A monome-like grid controller built for Live, shipping in November for $199 – and I’ve got a first hands-on look with the hardware.

The feature that makes Ableton Live Ableton Live has always been its Session View, an array of Lego-like blocks of music triggering samples and patterns. In the grand tradition of the MPC, mapping hardware controls that make music non-linear has been a major theme of computer music, leading to the monome and the Tenori-On. Usually, consumer gear has only combined these with traditional drum pads, knobs, or faders.

Enter the Novation Launchpad. It’s $199. It’s a grid controller and nothing else, with a set of on/off buttons in an 8×8 array, plus additional shortcut buttons around the sides for switching modes. It’s set up out of the box to integrate with Ableton Live, but it also acts as a generic MIDI controller. It’s bus powered, really lightweight, and compact. Even following Akai’s earlier APC40 this year, there’s something special about the Launchpad: its radical simplicity, and the fact that it is this compact and cheap and plugs in via USB without power, makes this a potential no-brainer for any Live user with a laptop.

I’ve just gotten one of the first Launchpads to arrive (unit “#16″ on the back), so I’ve been playing around with it and can provide some initial impressions and details. I’ve also gotten input from Ableton’s Dave Hill as well as Novation, and I expect to fill in more soon.

monoming the sincerest form of flattery? Of course, one design more than any other championed the radical idea of a minimal grid of buttons — and nothing else. That design statement was the partially open-source, fully-homegrown monome. I’m sure as a result Novation will be accused of ripping off the monome design. I think the opposite: I think the availability of the Launchpad is a huge victory for monome, and an enormous compliment. More than any other design – including the APC40 – the Launchpad really says that an affordable, mass-market device can take on the monome’s radical form. It says grids could become ubiquitous. It’s an enormous validation of what the monome project has done. Furthermore, I think the monome community can continue to reinvent what to do with grids, with software and interaction. There are also many things the monome is – locally produced, sustainably produced, running with open source software, fully community-supported, available in kit form, working with OpenSoundControl, built in a premium form factor – that the Launchpad is not.

[edited for clarification] I think the Launchpad is unlikely to dissuade a person who wants a monome from getting a monome. But what’s significant here is that the design of musical instruments and controllers can adopt new forms. The monome was seen as radical when introduced. It seemed as though the music tech industry wouldn’t produce anything without slapping on some arbitrary knobs somewhere. The Launchpad really does follow the monome’s design cue, and maps control in Live in some new ways. That gives me hope that other designs could likewise tread in new direction, both from independent and larger designers.

Onto the details… The big picture aside, here’s a first look at how the operation of the Launchpad works. I’ll have a short video a little later on today.

Control Modes

The Launchpad has a series of modes that act allow the single 8×8 grid to perform multiple duties. Different modes and shortcuts bring up different visual feedback (by lighting up the buttons) and allow you to control different parameters.

Session mode

In Session mode, the Launchpad does exactly what Akai’s APC40 does. You can trigger clips and view clip state (playing, recording, ready, empty) by color (green, red, amber, and off). You can trigger scenes. You also get the red rectangle that highlights which bank of clips is active.

Unlike the APC40, though, the Launchpad is cheaper, smaller, thinner, lighter, and bus-powered. You can pick it up like a tablet, or squeeze it into a small club space. You can also easily chain multiple Launchpads together (or Launchpads and APC40s), so long as you have enough ports or a USB hub.

Multiple units can simultaneously access integrated control surface functions and clip triggering in Session View. So, for instance, you could have two Launchpads controlling clips, or one controlling the mixer and one controlling clips, or… you get the idea.

Mixer mode + parameter pages

Hit “mixer,” and you see an overview of all your tracks, eight at a time. (You can navigate through your set using the “page” buttons.)

Each row has a different function:

• Volume
• Pan
• Sends A + B
• Stop clips
• Track on
• Solo
• Arm

The “stop” row allows you to either stop an individual track or stop all clips by hitting the “stop” button itself on the right. Solo, arm, and track enable are self-explanatory.

Where things get a bit cooler is if you press the “snd A,” “snd B,” “pan,” and “vol” controls. These allow you to use each column to set parameters. So, for instance, if you want to adjust the send level on your second track, you’d hit “mixer,” then “snd A,” then use the second column to adjust the send up or down. You can fake a “fade” by dragging your finger up or down the column. Now, this doesn’t give you the continuous control a knob or fader would; there’s no interpolation between values. On the other hand, if you’re trying to create stepped, rhythmic changes, that could make the Launchpad (or any grid controller, including the monome) more interesting.

User mode

“User modes” provide open access to the pads for use as MIDI inputs. By default, “user 1″ sends MIDI note messages, and “user 2″ sends control change values.

In the video, you’ll see these modes used for some crazy things, like programming in a sequence and having it continue to light up as you add other layers. In my test – keeping in mind launch date is still over a month away – I couldn’t replicate any of these behaviors. Some of this interaction may require the upcoming Max for Live; I’m awaiting confirmation on details.

