February 8, 2021
Today we updated the MPAA Library with 98 new Ambiences recorded over the past 6 months. And we do have a few specialties for you, from the beautiful to the eerie:
Caves – 30 Ambiences
We visited two distinctly different caves. One is a man-built stalactite cave more than 160 years old. Its main characteristic is an over 10 second long reverb tail, and you can hear water drops, footsteps and balloon pops in this intriguing acoustic space, which we call “Cave ‘A'”.
The second cave is the world’s largest lime mine, 700-800 years old. The limestone covering the floors, walls and ceilings creates a very different acoustic space with a much shorter reverberation time. The mine contains water reservoirs connected by small streams and waterfalls, and water drips down year round at various places in the mine. You can hear all of this along with footsteps and struggling through the cave in our newly added Ambiences as “Cave ‘B'”.
Concert Hall & Church – 22 Ambiences
Get the atmospheres and audience applauses of two concert venues. This concert hall (“Concert Hall ‘A'”) is a 319 seat hall which, on these recordings, is about 1/3 full due to the Covid-19 restrictions in place at the time of recording, but the audience is very enthusiastic indeed!
The church recordings were made in a 365 year old church. It sounds as beautiful as it looks with its 50x20x18 meter room creating a nice, rich reverb tail. While the church has the capacity of about 700 seats, about 1/5 of those were occupied, again due to Covid-19 restrictions. However, with the wonderful acoustics of the room, the applauses sound full and rich. Find it as “Church ‘A'”.
Inside Refrigerator & Freezer – 5 Ambiences
If you’ve ever wondered how a fridge sounds on the inside, here’s your answer! These recordings make for quite an eerie, uneasy atmosphere, as the cooling fluid creates strange sounds running through the tubes.
Underwater in Bathtub – 3 Ambiences
These are the first examples of Ambisonic underwater recordings we’ve created, and while recording them is quite demanding, we plan to do more later this year. Bubbles and water running into the tub as they sound when your head is below the surface.
The rest
You get a few more of the eerie ambiences, useful for setting a darker, more sombre mood:
- howling wind (interior)
- creaking old wooden floors
- gurgling and flushing sounds inside a sewer
Plus more of our usual high-realism, professional Ambiences:
- city traffic
- train station with close passing trains, passengers and street music
- house sandblasting
- a nice, reverberant stairwell with people using the stairs
- New Year’s Eve fireworks – including 1 hour and 13 minutes from just before midnight through the end of the blasting inferno
How to listen & download
The 98 new Ambiences are available immediately for preview and download on the Single Ambiences page. Ambiences are listed with the newest at the top and the oldest at the bottom, so you’ll have no difficulty finding them.