the watmm GAS thread

I've recorded and trimmed some of my own but I haven't done a proper wavetable with slices and cross fader. If the OT had filter tracking it would be a decent synth, but it's quite usable without t.

Yeah that's one thing I couldn't figure out. I wonder if it's somehow possible..

Edited April 15, 2017 by modey

Gotta say, I'm very happy I made the switch from machinedrum to octatrack. I tried out some live sampling lastnight, with two nord lead channels going into two track recorders, and flex machines mangling the record buffers, which were updating in realtime. I sat there for three hours tweaking, recorded the whole thing, it was amazing. At this rate I don't even know if I need my KP3+ anymore lol

Edited April 16, 2017 by modey

Yeah, the OT is likely the best method to do that, over a DAW and everything else.

 

My current gripe with the OT is I'm spoiled by ableton's analog-modeled filters. They just sound so good.

 

But it kind of makes up for it with ease of poly meter, also pattern nudging! Function+left or right to shift the track one step is truly amazing. I was making some synth lines and copied one track to another, then shifted that track's sequence and got all these harmonizing variations.

http://picosong.com/i2PB/

 

this is my best synth patch on the OT so far. scenes on a synth is pretty insane.

Edited April 16, 2017 by sheathe

  On 4/15/2017 at 2:00 AM, sheathe said:

I've recorded and trimmed some of my own but I haven't done a proper wavetable with slices and cross fader. If the OT had filter tracking it would be a decent synth, but it's quite usable without t.

  On 4/15/2017 at 6:51 AM, modey said:

Yeah that's one thing I couldn't figure out. I wonder if it's somehow possible..

I don't think it is. You can do abrupt jumps between looped slices if you have the channel on slice mode, or you can do harsh timestretch-type transitions with slices off. I'm not aware of any way to crossfade between slices, though. Maybe there's a clever way to do it by using multiple channels but that's the only thing that's coming to mind and the specifics are unclear to me.

 

  On 4/16/2017 at 1:51 AM, sheathe said:

My current gripe with the OT is I'm spoiled by ableton's analog-modeled filters. They just sound so good.

 

But it kind of makes up for it with ease of poly meter, also pattern nudging! Function+left or right to shift the track one step is truly amazing. I was making some synth lines and copied one track to another, then shifted that track's sequence and got all these harmonizing variations.

I really like the OT's filters but they sound very dry and woody to me, not so liquidy or buttery like most filters. Like something that would have been expensive in the 80s. I find them useful for practical sort of filtering, like just cleanly shaving off the top or bottom end, and for cranking the resonance up and turning anything that sounds even vaguely percussive into a useable drum sound with a satisfying punch. Most other filters tend to create this cartoonish lump when doing this but it can sound natural and tasteful on the OT.

I haven't done any detailed comparison between the OT and MnM's filters, but I figured they'd be similar. Having said that, I have a real soft spot for filters that are unashamedly digital, so any dry/woody/plasticky sound is welcome imo :D

Mnm has 4 pole hp/bp/lp filters. I wish i could atleast change them to 2 pole when needed. But it's not just that, i feel they have very strangly shaped curves. How'bout the ot?

I'm not sure. From what I've heard so far it sounds pretty similar to the monomachine's filter, so I'm guessing 4 pole. Although, it also has an EQ, and a "DJ equaliser", neither of which I've even tried so far..

in the filter setup menu you can change from -12dB to -24dB, which i think in this case means 2 or 4 pole.

I haven't gathered any empirical evidence either, I'm just going by vibe and intuition, but the MnM's filters sound way more "analog" to me. You can make the OT sound fairly analog but yeah it's a dry, mellow sort of a sound, which turns out to be very handy in general for the many (infinite?) use cases of the OT - thinking specifically of "DJ" type mixing of tracks or at least loops, although it's great for one-shots as well. I think monosynth type filters is probably what it is weakest at but as sheathe nicely demonstrated this is certainly something it can do.

 

I also appreciate that they offered some nice options with the filters, like the different filter types, and the different envelope triggering modes. They're not lockable but I think this might actually be a strength - they did a good job of packing a lot of power into just 30 (plus level) lockable parameters per machine, where I sometimes get lost for a second on the MnM because there's like 60 lockable params.

You're right. They are very transparent, mellow, utilitarian filters. The OT seems utilitarian more than anything else. It can do any basic thing you need.

 

It's funny to me how much people freak out about it. It's one of those things that mosty works like it should and does what you need, like the iPhone of gear.

Yeah, i'd agree with that. While it has so much potential character because only it can do what it does it still has no character. Every time I turn on any other elektron box I make something i'm happy to save and maybe it will get used for something but the octa, I have loads of fun but nothing gets saved, well, it gets overwritten next time. It's like some practice ritual for when I want to make some serious music on other gear. I wish it had that something that would make me want to use it seriously. Not to demean it in any way of course, it's a mental machine, I think it's just me and my sound that's the problem.