In the meantime, you can at least use the Launchpad as a MIDI input in Live or any other software.

Use with other software

Every single button on the Launchpad sends MIDI; I opened a MIDI Monitor session on my MacBook while testing it. There’s not a single menu key that doesn’t send a message. Also interesting: each sends both an on and an off value, which makes it more useful as a button.

It should also be possible, as with the APC40, to use MIDI to light up the Launchpad, complete with color and limited dim levels. I’m assuming the mappings may even be identical to the APC40. I don’t know yet how to do this, however.

Another big selling point for Novation, of course, is Automap support. Along the top, there are alternative labels for the buttons: learn, view, page, instrument, fx, user, and mixer. These will work with Automap and Automap Pro, in case you want to use another host or map to third-party instruments and effects. I didn’t get a chance to test this functionality yet, however.

Physical form factor

The Launchpad feels really good. It’s thin, it’s light, it’s easy to toss in a backpack (as I did today), and yet the plastic case feels very solid. The pads feel good, though I find the throw a little long, making them rock slightly if you don’t hit them dead-center. Angled pads indicate the center, and four pads around them have slight nubs on the surface for additional tactile feedback.

Rubber strips underneath the unit help grip surfaces.

One possibly unfortunate decision was to put the USB port on the side rather than the top, which means you can’t easily put two Launchpads side by side.

Software

The Launchpad ships with a copy of Ableton Live Launchpad edition (aka Live Lite), version 8.0.6. On both my Mac and Windows boxes, I simply installed that version and it automatically found my full Live license. I expect that the 8.0.6 build will get pushed to everyone else in time for launch.

You select the Launchpad as other control surfaces, by looking for “Launchpad” in the Control Surface menu. This presumably means that, like the APC40, a software handshake is used to enable the red clip selection box. I’d still like to see a universal solution from Ableton, one resizable to other controllers. Why not plug in a 4×4 drum pad and bank through clips in a 4×4 rectangle instead of an 8×8 one? The red rectangle is also limited in that it’s tough to see which tracks are selected. (It’s also kind of tough to see, period.) That’s really become an Ableton complaint, though. I’m sure we’ll be working on Max for Live and Live API solutions for heads-up displays that replace all of this soon.

Questions and Initial Impressions

I like the Launchpad a whole lot. Sure, it doesn’t have knobs or faders – but you could throw the Launchpad into your backpack alongside a KORG nanoKONTROL, using the Korg for your fader and knob tasks while the Launchpad launches clips, triggers drum pads, and gets used for live sequencing and playing instruments.

I am a little disappointed that there doesn’t seem to be a way to control Devices. I’d like to be able to take the User Mode and use my eight columns to control the eight macro knobs on any active Device. Sure, you only get 8 values of resolution, but you could set up a Device so that those eight values were musically interesting. I’m investigating whether this is possible; if not, I may look into hacking a solution.

I still think there’s a big place for open tools. The Launchpad is already touting forthcoming use with Max for Live, but that’s only because it sends MIDI messages – and anything else that can send MIDI (or OSC, via work from the Live community to use it) will do the same. I think those of us working on open interaction, though, can find ways of building stuff that works in open tools and closed tools (Java, Pd, and the like are open, Max is not), and open and closed hardware (monome, Livid’s Ohm on the open side, things like the cheap-and-light Launchpad on the proprietary side). Having lots of grids could be a good thing. If everyone has the same thing, the pressure is on to make your performance different from everyone else’s.

But the bottom line is, I think this is going to be a huge hit with the Live user base. And even more than the APC40, I think it’s cheap, an easy impulse-buy, extremely compact, and complements other hardware. It also looks like it’ll be a terrific live visual controller for people who moonlight between music and visual sets.

Since I do have this Launchpad here well over a month prior to launch, and some folks at Ableton and Novation ready to share, if you’ve got questions or concerns, please don’t be shy.

Still evaluating Live 8 – or want to learn more about how to use it? You can now read my review of Ableton Live 8 free on Keyboard Magazine’s site:

Ableton Live 8 Review [Keyboard Magazine]
See also (via comments) Nick Rothwell’s review for Sound on Sound June [subscription or US$1.49 fee required]

Keyboard doesn’t yet have comments, so feel free to discuss – or disagree – here.

I wanted to back up a little bit and consider Live as if for the first time. Now, I had also personally heard at least Robert Henke complain at one point that reviews of Live were uncritical. That to me would be a flaw as a reviewer, because all software designs involve compromises, so no software can ever be perfect. Here, I still feel there’s legitimate room for improvement in terms of the way Live handles interactive clip triggering and how it assigns control. Of course, we’re not just passively complaining about it – there’s also a community of Live users working to hack in functionality they need using the Live API, both via Python and forthcoming Max for Live.

Also for the review, I shot some quick video demos of features that were easier to show than describe, namely the new instrument Collision and the Vocoder effect. These are basically mini-tutorials on these creations. See Collision at top, Vocoder after the break at bottom. Fixed! Now the top video is actually the Collision video. (Oops.)

