Ideal midi synth partner for octatrack

No good audio examples to share, I got in to that combo a couple of weeks before I started a new duo that has me playing guitar, Tanzmaus and x0xb0x, and that has really taken over most of my music time for the last few months so I haven’t really recorded much with the OT recently, just occasionally jammed on it so I don’t get rusty.

The parameter control for the k1m is kind of limited, but it’s not really the kind of architecture where that would be too useful anyhow. I’ll have a Linnstrument in a few weeks (just ordered it, but we have a lot of mail theft in my area so I had it sent to my parents’ place and I’ll pick it up when I go to visit them over the holidays) and I’ll probably dig in to MIDI control of the k1m more when I have that, since they’re a natural match for each other - the K1m is 8 parts multitimbral with channel aftertouch, so duplicating the same monophonic program across all 8 parts an using the Linnstrument in channel-per-row mode like a lap steel should work well.

There’s no direct MIDI control of most of the parameters (unless you dive into realtime sysex) but there IS a CC for controlling the value of the current parameter in edit mode, and that could be abused - you could control any one parameter at a time from the OT and use the front panel controls on the k1m to chose different parameters. I haven’t tried it so I don’t know how well it would work, for example there are 255 waveforms in the k1m but only 128 CC values so I’m not sure how it would work to change the waveform via CC. To be honest, most of the parameters wouldn’t be that interesting to change in real time anyway, it’s a pretty basic architecture. The way I’ve been using it is to have a bank of preprogrammed sounds and have the output of the k1m going through a few thru machines in parallel, while also being sampled by a few flex machines, and then I do most of the actual playing using the OT’s crossfader in my right hand and the k1m’s joystick in the left, plus track mutes. You can get a LOT of variation from a really basic starting point.

The joystick on the K1 and K1m is completely separate from the MIDI implementation, it’s only assignable to crossfade between the four different waveforms in a patch (just like in a Wavestation or TG33 but without MIDI), but apparently it’s VERY simple to add external CV inputs to modulate its X and Y values from a Eurorack system. I haven’t done it myself but when I was looking in to it a few years back it sounded like it was using the same voltage range as eurorack control voltages so it really was just a matter of adding a pair of switched 1/8" jacks that override the internal CV.

Anyway, I like that it sounds nothing like an analog synth and nothing like an FM synth and nothing like a ROMpler (VSE compares it to a D-50 but it sounds nothing like the Roland D series synths, or any other synth I’ve used so I don’t know what they’re talking about - I guess the architecture is superficially similar but not really). Maybe the closest comparison would be a a CZ series Casio but the architecture is completely different.

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That looks a lot like a Monoprice snake to me, I use those a lot. Good value (around $12 USD for one that size) but inside that shrink tubing they’ve glued the cables together with superglue every foot or so, so there’s no easy way to repair it or open it up and use the cables individually if one of them fails. I guess maybe if you used a bunch of acetone you could get the glue out and rescue the cables.

But other than that they’ve worked great for me.

Thanks. I was tempted by a K1R, 90€, but finally I’d prefer a 2nd Micromonsta, for poly chain. :wink:

Yeah, people are trying to get like $200 for k1m’s these days and that’s a harder sell. They’re a really cool synth to have but definitely not an all-around synth, more something to pick up if you see a good deal. I wouldn’t have bought mine for more than $100 tops, but I also wouldn’t even consider selling it for twice that because as limited as it is (and it’s a lot less limited than it seems) there’s something about the sound of it that just makes the hair on my neck stand up, you know?

Micromonsta seems cool. I built a P6 about a year before the Micromonsta came out and it was a really capable synth with a good interface, although for some reason I never really got on with the sound of it. The Micromonsta seems like it takes everything good about the P6 and makes it better, plus MPE support is really cool in something that convenient and relatively affordable. I really wish the P6 supported MPE.

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