Music Making

[acidbasement]

That's nuts. The Keystep is already a bargain, and still in production. I don't imagine anyone besides Uli ever looked at it and said "the world needs a cheaper knockoff of this"

I hope they sell zero units, but I know they'll probably sell tons.

[ironbut]

That is some f**ked up shit there!

The response from Uli is shocking IMHO.

[Sherwood]

Really disappointing product from Behringer. I have a Behringer Pro-1, and justified it to myself by both deeply wanting the sound of the real Sequential Pro-1, and not wanting to find myself on the banks of Lake Chad or whatever with a busted OOP synth no one on the continent could service. For $300, it was an easy decision, and since the original was long since out of production I felt it was hardly a straight line to taking money out of the pocket of someone more deserving.

This is a shitty move that really makes me feel bad about that purchase. I knew deep down Behringer was probably the same assholes that made bottom-of-the-barrel portable mixers when I was a kid, but didn’t want to believe it and miss out on a fun synth. I find it hard to imagine getting anything else from them now.

[acidbasement]

https://www.proaudiostar.com/arturia-matrixbrute-analog-synthesizer.html

Pretty nice price on a matrixbrute if anyone is gassing for it.

[Sherwood]

I’m itching to put some modules in a skiff and spend some more money making music I’m not satisfied with. Anyone here into modular?

[ironbut]

I'm not into Eurorack, but I did fool around with the one we had at college.

You should check out VCV Rack.

It's billed as a eurorack simulator. You can build and patch virtual modules which are designed by the guys that make the real modules. 

Lots of the modules are free and the paid ones are cheap (after all, they want you to buy the real things).

Plenty of YT tutorial videos too.

https://vcvrack.com/

Edited November 30, 2020 by ironbut

[grawk]

I didn't make the music, I just made the recording, and put together the video

 

[Sherwood]

On 11/30/2020 at 10:15 PM, ironbut said:

I'm not into Eurorack, but I did fool around with the one we had at college.
You should check out VCV Rack.
It's billed as a eurorack simulator. You can build and patch virtual modules which are designed by the guys that make the real modules. 
Lots of the modules are free and the paid ones are cheap (after all, they want you to buy the real things).
Plenty of YT tutorial videos too.
https://vcvrack.com/

This was a great suggestion, Steve. I spent a few blissful hours twiddling knobs on VCV rack tonight and designing monosynths. Tomorrow’s project is figuring out how to wire it into Ableton and sync the clock so I can actually make some music and not just play basslines.

Edited December 2, 2020 by Sherwood

[Dusty Chalk]

On 11/30/2020 at 3:15 PM, ironbut said:

I'm not into Eurorack, but I did fool around with the one we had at college.

You should check out VCV Rack.

It's billed as a eurorack simulator. You can build and patch virtual modules which are designed by the guys that make the real modules. 

Lots of the modules are free and the paid ones are cheap (after all, they want you to buy the real things).

Plenty of YT tutorial videos too.

https://vcvrack.com/

Interesting, I wasn’t aware.  Have you ever played with Cherry Audio’s Voltage, and if so, how would they compare?  

[ironbut]

Be sure and check out their community forum.

It looks like it's pretty active.

https://community.vcvrack.com/

 

Dusty, nope. 

At first glance, they seem very similar. 

I'm sure there's some comparisons on the web somewhere though.

Another modular site that seems pretty popular (with folks who actually know something unlike myself) is Muff Wiggler.

https://www.muffwiggler.com/forum/

[ironbut]

Once you decide to make the leap to actual hardware check out Christian's series "Modular Mondays".

It kinda slowed during Covid but still has popped up with a video here and there in 2020.

Christian's my fav YouTube buddy (communicating through the video comments and my contributions to his companies checkout cart) and I look forward to all his videos.

PianoBook is well worth becoming familiar with too (sample instruments are more of what I'm about).

 

[acidbasement]

Anyone familiar with hardware vocal multi-effects boxes? I'm thinking about the Roland VT-4. I know I can get better and more versatile for less money in a DAW, but I'm not motivated to use a DAW, so going that route will make me play less. I just want something fun that will make me want to sing.

The other main contender seems to be TC Helicon, but a) they're the same company as Behringer, and b) I think they don't do exactly what I want, while the Roland does.

[Dusty Chalk]

Lollers, I have one of the TC Helicon boxes (which I can’t find right now) (deflated emoji) (I was already looking for it myself) bought pre merger.  Feel free to ask questions, I didn’t really hear one in there.  What is it specifically you don’t think it does that you want it to?