I’m a huge fan of physical modeling and Applied Acoustics, and Collision is one of the best percussion models I’ve seen. It starts to approach some of what’s possible in Apple’s Sculpture in Logic, but in a much more focused context, and with some unparalleled resonators (which you can also use on their own in the form of Corpus). See the top video for a walkthrough of the interface.

We may need to revisit the vocoder issue as there’s a new vocoder in FL Studio (Vocodex in the current beta), plus the existing vocoder in Reason. Sounds like there’s an article here waiting to happen. I like Ableton’s vocoder, though; it’s a different implementation and coupled with their unique Frequency Shifter, you can get some really unusual sounds.

For more Live 8 learning (and a more in-depth discussion of different ways of approaching the Frequency Shifter):

Live 8 Videos: New Warping Explained, APC + ReMOTE SL Integration

Ableton Live 8 Misuse: Ping Pong Psuedo Scratching Effect Video Tutorial

Ableton Live 8 Creative Tutorial Videos: Using and Misusing Groove Extraction

Ableton Live 8 Creative Tutorial Videos: Misusing Frequency Shifter

Can a software/hardware combination be as tactile as standalone gear like the MPC, but do, you know, computer-y things, too? That’s the question posed by Native Instruments’ new Maschine.

My Maschine just arrived in the mail, but one look in my inbox and I find that the folks at AudioMIDI have beat me to shooting a hands-on. What you see immediately is that you have immediate, hands-on hardware control of everything. With software behind that, that could lead to a lovely melding of hardware-style manipulation but software-style flexibility.

Conclusions of the AudioMIDI vid:

• Feels great; feels not cheap
• Roland-style step mode
• On-the-fly sampling
• Performance-style controls

Since AudioMIDI did shoot their video first, here’s your chance to say what you’d like in the CDM video. What do you want to see? What questions do you have?

And MPC fans, let me put it a different way: what would you have to see to be impressed by this?

Update/Clarification: Since this seems to be a point of confusion for some readers, both NI and AudioMIDI have confirmed that this isn’t an official review or special NI-sponsored promotion. This is a retailer excited about a box they got in the mail grabbing a camera and showing some initial impressions as they started using it. I am glad we put this up, though, because we’re getting some great feedback from all of you as far as what details you care about. So keep that coming, as I think I’ll be able to answer all those questions.

SoundCloud: The Tour from SoundCloud on Vimeo.

SoundCloud, an online sharing community for sound and music, is now hours from public launch. I’ve been playing around with a closed beta for several months, and have to say, I’ve been really impressed. SoundCloud isn’t the first attempt to provide places to share music files with others, but previous attempts have been lackluster when it comes to easy sharing, features necessary to make music listening more enjoyable, and upload capacity. Most importantly, none has accomplished the community “stickiness” that has been the cornerstone of successful media services like Flickr, Vimeo, and YouTube. In fact, there’s been so much of a noise-to-signal problem with the Web space, I expect a lot of you have simply tuned out new Web services. There are some good reasons to pay attention to SoundCloud, though:

• Singing telegram, anyone? Music on SoundCloud acts more like a messaging service. Tracks from people you’re following appear in an inbox for you to sort through. You can even create a DropBox for other people, so this could be huge for people running labels or live events. (That’s especially welcome now that a lot of people have given up on individually clicking myspace links to hear what someone sounds like.)
• Easier uploads and sharing: Getting files on the service in your favorite format, with whatever length you want, is a whole lot easier than on competing services.
• Smart player interaction: Services like this now live and die on their embeddable player. SoundCloud’s is really clever and attractive. Download links are everywhere. Also, SoundCloud attacks the biggest problem with music – it’s invisible. There’s a waveform view, and people can comment on specific points in your music. That feature has been annoying in a lot of video players, but here comments appear only if you want them to, and I’ve found them really helpful in getting feedback. (See my example track below, for instance.)
• Open API: A full API means you can built interesting apps atop SoundCloud. Check out the lovely Radioclouds by Matas Petrikas for an example of how interesting this can be; source code is available.

SoundCloud, indeed, seems to have all the kinds of features that made Flickr stand out from a crowd of photo services. Labels are already onboard, too: Compost, BPitch Control, and Goldie are already making it part of their workflow, says SoundCloud.

One very significant missing feature: it’s not yet possible to embed licenses in your music, so it’s not possible to tell what’s copyrighted and what’s Creative Commons-licensed. SoundCloud founder Alexander Ljung tells us this feature is coming very soon, though, and as on Flickr, you’ll be able to set a global default for your music, so if you want to release everything under a CC license, you can. That should make SoundCloud absolutely explode as a place for CC-licensed remixing.