Huh. That's interesting; I've found that the octatrack has shown way more character than what I was getting out of the machinedrum. And I'm getting down a whole bunch of ideas that I can evolve into interesting live pieces.

 

  On 4/16/2017 at 10:22 PM, sheathe said:

It's funny to me how much people freak out about it. It's one of those things that mosty works like it should and does what you need, like the iPhone of gear.

I'm mostly surprised at how much people think of it as an impenetrable machine. I've been taking it one step at a time, following tutorials and referring to the manual, and while I admit it is complex, it's fucking amazing once you start picking up on the way it works. I'm just discovering resampling the master track in order to use it for transitions and mangling.

 

 

Back on the GAS subject: I'm thinking of selling a bunch of gear in order to buy another nord (a rack this time, for taking to gigs). Including my JX8P.. the nord has surpassed it imo

Thinking of sticking with the same model Nord or trying a different one?

Maybe the NR2, which someone is selling for a good price locally. Or perhaps I'll shell out for a NR4 or a secondhand 3 with the lush encoders.. Tempted to go for a G2 but I just love the Lead architecture so much..

NR2 is one of my dream synths. Not sure why I haven't got one yet, afaik it's cheaper than any Elektron, even used.

Yeah, even though I have and love the NL1, I want the NR2 for live use, and the 4 outputs will slot right in to the octatrack's inputs; coupled with a nice road/flight case it makes for a really tidy setup!

 

 

edit: in other news, my bastl kastle kit finally arrived :D gonna try to put it together tonight.

Edited April 18, 2017 by modey

Yeah, that is pretty much exactly what I was thinking.

IDM status results from efficiency in knowing how one's toolset relates to the heart, in order to convert most directly to sonics. But as a music exercise, I wonder how tracks would turn out if minimalistic approaches were replaced with a maximal approach... That means having to use EVERY SINGLE PIECE OF GEAR one owns, as a requirement. So like in a DAW, the challenge would be to use every plugin, every instrument. With hardware, everything (all synths, pedals, guitars, mics, etc.). So if you use software and hardware, muthafuckin' errting!!!

 

I wonder how working within such "constraints" would affect output. When I was all hardware I actually did use everything I had for some tracks, but some of you guys have like 20 synths.

 

It's weird cuz something inside me tells me that the results might actually be quite good.

Yeah, that's a reason why I'm selling a bunch of stuff. My techno stuff sounds best when I'm only using 1-2 pieces of hardware, and my prog stuff is so meticulously composed that it doesn't make much sense to use hardware, unless I'm layering live synth/guitar parts.

I have a bunch of gear that I bought on a whim, or that has been made obsolete by other gear, so it has to go. Having said that, a few pieces have a value I can't put a dollar figure on, and thus I'll never sell them, even if I don't use them very often (ES-1, HR-16, monomachine etc).

You pretty much described my workflow Peace7 ha. (sort of, Not EVERY piece for every track of course)

I use everything I have, all the time and love to ram my music to the hilt. I'm not one for minimalistic, I just can't help adding and adding. Not to say I don't have more minimalist sketches as tracks, but they too are usually sonically full. I listen to minimalistic thought, just can't make it.

I do think my sounds and techniques put most listeners off though especially ones that are going to judge on one listen, but what can you do? personal satisfaction over audience satisfaction any day.

Edited April 18, 2017 by Chesney

I've tried both approaches, from a total gear minimalism to using thousands of oscillators in supercollider and i like both of them. The minimalistic one is creatively more powerful but the other one is sometimes pure joy. Hey, thousands of oscs! ...tuned differently. Fm synths with thousands of everything!

Looking back id say that the best tracks i made was made with one or two synths. Knowing and 'feeling' your gear is much more important.imo.

Edited April 18, 2017 by xox

I think my problem is I struggle with keeping elements thin/minimal enough to warrant multiple layers. I think it might be my tracker/chip/slow computer background, having to make do with fewer tracks and as a result making everything big and up front. I'm getting better, but I also have trouble handling too many things going on at once, let along mixing them, so my relative minimalism is a blessing in disguise.

On the minimalist/maximalist tip, I just began reorganizing my studio yesterday...I had split all my hardware from my software and it just was not working for me, probably because I can't do much with my synths without a controller, which I'm using Ableton/Push for. So now I'm trying to fully integrate and take advantage of all my hardware and software, but also recreate my software techniques (lots of rerouting audio through multiple effects paths, sounds modifying other sounds, etc.) with the hardware as well. But hopefully a minimalist approach with that hardware setup (Rytm & two synths) with lots of routing, software processing, and some interesting effects options will give me some room to be both minimal and yet allow a breadth of options.