his erstwhile mentor Zimmer on several superhero-themed box-office smashes.

Born into a musical family in 1967, Holkenborg began playing instruments when barely out of nappies, learned drums at the age of eight and fell in love with studio technology, synths and samplers as a teenager, a passion which has never gone away. In the 1990s he began releasing breakbeat-driven albums under the stage name Junkie XL and toured the world extensively, before scoring a spectacular breakthrough with a funked-up remix of Elvis Presley's 'A Little Less Conversation', a chart-topper in 24 countries. Having relocated to LA to pursue a career in film composing, our man has spent the last 21 years steadily building a reputation as a creator of exciting contemporary soundtracks.

The jewel in Junkie XL's crown is his explosive score for the 2015 post-apocalyptic road movie Mad Max: Fury Road, an astonishing tour de force ('force' being the operative word) which combines a large, manic-sounding orchestra, an 80-voice choir, a huge artillery of battering drums (created using the composer's personal percussion collection), brutally aggressive metal guitars, earthshaking sound design and pulsating industrial synths straight out of the Prodigy playbook. Described by Holkenborg as "over the top" and "very loud, very dark", this relentless sonic onslaught should be a study score for anyone wishing to turn their hand to creating action film music.

Self-confessed 'big nerd' Tom Holkenborg (aka Junkie XL) with his small collection of synth modules.

Top Brass

In order to maintain a personal signature in his film work, Holkenborg has always built his own sample libraries, starting with guitar and bass and progressing to small orchestral sampling sessions. Dissatisfied with the articulations available in commercial brass collections, he resolved to create his own large-scale sample project which would nail all the details and dynamics of a Hollywood-style orchestral brass line-up, "from the super-soft to the super-blatantly-loud". Aware that this isn't the kind of thing you can knock up single-handed over a weekend, Holkenborg set out to find collaborators.

Around the same time, Orchestral Tools were looking to start a new series in conjunction with different composers, and an idea was hatched: a big, next-generation brass library designed for maximum playability, just a few notes from which would, according to Holkenborg, inspire users to instantly create their own major movie themes. After much brainstorming, the composer and Orchestral Tools team agreed a stylistic blueprint, copyists sprang into action and a large cast of brass players was hired to record a stupendous amount of samples at the Teldex Scoring Stage, Berlin.

Pick & Mix

Junkie XL Brass (which we'll call JXLB for short) features the traditional orchestral line-up of trumpets, trombones, French horns and tuba, and adds a modern ingredient: the cimbasso, a powerful cross between a tuba and trombone which has now become a standard fixture in film scores, recorded here in a three-player section. The first four instrument types include a solo player, while the trumpets, trombones and horns offer different section sizes, including extra-large 12-player ensembles. No muted samples are included.

The sampling sessions took place over 20 days, with articulations performed at five dynamics and captured from seven mic positions (see box). Once the samples were sorted, a complete set of additional processed mixes was created, bringing the channel count for each instrument up to 16. Due to this multiplication, the final sample tally clocks in at 690GB, which compresses down to 300GB on your hard drive.

While that's a lot of data to download, the good news is that you can buy instruments separately at affordable prices and download only the mic positions and mixes you need: a Godsend for those struggling with slow broadband speeds or running low on disk space. This terrific feature seems likely to become standard industry practice over time, so kudos to Orchestral Tools for getting it off the ground.

Low Brass

OK, let's listen to this thing. Starting at the low end, you have a great, fat-sounding solo tuba, robust enough to carry the sonic weight of all the other instruments and still make its presence felt. The instrument's quiet notes sound wonderfully big and warm, while louder velocities reveal a brassy edge which turns into a vicious snarl at peak volume. The positive attack of the tuba's long notes helps define the rhythmic outline of melodies, and a great VSL-style legato mode enables you to play anything from slow-moving, solemn tunes to a manic 'Flight Of The Bumblebee', but if it's sheer power you're after, the sforzando samples carry the greatest impact.

The Sine player's Switch Mode shows the velocity split points you've set between different articulations. In this example, quiet velocities trigger sustains, while the loudest velocities trigger rips. If you select a MIDI CC control change as the controller, an inner circle appears on screen showing the upper and lower CC values you set: here, the CC switch will toggle between the sustains and short marcato articulations.Originally used for supportive low-register parts by 19th-century Italian opera composers, the cimbasso is often employed in today's action film scores to add loud, percussive stabs. This library's three cimbassos can do both jobs: soft-attack sustains produce a mellow, comforting brass-band-esque glow, while loud sforzandos generate a red-hot brass furnace blast. I enjoyed the section's elephantine rips (vigorous, full-bodied dashes up to a short target note from a fourth below) and had fun programming oompah-style sequences with the staccatissimo articulation, using the longer staccato style for accents.

Depending on the dynamic, the cimbassos' legatos can handle anything from subdued countermelodies to monstrous War Of The Worlds-type bass roars, but the section's legato transitions are not nimble enough to cope with fast runs. Bearing out Holkenborg's promise that this brass library's low end would be "f***ing kicking ass", the cimbassos and tuba deliver their forceful, aggressive note attacks without ever sounding thin or attenuated.

Trombones

Three bass trombones add extra oomph to the low end. Their loud sforzandos and marcatos are a knockout: great, ripping foghorn blasts which would energise any epic score (though you might want to give them a miss in a smoochy soul ballad). As well as being a good source of mighty bass trumps, the trio's wide C1-G4 range offers great scope for chordal work.