Now, the only bad news: pro accounts are a bit pricey when compared to a service like Flickr, priced at EUR9-EUR59 each month. The EUR9/mo account is actually probably what most people will need: 15 tracks per month (that seems like plenty), plus basic stats, dropbox, and support. If you were a beta tester like me, you probably got a complimentary Light account through the beginning of next year. And importantly, there’s no limit on file sizes on any of the accounts. That means you could easily upload 15 live/DJ sets a month, so no complaint here. My guess is that the rates are a reflection of what it costs now in bandwidth for an ad-free site. And you can always go for a free account and see how the service works. But I do expect price to be the major obstacle to this service’s popularity. Update: comment to that effect in, what, five minutes of me posting?

Alex and the team say they’re CDM readers, and I’ll get to meet with them next week while I’m in Berlin. So if you’ve got any questions or feedback, let us know. I’d also love to see this stuff integrated more tightly in other communities; Facebook is there, for a start. Stay tuned.

SoundCloud

SoundCloud Tour

SoundCloud Blog

Here’s an example of my player (just an informal live improv set, not a full track). I need to go upload more content but plan to do that over the coming weeks. But it gives you a sense of how this works in action.

Here’s the upload interface, which I find quite usable. Note that you can also use SoundCloud for private files:

Among a generation of new, alternative controllers for music and visuals that have actually made it to market as products, the AudioCubes from Percussa are one of the stand-outs. They’re unquestionably cool on first look, lit with glowing, colored LEDs and moved around wirelessly for control. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll immediately know what to do with them. So, for this hands-on with the cubes, we turn to Peter Nyboer, an A/V performer, Max/MSP guru, and developer for Livid. Peter spent some time and gives us a look inside his brain as he works out what potential the cubes might have. -PK

I first saw the Percussa AudioCubes at NAMM a couple of years ago.  As it was colorful, and clearly off the beaten track, I was immediately interested in this unusual controller for music.  I started to chat with creator Bert Schiettecatte, and learned that these had native Max support, and worked in all sorts of different modes, and could process audio, and change color, and worked wirelessly, but also connected to USB, and… well, all sorts of odd interactions were possible, that much was clear.

I finally got a chance to try them out, receiving a set of four cubes from Peter Kirn on a cold, sunny day in New Jersey.  My initial goal was to get to know them, and, as developer for Livid Instruments, see about making Livid Union and Cell "cube native". 

I unpacked the cubes from their handsome glossy black box, and got them hooked up to my computer, and went through the tutorials.  I opened the MIDI Bridge software and the supplied Ableton Live set. The tutorials are good, though it didn’t mention that Live was receiving, oddly enough, on channel 14 (this will be fixed in the next manual revision).  Once I got the MIDI Bridge sending on the right channel, I was ready to try out some suggested uses.

Here’s a video demonstrating the basics of using the cubes to trigger samples in Live….

Percussa Cubes basics from Livid Instruments on Vimeo.

As someone who is primarily a Max user, I found the MIDI Bridge software a bit limiting and, well, too steeped in MIDI.  I wanted raw data!  I don’t care about notes, I want numbers!  I wanted 0. to 1., not 0-127.  That, however, was for another day, as I had to get back to some other work.

What are they for?

During the time away from the cubes, I tried to imagine what I might do with them.  As you can see in the first video, you can do face detection (the faces of the cubes, that is, not your face) and trigger events with different cubes on different faces.  I wasn’t sure how this was an advantage over a button.  Sure, there’s a theatrical gesture involved, but, unless you are using quantization (something Live conveniently provides), you would have a hard time getting triggers in correct musical time, trying to match up the sensors on the faces. It does provide a novel scenario of arrangement; it’s just not one that suited me.

The other curious interaction possibility is the "sensor" mode, in which you can use the sensors to measure distance from the cube face to some other object, such as your hand. [Ed.: Embedded in each face is a simple infrared range sensor - that's the black dot you see in the video at the center of each cube side.] Finally, the cubes do audio output and processing, but it’s a sort of "experimental" feature, not very well documented, and would clearly have to wait for me to figure them out. 

As I thought about it, I realized that the AudioCubes don’t have a comprehensive "scenario of use" or "interaction metaphor" that provide a path to discovery. It’s not like a piano keyboard, where you can walk up to it and have an expectation.  

But for the adventurous experimentalist, isn’t this what I’m in it for?  Pure experimentalism?  Wiping your preconceptions clean, relying on creativity and new ideas of interaction?

A scenario: sculpting sound with distance

Eventually, after showing the cubes to a bunch of people and trying to get some ideas, I finally decided to focus on working with the distance sensors. I came upon the idea of a "sound sculpting" metaphor – by forming my hands around the cubes, I could create settings for the synth.  Additionally, I thought up a fanning gesture that would "excite" the synth, producing sound.  Once I got the color talking back to the cubes, their utillity as a performance instrument became much clearer.  The simple color change could inform me where I was and where I wanted to be, rather than just waving my hands wildly and hoping for the best.

The video demonstrates the results. I made this instrument in my favorite environment, Max/MSP, which afforded me some extra interaction capabilities that you wouldn’t get using the MIDI Bridge.  I used a "pause detection" to sense that I was holding steady, which would stop any data from being set – this way, I could shape the sound, pause, then take my hands away, without messing up my settings from my motion.

