I made a beat tape for Red Bull Academy this year - what a great process. Here’s a collage of things I’ve gotten down and in to over the past 18 months.
Lot’s of OT and MD in there, even if it’s not instantly apparent.
This is really dope, love hearing stuff like this on Elektron boxes. Great beats, and I like the way you’ve made it into a set.
I applied to RBMA this year too - hope to see you in Tokyo!
Thanks Jamrod! I had to trim it down from 400 beats/ideas from over 2 years…
It would be a great experience, the RBMA. Would be great to see another Elektron person there, fucking ay, tear it up.
Nice stuff, love the tone and vibe.
Care to mention any hardware or software you like to use? 
Thank you. I’m in Australia too, for a little bit longer anyway.
Over that time I’ve bought and sold a hell of a lot really, but off the top of my head it’d be Machinedrum, Octatrack, ASR10, Ensoniq EPS, Chroma Polaris, Ensoniq ESQ-1 and sp404 holding the most of it.
I use FL11 and cut a bunch of things up. The samplers are the key. Everyone should buy all the old sampler - they’re not making any new ones.
Software I am liking lately is BootEQ mk2, Ferris Tape Saturation, Thrillseeker VBL comp, iZotope Ozone5.
Thank you!
Yes I noticed you are in Melbourne.
That’s great to hear your gear. I just bought an esq-1 last week so very excited about that. You just sold me on the samplers. Love the Polaris, a friend has one and I love what he does with it.
You use the asr-10 that much? I think I may need to stick to rack samplers for space.
Wow, there’s so many great bits in there! Perfect beat tape vibes.
That’s great to hear your gear. I just bought an esq-1 last week so very excited about that. You just sold me on the samplers. Love the Polaris, a friend has one and I love what he does with it.
You use the asr-10 that much? I think I may need to stick to rack samplers for space.
Ah, you’ll love the ESQ - take any factory sound, turn on AM mod, pitch them all down to -3 octaves, hit the filters, and start from there 
The Polaris is phenomenal. It’s the thick filter and the greasy OSCs, and the pulse width options; it’s unique to me. It’s like a more raw OBX - the same league I believe.
As for samplers, mate they aren’t making any more of them. The OT doesn’t count - it’s not really a sampler in this sense - it’s great but the converters are terrible. The S770 that I just picked up for $150 cost $9k in the 1980s because of the quality of the AD/DA and the computer. They are not going to make any more - this is it guys.
I should point out that I only sample my own hardware. I don’t sample records, my friends do that, but I sometimes sample VHS.
Instant vibes. I’d go Ensoniq for the vibe factor if you’re starting out with them anew. And don’t be picky - any Ensoniq: Mirage, EPS, 16, ASR, they are all unique, none is inherently better sonicly, they each have their own valuable voice.
Thanks!
I wanted to smash the final thing to cassette but I ran out of time…
The aim now is to flesh out the stand outs. The problem is I write so much and am impassioned by the idea of modular beat compositions, but I am not as often impassioned about taking a modular idea and expanding upon it to create a song.
I’m relatively new at this beat thing - I started 3 years ago and before that a lot of synths and folk music.
Great info man, thanks, especially for the ESQ-1!
I have felt that way about the OT, its greatest weakness for me is the sound quality, regardless of how unique/easy it can be with mangling samples. Ive noticed some people say this, including a top producer I respect but this complaint usually gets beaten down in threads.
I had a Roland S760 and although the sound was nice it wasn’t different enough in sound for the hassle of sampling. If going with a hardware sampler I would want something more gritty to make up for the hassle compared to a DAW.
What do you use your OT for if not for sampling?
Will check out the Ensoniq samplers for sure. Had an eye on ASR-10 for a long time but also the EPS for its lower sampling rates.
I think you are looking for a sampler vibe. The 760 has it but it’s a hi-fi vibe. I think you need to try an ASR. But if an EPS or EPS 16 comes along, just jump on it.
I have a lot of repect for the OT but I would never sample straight into the inputs. The AD converter is really poor and loses a LOT of information and offers NO magic in the conversion, NONE.
A sampler is valuable for how good it sounds sampling into it, not just what it does to samples once they’re inside. I laugh at kids with a 500 or 1000 or 2000XL wondering why it doesn’t sound like Dilla. There’s a reason why Atom TM still uses an old MPC 3000, even when he plays live. It’s the sound, not just t game ever functionality.
I use the OT for basic arrangements, FX, stem editing, fucking around, MIDI sequencing; it has a lot of features in it’s FX and sample mangling abilities that I lack on other hardware or in my current software setup.
Of all the samplers I have owned (MPC 60, EPS, EPS16, ASR10, Mirage, Emax, Emulator 3, X7000, S770, SP404sx 303 and 202) the ASR is my all round favorite.
The ASR can sample at a lower rate but it is higher fidelity in audio quality (16 bit vs 13).
I definitely notice a weird quality in the OT as well. Not the best inputs.
But I think a lot of what people are reacting to about the OT’s sound quality is the timestretch algorithm. Early on using my OT, I didn’t realize it was on by default. Now that I turn it off whenever I don’t need it, I get much cleaner results.
You’re right - the time stretch algorithm isn’t the best on the OT.
But the AD converters are much worse, in my opinion. And the DA isn’t completely to my liking either. I find it masks a lot of detail.
I really enjoy what the OT does to sound, and I really like it’s features and MIDI abilities - I like how people like Actress are all over it - but I find the output needs a lot of EQ and processing on it’s way into (and inside) the DAW.
I can’t put my finger on what I don’t like about the OT sound. Any sampler has a “sound”, the OT has a “sound” too, I like parts of it, but other parts not so much.
I don’t think it’s remotely fair to relegate all of the people who say they don’t like the sound of the OT, to being people who don’t know how to turn the time stretch off. I think for many people the sound just is substandard, to their ears.
Hey, I still use mine every day! Very useful box for me!
I’m with you on the sound of the box. Just pointing out that even beyond the obvious uses of the timestretch (i.e., on a loop), it can sometimes be subtly active on short one shot sounds. I didn’t realize this at first.
But yeah, I know what you mean about the masked detail - I find my OT tracks are sometimes lacking a certain crispness/presence that I’m used to on other units. Makes me wish that each channel on the OT had a dedicated EQ. I used to love the sound of my SP-404. Definitely had more of a distinct color to it, but I found it glued beats together in a way I liked.
I hear you.
It’s nothing so great as to get in my way. I just have to be creative to get the sound I want. There’s a distorted digital sound in it that I love and hate
I like the stereo functions of the OT, which means I can only print two pairs of sounds at once. I think it’s best to print the sounds separately, even though its a chore.
I get the feeling that fatness or dopeness in terms of sound is not something that a lot of users of Elektron gear hear or feel. I think most users tend to go for other aesthetics and this crucial aspect gets overlooked a bit.
So glad to read both of your comments. Glad to know I wasn’t going crazy. The OT sound has been the thing that has bothered me the most, something was missing and sometimes a lot.
AD is missing but DA is also definitely missing, I really need to spice it up in the DAW to get sounding like it should.
Other times I like the OT ‘sound’, it can work but other times it has a flatness that is a little depressing.
I have had some success sampling lo-fi synths, like a DX100 but also vinyl, and mangling them, they still sound good, likewise for analogue drums - but that stuff is rich to begin with.
It is also still very useful and creative for me too, in many ways, and its become invaluable for me but it is a pity that Elektron missed the boat on that one, especially given the history of samplers and how much attention went into the sound input/output.
Thanks for the info re the ASR-10, its always fascinated me.