The 12-player tenor trombone section is one of the library's highlights. The players' quiet long notes are magnificent, a rich, sumptuous blended timbre which sounds glorious on choral passages. Push up the mod wheel, and the dynamic escalation is almost frightening. Under instructions to blow their fff deliveries as hard as physically possible, the players rose to the occasion with a stupendous racket fit to wake the dead. While these loud performances will reliably blow your head off, a set of gorgeous soft sustains is begging to be programmed into tender laments and love songs.

Keyswitches (marked in brown) allow you to switch articulations on the fly. If it helps your workflow, you can move a set of keyswitches up or down to a new keyboard position.Though less intense, the six-player trombone patches also sound big and expansive, and will handle supportive parts and commanding lead lines without blowing everything else out of the water. Downsizing further, the three-player section sounds tight and focused: their staccatissimo shorts work supremely well for pumping rhythmic ostinatos, and their fearsome-sounding rips are amongst the best in the library.

Amidst all this splendour, the solo trombone sounds almost unassuming. Its legatos carry a tune well, but can't keep pace with very fast lines or trills; I guess that might improve in a future update. Sadly, none of these trombones play glissando slides, but on the plus side, you can create a massive octaves brass sound by layering the trombones, cimbassos and tuba.

Trumpets

Accurately played over a generous E3-D6 range with nary a wobble in the top register, the six-trumpet ensemble is the attacking front line of the JXLB strike force. When planning the library, Holkenborg was concerned to capture the right articulations for quick, fanfare-like figures, and these players hit the mark: their sustains speak quickly and decisively, obviating the need for a staccato overlay to strengthen note fronts.

The six-trumpet ensemble is the attacking front line of the JXLB strike force.

For Hollywood-style action scenes, the combative loud sforzando style kicks like a mule, and some truly confrontational, shrieking rips will dislodge plaster from your ceiling. The section sounds equally at home playing bright staccato stabs, breezy staccatissimo shorts and quiet, sensitive soft sustains. The fact that you could use these trumpets in a smoky jazz ballad or James Brown-style funk arrangement as well as in an epic movie score speaks volumes about their versatility.

Featuring tight, precise legatos and excellent tuning (a hallmark of the library), the three-player trumpet section is no less powerful than the larger ensemble. The musicians whip out hair-raising rips, and their marcato articulations sound great on rousing heroic themes and fanfares. A solo trumpet also contributes strong, dynamic performances, including some zippy staccatissimo shorts. While the solo instrument's legato patch sounds OK, it's not the most convincing I've heard; perhaps a touch of vibrato would have humanised it a little.

French Horns

A Zimmer-scale battalion of 12 French horns is another of JXLB's epic sonorities. This ensemble turns in some tremendous dynamic performances over a wide Bb1-F5 pitch range: enveloping quiet sustains, dignified, noble-sounding mezzo-fortes and big, ceremonious, palatial loud deliveries. Great for chordal work and offering hugely attacking marcatos, express-train rips and legatos which shine on soaring superhero themes, these horns are a triumph.

Two smaller sections offer musical alternatives: the six horns' legatos sound pleasantly natural, and their short staccatissimos work well for ostinatos. The four-horn section's sustains are stately and steady and the players' legatos remain strong and impressively pure at the top of their range. I'd have been happy with just this horn quartet, but having the terrific six and 12-player sections thrown in feels almost decadent!

The library's solo horn works nicely for chords and melody lines and is arguably the best choice for ostinato horn short notes. I also appreciated that the player's rips are beautifully synchronised. Regarding the section sizes, Holkenborg explains in one of his numerous videos that he generally reserves 12 horns for big, heroic unison melodies, uses six players for octaves and two-note intervals, and dials up four horns for three-part chorale writing, thereby creating a virtual 12-horn ensemble sound.

Final Reel

In addition to the above-mentioned instruments and sections, there's a programmed Full Brass patch spanning the full brass compass which you can use as a sketchpad. Some general notes: the instruments play an identical set of articulations (apart from the 12 trombones, which omit the rips). The advertised 'Playable Runs' patches are not yet implemented. At the time of writing no expansions or second volumes have been announced, but if any are planned, I imagine muted performances would be high on the agenda.

The Dynamics tab allows you to deactivate certain dynamic layers to force an instrument's response into a selected dynamic range. The 'Niente' setting causes the instrument to be silent at the lowest velocity setting, which is good for creating very slow, subtle crescendos!All instruments are played with no vibrato. In keeping with modern convention, long notes' dynamics are controlled by CC1 (mod wheel) while short notes respond to velocity, but you can change that if you wish. The inclusion of five dynamics throughout obviates the need for played crescendos and diminuendos: you can create your own by using the mod wheel. Be careful, though: the ff performances are ferociously loud, and you really have to take care not to damage your equipment!

Roll Credits

So what's with the 'Junkie' tag? Since Holkenborg is a picture of health, we can rule out substance abuse, and the only visible sign of dependence is his obsession with analogue synth modules, which occupy a whole wall of his studio. Google searches for "How popular is the baby name Junkie?" also drew a blank, and frankly it's hard to imagine his parents calling him that. In the end, the composer himself answers the question: 'Junkie' is apparently a tongue-in-cheek reference to his insomniac workaholic tendencies, while the 'XL' part stands for "expanding limits — broadening up your vision". I'm all for that, though nowadays I find I need a good night's sleep first.

Returning to the product, libraries of this quality don't crop up very often. Its sheer playability, polished sound, pp-fff dynamics and flexible section sizes place it in the top echelon of sampled orchestral titles, and its finely tuned performances are second to none. It was Holkenborg's ambition to create a brass library that would work equally well for film composers and pop producers and, by Jove, I think he's done it. This is a classic, powerful and expressive blockbuster library for all seasons: brass dynamite. I'm addicted.