This was quite quickly engaging, and made me warm up the cubes that had so far confounded me.

Note: the first part of the video is silent. No need to adjust your sets. -PK

Percussa Cubes with Resonant Synth from Livid Instruments on Vimeo.

Showing it off, and scratching

The next step was to show off my creation.  Maker Faire (Make Magazine’s giant DIY fiesta) was just around the corner, so I joined up with a local group. I showed off the cubes and the Livid Ohm controllers to a constant stream of makers.  People loved the bizarre interaction, the flashing colors, and design – no small feat when you have to compete with robots, CNC machines, a variety of flamethrowers, and the other large-scale creative works. The performance potential of the cube’s distance sensors alone was definitely verified! It also became clear that I had created an "instrument." It was very easy for me to use and demonstrate — while at the same time, because of the quirks I had programmed in, it required a certain amount of virtuosity and learning. That to me is a characteristic of any quality instrument (or cobbled-together programs)!

I also prepared an example with an easy-to-understand mapping of distance to audio loop playback — think "scratching."  I used an audio looping patch that I’ve been working on for a future Livid release, and mapped the sensors to the pitch of four different loops.  With a couple of tweaks, I had created a four-way scratcher, by getting velocity information from my gestures, and mapping that to speed changes on the loops.  This is a LOT of fun. Ed.: Calling it "scratching" may be a stretch, but I love the distorted results you get — definitely sound unique, Peter! -PK

Scratching with Percussa Cubes from Livid Instruments on Vimeo.

Target audience?

So whom exactly are the cubes for? Just the radical performers, programmers, and experimentalists?  After showing them to a lot of people – children, adults, musicians, geeks, freaks, moms, and more – I’d have to say the cubes have a broader appeal than that.

DJs could benefit from having a couple of these controllers around – they don’t take up much room, and the distance sensors provide a great theatrical addition to your set – you can hook them up to a synth or some samples and add some extremely cool overlays way beyond what you might do with scratching. Plus, using the face detection, you can arrange them in different ways to load different synths, sounds, or loops.  With a bit of work, or patience for more documentation, I think the sound capabilities would delight anyone with an 8-bit aesthetic. Video programmers could extend the cubes feature set with a camera and color detection – the distinct colors would be easy to track, giving you not only the four distance sensors, but an individual XY- controller for each cube!

In spite of their lack of an easy-to-follow narrative, the Percussa AudioCubes offer a wealth of exploration for performance and sonic mischief that will continually challenge and reward your creativity. If you are working with music a lot and performing on a regular basis, I would definitely give the cubes a strong consideration, as they’ll at the very least add something different to your set, and better, force you to think differently about how you interact with sound and video. It’s unlikely you’ll get tired of them, since they have so many weird options for use.  I don’t think the casual music maker would get much out of them, though, as they have a bit of a steep price and require some time dedicated to getting the most out of them. 

More information can be had at http://www.percussa.com.  US Sales are handled through dealers, and the east coast rep is Jean Paul, jeanpaul [at] percussa.com

Ed.: Thanks, Peter! I’m curious to hear from readers — other folks with experience of the AudioCubes? People who bought a set and are playing out with them? And, of course, the basic technologies here, like the IR sensors, are relatively well-known — anyone who’s built similar interfaces of their own design? Let us know. -PK

Peter Dines, known for his work with Reaktor (don’t miss his fantastic Reaktor Tutorial Project blog) got a first-hand look at the Yamaha Tenori-On’s first North American stop on its launch tour. He brings us some impressions of the launch, and introduces the phrase "switchboard acrobatics" to the lexicon, which I think will have to find a home in these discussions from now on.

I’ll be at the Brooklyn event tonight, so if you’re there, do say hi! We’ll have coverage of the artists and event soon. (Yeah, I cheated — these are London launch event photos.)

Here’s Peter — and yes, it’s interesting to know that those buttons aren’t necessarily immediately intuitive when you’re under the gun!

Since I am an extremely lazy person I had only a cursory knowledge of the Yamaha Tenori-On when I arrived at SAT for its gala Montreal launch. A number of the little blinking beauties were set up at kiosks separated from the loud music of Pheek by the flimsiest of curtains. I waited in line for my turn to have a poke at it, and when I got it I was baffled.

Yes, there were instructions. Step four required the user to hold down a function key while pressing an LED in row nine. Now I don’t know about you but I don’t immediately recognize groups of nine out of an array of sixteen by sixteen identical, evenly spaced das blinkenlights, especially when there’s a queue of impatient people behind me. There was also no obvious way to turn up the volume to a level that would be audible in the venue. Disheartened, I passed the headphones to the guy breathing down my neck, got a beer and settled in to watch musicians who evidently knew the ins and outs of the thing as they worked it on stage.

Pheek was just finishing his set and I Am Robot And Proud followed with fun music that reminded me of a funkier take on Sign by Nobuzaku Takemura. The man clearly knows his way around a traditional keyboard as well as the tetris-like interface of the Tenori. He alternated between them and at times played one with each hand, a feat something like typing with one hand while writing cursively with the other.

