Gates of Babylon
Rainbow's orchestral epic, cut at the Chateau d'Herouville in December 1977 and finished with a Bavarian string ensemble scored by Rainer Pietsch. The front end is the same AIWA-tape-deck-into-Marshall-Major rig as the rest of Long Live Rock 'n' Roll, but this solo asks something different of it: a harmonic-minor melody that has to sing over real strings. The tone sits darker and wetter than the album's riffs, because the orchestra already owns the top end.
What we checked
Computed by a program, on this recipe, every time this page is built. How this works
Preset files — 1 of 3 complete
- Helix builds complete — every block in the recipe is in the file
- Quad Cortex 4 blocks replaced with a stand-in model
Which ones
Replaced with a stand-in: Studio Comp, Tape Preamp Boost, Plexi 100, 4x12 Greenback. These load cleanly but are not the model named above — the file will sound wrong here until we map them. Set these blocks by hand.
- Katana 1 block missing from the file; 4 blocks replaced with a stand-in model
Which ones
Not in the file: Reverb. The recipe calls for this block, but we have no verified model ID for it on this platform, so the preset is written without it. Add it by hand using the settings above.
Replaced with a stand-in: Crunch, Booster, Delay, Reverb. These load cleanly but are not the model named above — the file will sound wrong here until we map them. Set these blocks by hand.
What we didn't check
- Nobody played this through a real amp. There is no human listening test behind any number on this page.
- The settings are reasoned from the sources below, not measured off the record.
- No audio has been rendered for this recipe yet, so you cannot hear it before you load it.
- 3 platforms on this page (TONEX, Kemper, Fractal) get a model pointer, not a preset file — nothing was built or checked for them.
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