[acidbasement]

Ha, I mostly just want something fun that makes me want to sing. Distortion, filter, and modulation effects would be more important than pitch correct and harmonizer, although I would probably experiment with using pitch corrected voice as an oscillator source.

I know it's GAS, but I also know I'd use it.

I guess I don't have questions, I like the way the Roland looks unless someone says don't get it.

Edited December 5, 2020 by acidbasement

[Dusty Chalk]

8 hours ago, acidbasement said:

Ha, I mostly just want something fun that makes me want to sing. Distortion, filter, and modulation effects would be more important than pitch correct and harmonizer, although I would probably experiment with using pitch corrected voice as an oscillator source.

I know it's GAS, but I also know I'd use it.

I guess I don't have questions, I like the way the Roland looks unless someone says don't get it.

Okay, yeah, understood—TC Helicon also have smaller, guitar pedal sized boxes.

https://www.tc-helicon.com/catalog.html?catalog=Application&category=P-TCHELICON-MUSICIAN

[acidbasement]

I got the TC Helicon Perform VE in spite of my dislike of Behringer, because it does everything I want from the Roland, plus some other really cool things that nothing else does. And it was cheaper.

[Dusty Chalk]

Yeah, I wouldn’t feel too bad about TC Electronic or TC Helicon, they were bought by the parent company, but have their own business practices, and are for all practical purposes, decoupled from Behringer. Their pedals and bass amplifier gear are ace, for example, developed by the company’s in-house R&D department.

[ironbut]

Dusty's right.

TC Electronics, Dynaudio, Tannoy, TC Helicon are all smaller fish under the same corp umbrella. 

About the only thing they have in common are (sometimes) consolidated customer service pools, warehouses and shipping.

Many have long and important places in pro audio.

I remember when TC Electronics released one of the early interfaces with 96k converters! Imagine that!

And their Icon 6000 System is still coveted in big post production film studios (Skywalker Sound, Sony/Universal) where they still apply the same algo reverb presets to lots of AAA films.

[acidbasement]

Excellent. I'm looking forward to talking like T-Pain in Zoom chats, in any event, even if pop superstardom doesn't happen.

[Kattefjaes]

On 11/14/2020 at 3:17 AM, Dusty Chalk said:

Dude, I’m a serious musician and I totally agree with you.

Tangential story:  I cut my teeth on my high school’s ARP 2600 with a busted keyboard, so I spent my first year finding unorthodox ways to create melodies ... and I did.  When I went to the guy I bought my own ARP 2600 from, in 5 minutes, I was showing him stuff he never even dreamed of.  

Marvellous- I'm fairly sure that learning to hack tunes out of it in bizarre ways would have amused the thing's original designer too. That sort of thing is immensely flattering.

Honestly, patch points are just an incitement, aren't they? I wonder if that seller experienced a pang of regret.

Meanwhile, I am happy to report that I have come across one of the few Euro modules that I was consciously looking for- a Natural Gate. They're one of those modules in enough demand that they sell for more used than the normal retail price, often. Better yet- I got a brand new one for the "normal" price. It was completely out of the blue, from my favourite small synth shop, bless them.

It's a very clever and good-sounding module, an LPG that doesn't use vactrols, but is incredibly controllable and has a much wider range. Really satisfying.

Here's the result of taking it for a spin around the block- utterly gratuitous:

 

 

 

 

 

 

[acidbasement]

 

[acidbasement]

Anyone here use reel to reel tape to add juice while tracking into digital gear? My dad has a Revox B77 and I'm going to try it out. You can monitor the tape-recorded signal while performing, and run that monitor signal into a digital recorder, since the read head is located after the write head. I was thinking of getting a Strymon Deco to add saturation, but if I can save cash and use real tape, that's even more better.

[Dusty Chalk]

No, but that sounds like an awesome idea.  I may tap you to process some tracks for me.  Will be in touch.  Seriously.

Bowie’s early reissues on Rykodisc deliberately did exactly this, BTW.

[acidbasement]

For sure, I'll try it out and let you know how it works. The only thing I can think might be a deal-breaker is if the tape deck has issues with variable speed due to age, beyond the warble that you'd expect, that might cause it to lose sync with the rest of the track.

Or, I'm not sure, it might be really noisy depending on how well it's aged. It hasn't been fired up in a long time.

[Dusty Chalk]

No worries, it’s a lot different doing individual tracks in a larger mix than it is doing it on a whole stereo mix.  I’ll be asking the former.  Also, not really worried about synchronization if it’s a foundation track.