Nathan Michel played a set that, I first thought, demonstrated exactly how not to perform with the Tenori-On, standing motionless like a kid with a Nintendo DS. Then I slowly became aware of how well he knew the interface and what he was doing with it – switching effortlessly between patterns and modifying them on the fly. It was geekily hypnotic; an impressive demonstration of switchboard acrobatics.

By this time the crowds around the Tenori-On kiosks had thinned out so I took another stab at it, read the instructions at my leisure, figured out how to turn up the volume and got a few sounds working in bounce mode. Though the interface was not as intuitive as I expected, it was a relief to find that the instrument was also deeper – not at all the cookie cutter sequencer with a tic-tac-toe interface I had feared it might be. It’s a good piece of finger, ear and mind candy. Each musician who performed, including the Tenori-On’s creator Toshio Iwai, had his own way of using the device expressively, which is exciting. It is by no means a one trick pony or toy that corrals creativity into strict bounds. I can imagine a lot of potential for its abilities to import samples and to control external gear.

Toshio himself took the stage and gave us a history lesson on the Tenori-On’s roots. One of its early inspirations was the Scots-Canadian animator Norman McLaren, who painted shapes directly on the sound and image tracks of film, creating images that were sound and sounds that were images. Toshio, if you want to butter up a Canadian audience, complimenting McLaren and our National Film Board is the way to do it. We were putty in his hands from that point. Highlights of his spiel included playing a punch-roll of the song Happy Birthday backwards through a hand cranked music box – it turned the music pleasantly melancholic – and a video of Ryuichi Sakamoto playing a piano linked to a Toshio-designed audiovisual device that bounced the sounds as colorful images on a screen to a second piano that translated them back into sound.

Robert Lippok played the Tenori-On accompanied by percussionist Debashi Sinha in a performance that started out rhythmically off-the-grid before settling into a giant swirling groove accompanied by similar motion on the Tenori and VJ projections on the screens behind. Lippok had the Tenori clamped upright to show the sound and light patterns as he created them. I enjoyed seeing a performance that demonstrated the Tenori in a free-flowing, improvisational and partly non-quantized context.

Sutekh made dark music in a dark room. Like Lippok and Sinha, he used the Tenori-On in a non-obvious way, creating drones and cascades of threatening sound over a throbbing bass. As with Lippok, I can’t say precisely what he was doing even though I watched him do it. Chinstroker nirvana!

The evening’s final performer was Stefan Betke, a big, avuncular seeming guy who, as Pole, creates some of the most brutally ass shaking grooves you will hear. Like the last time I’d seen him, he rattled my organs loose. There are technologies and there are musicians who transcend those technologies. I think Stefan could create bone shattering sub bass with a kazoo and sheer force of will if the situation called for it. He engages the music with his full body, cobra-swaying nonstop behind his equipment in a way that makes him difficult to photograph in low light. The groove was infectious and everyone near the stage including myself broke into dance. Stefan’s music that night was utterly, idiosyncratically his own, another indicator of the Tenori-On’s versatility.

If the event was meant to stoke desire for the Tenori – and surely it was – then it succeeded. I certainly want one, though I understand they aren’t cheap. When they hit the shelves I’ll be annoying the employees at my favorite music store by playing with the thing for as long as I can before they boot me out.

We hope to have some more on the FreqBox soon; let us know if you’ve gotten one yourself and how it’s working out for you.

Previously: NAMM: Moog Music moogerfooger FreqBox Meant to be Heard, Not Seen?

Sofie writes:

This bundle of joy came this afternoon and I couldn’t help but take a few happy snaps to celebrate its arrival. My initial comments are â€Å“yayâ€Â? and â€Å“woohoo.â€Â? It looks and feels solid, great key action (no skimping on key size depth), it has pink and blue buttons (extremely important) and rotary LED knobs. The layout is simple and easy to use, and its controls are chosen to emphasise its role as a chunky sounding monophonic synth. And above all it sounds like a moog. My thirst for tangible analogue aesthetic has been quenched. Every girl should have one. ;)

And it glows in the dark. (Hint to product makers: as a reviewer, I instantly put that in my “pros” column.) I don’t own a Moog here, sadly, but I will say, if you haven’t played the Voyager or Little Phatty, you really should get a hands-on experience. The total user experience of the Moog instruments is truly greater than just the sum of their parts; they are fantastic designs.

Sofie, who says she’s also a CDM reader, is an interesting figure herself. In addition to various compositional projects, she helped put together the record label Southern Outpost (as in Southern Hemisphere, I presume), which now has a deal with Submerge in Detroit, has worked with a lot of really cool people, has played SONAR as a laptop artist, and, well, go read her bio. And she has her Little Phatty under a Roland SH1000, a rig that will make any synth-loving boy or girl happy!

For more:

my first moog
my first moog part 2
flickr stream

(Apologies to Matrixsynth readers, who are now experiencing the new Sofie Moog meme.)

