I am about to purchase an Octatrack. I produce experimental / avant-garde type music. I guess you could also call it ambient because it is mostly non-beat based. I watched countless videos, read the manual and comments and I understand the OT is great for mangling audio.samples. … but all the examples I’ve seen are all beat based… in other words there is always some sort of constant drum/percussion beats/hits, going non stop at the same tempo no less.
I’m currently using several looping devices in a non tempo based fashion, inserting odd samples on the fly, sound FX, etc…
Sorry for what may seem like a stupid question, but is the OT strictly a beat based machine? Can tempos be changed in the middle of a sequence? chopped at different rates? sped-up? slowed downed?, etc?
I’m also concerned about the 4 note poly limit in the MIDI sequencer
I’m excited about the possibilities with the OT but all I’m hearing are beat based examples…
Not interested in techno-dance type applications… more like weird film score stuff…
I’d really appreciate some thoughts and comments on the above.
You can speed up / slow down / timestretch one or multiple samples at the same time. OT does not demand a beat at all. Only the global tempo cannot be automated, but you can tweak it live as much as you like.
i gravitate to that end of the spectrum too, there’s no doubt its strengths are leaning towards 4s etc but there’s plenty about it to break from that, plus the polyrhythmic side and different tempo factors can lead to other genres/styles - plays free mode will be of interest
it’s as good at fighting the 4s thing as you could reasonably hope for in a sequencer like this
you could run two midi tracks with 4 voices each on same ch
i’ve never found 4 voices limiting, but i don’t just make piano voices
i enjoy the OT often without engaging the transport
it is still based on a 16step workflow, but with a bit of creative thinking it can go off in different directions
it’s highly recommended, but what is the competition anyway ? none !
If you put some thought to your programing and sample-choice. and the techniques to manipulate realtime what you are recording now. you can get the most weird shit you want.
freaky shit, like making my machinedrum play a 4/4 beat, but using the realtime sampling goodness of the octatrack play that recording at 4/3 speed. gets extra crispy if you figure out how to switch from 4/3 beats to 4/4 just using the fader…
I am positive that the octatrack can get as weird and brave into the realms outside the 4/4 as you can imagine it and program it. and I got a youtube full of stuff to prove it
The Octatrack is incredibly versatile. There are many many ways to approach musicmaking with it.
A few examples…
All 16 tracks can have their own step length (2 to 64), time signature and tempo multiplier (eg 1/4 runs 4 times slower than the bpm).
The 8 Audio tracks can be decoupled from the master clock altogether in Plays Free mode. This means they can effectively play any length of loop (or oneshot) at any speed, independently.
The 8 Midi tracks have 3 LFOs each which can be assigned across 10 Midi CCs per track (plus PB and AT) . Midi tracks can be set to the same Channel.
Each Midi track has its own arpeggiator which can run at a different speed to its associated track and the speed of the arpeggio (along with it’s other parameters) can be changed per step!
If you already have a set way of composing, you will have to wrestle the Octatrack and ultimately make some compromises. But if you can let it dictate the way you work and adjust to go with the flow, the possibilities are endless.
Thanks to everyone for the replies and VERY helpful info…
for my “strange” music up till now I’ve been using a pair of Echoplex Digital Pro +'s, a Roland Fantom XR, a Roland MV8800, Eventide Eclipse and a boss RC-50 looper. I’ve done some pretty wild stuff but I’m geting the feeling the OT will help transport me into a different mangled world.
The samples on my web site were recorded with the above gear in addition to a pair of Daxophones, Chapman Stick, strange contact microphone amplified instruments (like a violin bowed door spring,)… I’ve also started getting into circuit bending…With all these things considered, it seems like the Octatrack will be the next logical gear choice…
One more question regarding MIDI sequencing, does the OT do linear realtime MIDI sequencing? or just step and pattern…
No linear sequencing on Octatrack unfortunately, though you can record realtime within the 64 step limit for both internal sounds and midi.
You can also use scale modes to give longer progressions than the 64 step limit (which might be useful for the type of music you’re making)
As a new OT owner (had it for a few weeks) I can strongly recommend it for any genre of electronic/experimental music. For sound mangling/ambient/special FX etc its superb.
Sound quality is excellent even when piling on the filters and effects, option to use inputs in either ‘thru track’ mode or direct method (i.e. not using up a track for the external inputs) makes it really versatile. Live sampling either manually or with pre-programmed ‘sample triggers’ is also great for jamming and improv.
