Yeah I bought two, they are awesome. Make sure you’re on the latest firmware, it’s huge!
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Same here, I’ve been having it for some months now and use it with everything. Its beauty lies in its simplicity. And it’s pretty reliable.
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With MD or MnM, it’s pretty cool to record notes on one track (transposing them, changing pattern length, etc.), and CC’s on another track, of a different length, so you never get the same thing twice.
All this with a few button presses.
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I just ordered a 5-pin to 3.5mm MIDI cable to run the Bastl off of the MD’s clock.
But I also have a drum pad that I may use to sequence the MD via the Bastl. Then the MD will have a workflow similar to a Nord Drum. It also looks like a way to do polyrhythms without having to build a Mega Command.
I think there are going to be applications for this that I haven’t thought of yet as well. Cool stuff.
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I hope you’re better than me at playing on time.
Since I totally suck at that, I’m really grateful they included auto-quantize!
Timing???
Those who can, do.
Those who can’t, play abstract ambient soundscapes. 
I will let you know the release date for my new album, “Music For Airports Volume IX: Sbarro’s Cheese Slice and Beer Combo”
But yeah, auto-quantize is my friend.
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Does anyone use this as well as a Pyramid? Midi looping seems to be what I do most of the time on the Pyramid. Are there aspects of the Bastl that might be preferred?
Could describe a bit how you use looping on the Pyramid, for the sake of comparison?
For sure.
set up multiple MIDI tracks corresponding to whatever channel, either notes or CC data; pre-determine each track length or live record.
Once tracks are rolling can play around with track/note lengths, time signatures, velocities, CC data. A few Midi fx (delay, harmonization, random, chance, etc), muting/unmuting tracks. Stuff like that.
Just curious if anyone has used both and if they have any thoughts about what might draw them to use the Bastl.
I can’t speak to the Pyramid itself. It does appear to be a great center piece of an electronic rig.
In that sense, it could be similar to my experiences with the MPC1000 and the E-Mu Command Station/MP-7. Those were standalone instruments (one is a sampler, the other is a rompler) that also worked great as the brains/heart of bank of synths/samplers.
I loved both (well, I liked the MPC1000 well enough) but my tastes run more toward subtractive synthesis and less so regarding samples or orchestrating a huge palette of sounds.
One of my favorite setups is my Virus Indigo and something allow me to create multitimbral loops. I can keep myself (and sometimes others) entertained for days with just the synth and a trusty old Boss DD-20 pedal set to a long delay with the feedback cranked up.
The downside of that set up is that the timbre of the loop is unchanging. I can layer and fade but I can’t change what is being looped.
I’m still at the start of my experiments with the Midi Looper but I spent a couple of hours last night with just the Virus and the Midi Looper. Being able to manipulate the loop using the controls on the Virus was a revelation. I could do a set with just those two pieces and a PA system.
From what I can tell about the Pyramid from the website, it may be a more capable Midi looper.
It definitely looks like an easy to maneuver piece of kit compared to the short cuts in UI in the Bastl that is necessary because of its small size.
It also looks like you can manipulate the tracks much like Ableton or FL Studio. The Bastl only allows three parallel loops, even if loop length is adjustable.
If I wanted a fully capable MIDI controller/sequencer, the Pyramid might scratch every itch.
The beauty of the Bastl is in its simplicity. Having the MachineDrum sitting on the sidelines allows me to be more complicated when the need arises.
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Thanks for that. Yea I wouldn’t expect it to be as capable feature-wise, given it’s a compact thing, lower price point etc. But it looks like a cool
Box and figure it might bring something unique to the table.
I love to play with the midilooper. But it has a few bugs. It froze a few times while playing.
I wonder if anybody has the issue of not being able to save more than three patterns? I can’t select a pattern group to store the pattern into. The group seems to be set to the oct/transpose indicator. (I sent a support request to Bastl)
Edit: Andreas has the same issue
Yes. I have this and sent in a support request. I just typed the same question just to stumble upon yours shortly after.
Oh, sad. I never use patterns so I never experienced this problem. Good to know.
From what you write, the limitations I see are:
- a maximum of three MIDI channels on the Bastl MIDI Looper
- no fiddling with time signatures (but you can change the quantize ratio to triplets, and time-stretch your MIDI loops)
- none of the MIDI effects you mention (but you can “humanize” velocity and introduce shuffle)
Of course the Looper cannot compare with the Pyramid, which is a fully featured and expensive tool (and great as far as I know).
But the Looper’s advantage is its immediacy. You just get a couple of buttons to press. For me it was quite fast to memorize shortcuts. I don’t see it as a hurdle.
This being said, I may have a very basic use of it. But it does the job for what you describe, with the above-mentioned limitations.
As an example of a deeper use of the Looper, at the very end of this video https://youtu.be/0T7fvLK68e0, Vaclav explains how to use CV retrigger. I never delved into that but it looks pretty exciting!
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The solution for me was:
format the EEPROM by holding down Fn Button at boot (all recorded data will be lost).
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Is there anything that this MIDI looper can do that something like an MPC One can’t do or am I missing something here? Seems like the advantage is just that it’s so small / portable? I’m curious about one of these as a secondary “loop” source using it alongside my MPC One but I’m not really sure it’d do much more than just using a “live” track on the MPC dedicated to improv stuff. Would love to hear feedback from experienced users with the MIDI looper; it does seem quite cool and I remember wanting something like this for years.
No, you pretty much have it right. An MPC can do what the Bastl does and then some: more tracks, song arranging and so on.
For me, that is kind of the point. I’ve been really digging into my Virus as a multi-timbral instrument. I had an MPC years ago. I realized that I was only using it to sequence the Virus and I never really glommed onto it as a sampler. The Bastl allows me to do what I used the MPC for but much more conveniently.
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Actually you are able to change the sequence length to whatever you want on the three tracks independently, so you are able to do crazy signature stuff.
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