We’re always happy to hear reader stories, so all you good folks, feel free to share any time you like.

Eric Richmond is a “deep house DJ who was looking for a dedicated MIDI controller for ’standard’ 2 channel mixing.” Amidst all the buzz about M-Audio’s new X-Session Pro (XSP) DJ-style controller, even before it had been released, it’s been hard to get solid information on how the gear works in the real world. Eric took the plunge early and brings us some hands-on testing from the DJ booth.

The XSP is a new MIDI controller by M-Audio set to replace the older “X-Session” MIDI device, and attempts to replicate the standard 2-4 channel audio mixers with which most of us are familiar.

The device feels sturdy, better than my M-Audio Oxygen 8, and on par with my M-Audio Trigger Finger. One nice touch is the crossfader slider is much less resistant then the volume/pitch sliders, as you’d expect. The EQ/aux knobs are tall and spread out apart, so it’s very easy to tweak just the ones you want. The only real complaint I might have is that the top piece of plastic feels a little “cheap”, and the knobs and sliders stick up so high that if you pack it in a bag as-is, you need to take care that nothing would come crushing down on top of it. However, for $100 retail, these are minor complaints. [Ed: I will say, such is the case with the protruding controls on most controllers. -PK]

Choosing MIDI Assignments

Getting the XSP to work in Live 5.2.2 (my DJ tool of choice) was a snap. Just load up Live, press the “MIDI” button, and assign away. No problems/gotchas here. My first test was going to just be a standard 2-channel DJ gig, so I assigned things in a pretty standard way. The EQ knobs went to each channel respectively, and two of the aux knobs went to aux send levels for each channel (where I had various effects). Volume sliders, crossfader, and the start and stop buttons were standard as well.

Instead of using the “cue” buttons for cueing, I decided to use the “pitch” sliders as independent cue volumes for each channel. This way, I could easily mix the two channels in my headphones, independently of how the individual volume sliders were set up. With the cue buttons, I set one to toggle “loop on/off” for the selected clip in live. I mapped the sets of REW/FF buttons to moving around the session view in Live. This way, the only time I had to touch the mouse was when I was dragging in a clip. Once I did that, I could use the REW/FF buttons to navigate session view to the correct clip and use the start/stop buttons to fire them off.

This setup worked extremely well: I had only used the XSP for a few hours before the gig, but since it felt like a standard mixer, it was obvious what was doing what, and I didn’t make any mistakes. If anything, it was pretty liberating rarely having to look at the computer screen — there was none of the dreaded “he’s checking e-mail” syndrome that people complain about with “digital DJs”.

Comparisons

Lastly, I know we’ve all probably tested a ton of devices in searching for MIDI controller nirvana. In my particular quest to find the perfect “standard DJ midi mixer” I looked into and have had physical experience with:

1. Kontrol DJ – A good friend of mine who DJs in Traktor uses this, and it’s an AMAZING controller, and is perfect for Traktor. Unfortunately, it does not map to Ableton Live that well.
2. Faderfox LV2, DJ2, DX2, LX2 devices – I know someone who has a couple of these, and they’re amazing, but the problem was I couldn’t find a combo of any two of them that gave me “everything” I wanted. Plus, they’re quite pricey, and at that price point, I would want things to be perfect.
3. M-Audio Trigger Finger – Before getting the XSP, I was using a TF as my main mixing controller. While it actually worked OK (I could use pads as EQ kill switches, which was sweet), I was leery of using other banks for one-shots and fx. Since the TF does not tell you which bank is loaded in the LCD display, I was fearful that I’d be in the wrong bank, trying to do the wrong thing.

Conclusions

So, what’s the verdict? In my case, it’s EXACTLY what I was looking for. Now when I have “standard” DJ gigs, I have a perfect controller just for that task. No more making a wacky Trigger Finger bank to try and fake it. The only thing I would have liked to have seen were kill switches for the EQs, but again, for $100, it’s hard to complain.

I know people will say “but the power of Live is being freed from two channels; I want to mix 13 clips at once and I only want to use one end-all-be-all device while doing it!” If this is the case, then this is not the device for you. With the XSP able to handle my “standard” DJ gigs, I can free up my Trigger Finger to be a wacky FX board, as well as programming a couple of banks for triggering one-shots and loops.