My advice would be go for it and have no fear. Excellent machine. Also holds its value well, so if you really can’t make it work in your setup you won’t take a big financial hit. (£900 new in UK, typical second hand price is around £800 in good condition)
Hope this helps. I dithered for months before buying but absolutely no regrets. Most inspiring box I’ve ever owned.
i might swim a little against the tide now, love hans reichel btw, i’ve bought from Emmett too, been looping before loopers were ubiquitous, but after frippertronics etc … but given i’m understanding your background a little more i would suggest that you look into writing your own audio software in Max/MSP not M4L ! the OT is amazing, i enjoy bending it towards my will, but it is bending, i also like all the other stuff it does, but maybe a machine with particular strengths isn’t the way ahead, the OT is amazing and it does off-piste, but it’s not the best tool to do it, amazing though it is - also as stated, they hold their value well and they can loop, just food for thought, do both
i might swim a little against the tide now, love hans reichel btw, i’ve bought from Emmett too, been looping before loopers were ubiquitous, but after frippertronics etc … but given i’m understanding your background a little more i would suggest that you look into writing your own audio software in Max/MSP not M4L ! the OT is amazing, i enjoy bending it towards my will, but it is bending, i also like all the other stuff it does, but maybe a machine with particular strengths isn’t the way ahead, the OT is amazing and it does off-piste, but it’s not the best tool to do it, amazing though it is - also as stated, they hold their value well and they can loop, just food for thought, do both [/quote]
Hi Avantronica, Yea, I’m really not sure at this point if the OT is going to do what “I think it’s going to do” for me…still, every OT produced example I’ve heard so far is rhythmic - tempo -beat based repetition. Not that there’s anything wrong with that (grin) but “tick tick tick tick” is just not my thing. Most (not all) of my music is non tempo based random improvisation. It’s interesting to note that the majority of MV8800 users are beat makers, yet I find it to be an extremely useful tool for what I do considering the ability to combine sampling , and linear MIDI and audio tracks in one machine. For what it does, the OT is an expensive piece of gear (in my opinion.) Before I take the plunge, I’m going to continue to read, research, ask for comments… I just printed the manual… by the way, MAX/MSP looks very interesting!.. I’m going to check that out although I’m trying to keep away from using a laptop on stage. I don’t suppose they have a version for Ubuntu?.(linux)… Have you ever heard of a program called “Sound Globs”?"
Never heard of that one, but pd covers some of the ground that max does, for free, once these environments are set up you could run it headless or without screen, don’t read too much into the videos you see
There’s been too many to recall, but this dude always pushes the OT away from the norm
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it is mighty and the routing internally w fx is mind-blowing plus good hands free external control
i sometimes play an unheard sample (can be up to 2gb long) and intermittently sample from that, very inspiring and loose ![/quote]
Ok, now that’s more like it! (the examples you posted) especially the “Octatrack experimental demo” Youtube you posted… ok, I’m convinced… I’ll get one… … time to order-up and the learning process begins… get ready for those annoying newbie questions.
great - your own tendencies and preferences will take you off in all sorts of directions too - it’s a steep learning curve to master it live, at least in terms of getting it to do all the things you may wish fluently - but if you get your head around the hugely flexible power of parts it will allow you to find new sonic territory - it is hugely powerful and very robust (the pickup machines need a bit of a polish or careful handling) but it is as they say on here a monster and very musical - i got a s/h one, well loved, with plenty of warranty left, no regrets, will never sell
Some of those OT demos/videos where the drum beats go on and on forever are so annoying to me… I don’t mind a little repetition but those 20 minuet long beat drones are like torture.
I think I finally realized that the OT is absolutely not a do everything machine. I believe it’s strengths will become obvious when combined with other devices… Of course I don’t have mine yet but I’ve decided to get one based on everyone’s comments, the videos and everything I’ve read so far…
I’ve resigned my self to the fact that there WILL be some hair pulling frustrations at first.
(maybe for a while).
I originally thought about getting a Yamaha RS7000 because it has some audio and MIDI mangling capabilities but the OT seems to a bit on the wilder side… heck, maybe I’ll get both!
Yes. Just hold down Function and turn the Level/Tempo knob to change master tempo. You could also tap tempo by holding down Function and tapping on another button.
Not sure what you mean exactly by “chopped up different rates”. You can set up each Flex machine track to slice audio into individual numbers of slices. My recording above has Track 3 playing 8 randomly assigned slices, and Track 4 playing 16. Each track has its own set of triggers for playback of slices (one trigger per slice). Each track can have its own multiplier of the master tempo. Each track can have its own length and time signature. Each track can set be set to “play free”, which is to play when you explicitly trigger it, instead of playing when you hit the Play button (normally triggers sequencer for all tracks). More details can be found in the “Pattern Settings Menu” section of the manual, which you can download for free from the Elektron site.
Right, it’s not that great a looper in the conventional (song-oriented: verse, verse, chorus, etc.) sense, only 80MB RAM for looping, sampling, etc. There’s also some things I wish were possible that are not at the moment (eg. a quicker way to slice audio and assign slices to trigs - or even better MIDI access to the slicing functions).
That all said, if you already have existing looping devices, you can use the Octatrack for its strengths in the sampling domain and not muck about with its onboard loopers (pickup machines) and three LFOs per track, retriggering, and messing with sample start gives you tons of potential for audio mangling fun, and the onboard FX gives you post-loop processing potential. And let me not forget the ability to route audio between tracks in realtime, and have one track slice the audio content in the record buffer of another track.
Oh, and please read Merlin’s classic document, which explains what its really good at (playing with short audio samples) and the differences between the Flex machines (short sample processing mayhem) and Static machines (intended for streaming longer - as in a couple of minutes or more long - samples from the CF card).