Anyway, hope this review helps, and if you guys have any further questions about the device, feel free to email me @ eric DOT richmond AT gmail DOT com

Ed: If anyone else has hands-on experience with the X-Session Pro, we’ll post that, too; I’m still interested in what non-traditional DJs, electronic musicians, and VJs might do with this device! -PK

Related:

M-Audio Releases X-Session Pro DJ Controller, $129

Cheap, Functional, Quirky: BCD2000 Mix & Scratch MIDI Controller Review, Part I

Faderfox Controllers for Live, DJing: US Distribution, Upcoming Models

Faders, Knobs, Crossfader: New VMX Control Surface

The best way to get 8-bit sounds is to employ a real NES system or Game Boy for fifteen bucks and go to town — nothing else sounds quite the same. But for the next best thing, and the ability to do evil things to those sounds within a serious host, this free plug-in from Japan that will do the job:

YCMK Magical 8bit Plug [ Official Site ]

Totally free, totally cross-platform (Windows VST, Mac AU). Via Adrian Anders and the CDM forums, where we’re trying to figure out why it’s crashing someone’s installation of Ableton Live. Not Universal: Note that this plug-in is not Intel-native (nor any of the other examples listed here, as far as I know), so you’ll need to go elsewhere for 8-bit sounds on an Intel Mac, ironically enough. Also, as several readers note over on TUAW, GarageBand has its own Atari Sings patch, though I don’t think it clips as realistically as this does for a true NES sound. (Makes sense that it doesn’t, since those patches are built with Logic’s synths.)

Anyway, here’s what it sounds like, emulating the compositional style of classical NES tunes of yore:

[audio:magical8bitPlugSample.mp3]

The authentic sound comes from the choice of 8-bit waveforms, limited to square, triangle, pulse, and noise waveforms, plus envelope shape. This version is simple, sounds just right, and does the job, and the price is certainly right. Here’s one beginner and one advanced example of how you might use this.

Beginner Tutorial: Add Nintendo Love to GarageBand

First off, here’s how to insert this as an effect in GarageBand, giving any Mac free access to an NES sequencer. (Actually, I’m labeling this beginner, but for advanced users who’ve never used GarageBand, it’s not at all intuitive!) You’ll need to first install the plug-in file (the Mac file has a .component extension); drop it in your Library > Audio > Plug-Ins > Components folder. Then, in GarageBand:

1. Create a new track.

2. Click Software Instrument in the New Track window. Click the disclosure triangle next to “Details…” to open advanced options for this Software Instrument track.

3. Choose “Magical 8bit Plug” as your Generator. GarageBand won’t yet let you edit the options for the plug-in, because you need to save this as a preset.

4. Choose a category. There’s no “Vintage Game Consoles” category, so I chose Synth Leads. Click the “Save Instrument…” button at the bottom of the dialog, and choose a catchy name for your instrument.

5. Now that you’ve saved, you can edit the options for the instrument. Click the pencil icon next to “Manual” to open up the editor for the plug-in.

6. The track is active, so you can try adjusting the settings in this dialog, paying particular attention to the “OscKind” setting for choosing different waveforms. The results will actually sound far better than an 8-bit sound should, because by default Apple has some of their high-quality effects turned on. You can relish the delays and reverbs, or go back and uncheck some of those for a pure, dry sound.

Silly “Advanced” Example

Just to demonstrate how much you can abuse something like this, I’ve rendered a couple of bars of a pattern in Ableton Live dry (sounds like an NES), then with various effects presets from Native Instruments’ Guitar Rig 2:

[audio:8bitexample.mp3]

Guitar Rig works really well as an effects package, and can easily be inserted into a track, giving you some evil sounds that emulate running your Game Boy through a giant chain of stomp boxes and amps. The results are utterly ridiculous. Mostly I want to fire up the real thing and play with that. But this plug-in will be very helpful for the occasional 8-bit touch. One idea: try mixing the noise patch with a fuller drum sound, so you alternate 8-bit hats/snares (or whatever that’s supposed to sound like) with other drums.

I’ll see if this finds its way into some real musical projects of my own, but in the meantime, let us know how it works for you here.

Alternative Options

There are many other options for creating chiptune style music. A few of our favorite plug-in versions: (thanks to W. Brent Latta, our resident gaming music editor, for suggestions)

Triforce, free plug-in from Tweakbench with all the 8-bit fixin’s (Windows only)

Chip32 is unique in that it features editable wavetables (as opposed to the fixed wavetables in the YMCK plug) and a fantastically retro interface:
Chip32 (Windows version, Japanese page but you can figure it out)
Apulsoft Chip32 Mac port (scroll down — or grab some of those other free Mac goodies)

Chip32 and Triforce are completely free, but for a commercial option, you might check out Reaktor’s Oki Computer. Brent notes that it was created “by Timothy Lamb of Trash80 fame – he did some of the music for the game Darwinia. Oki Computer started out as a user-created Ensemble for Reaktor, and then NI later picked it up and had him do an offical version for Reaktor 5.” And, of course, that means if you don’t like any of these options, you could use an environment like Reaktor, Max/MSP, or Pd to build your own.

Intel Mac Users

An updated version of this plug-in is now available with Universal binaries for compatibility with Intel Macs.

Previously:

Mobile Music: Tracker for Nintendo DS, DS Homebrew Music Roundup

Analog Industries Gets a MidiNES Nintendo Music Cart

Avoid Generation NEX; Get a Real NES for 8-bit Music

Prototype Nintendo Music Keyboard from 1984

See also the CDM forums, where you can discuss using real 8-bit systems:

Retro, Gaming, and Oddities Forum

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