i’m designing a performance for the winter time, and based on my goals, I think it is time for me to trade in my digitakt (6 year good buddy) for an octatrack.
I will be reading merlin’s guide, skimming the manual, and going in to a local store to get familiar and run some tests this weekend.
The main reasons i want to switch are:
more inputs
better integration w/ acoustic instruments (contact mics)
better performance capabilities (fast switching, more flexible template creation)
more streamlined live looping
mostly looking for affirmation that i won’t be making a mistake, as i will need to sell my digitakt to afford this, and i have built a relationship with that device.
I have time and dedicated focus to spend many hours in the next month learning the structure, building a template, and building muscle memory.
my performance will be using my nord lead 2x, a vocal microphone, 2 contact microphones attached to percussion instruments, and that behringer midi foot controller for some hands free control.
Looking for foresight on potential pitfalls, what i can expect in the learning process, and experiences in switching between the two machines.
I know this is similar to other posts, and i will be searching around the forum for advice, but it is always nice to get some personalized affirmation and advice. thank you all in advance.
Following this since I’m thinking about OT to go more organic with my live acts (Bass and Electric Guitar), mainly for live loopings and mangling them. Despite of that, I think I’ll keep my DT (midi master and samples) because the OT will role mostly mixing/effects. Makes sense?
The Octatrack’s Arranger is more powerful than the DT’s in some ways that I recommend you look into.
I honestly think the OT is better than Ableton Live for some tasks. Such as “pre-slicing” and sequencing a recording slot that you can live record into. I have no idea how to do that in Live, it’s super quick and easy on the OT. As a song writer, the OT is my favorite Elektron box by far. It’s so fast and flexible, I really see it like a straightforward and lightning-fast DAW rather than a sampler. I believe its speed is great in the studio as it makes experimentation easy and rewarding.
My only piece of advice would be to take your time, and try to do as many things as you can on the OT, coming up with workarounds for non-obvious tasks. It keeps surprising me just how much weight the OT can lift if you really try.
I am about 80% sure i’ll be picking it up in the next two weeks.
I plan to have several full days of experimentation and testing with it before beginning to build my performance.
Should i give a rats arse about mki over mkii?
leaning towards the mkii for the buttons and aesthetics
tl;dr: it doesn’t really matter, so pick whichever one you would enjoy using the most I think.
I prefer the looks of the MKII, I prefer the price and non-gag-inducing lack of button coating on MKI.
Other than that, I hear the OLED screen on MKII is also smaller and some people find it to be too small. I’m also not a fan of OLED panels on machines that stay on for hours with static UIs, but YOLO (aka, how long were you going to use it really? Plus the screen can be replaced).
Not sure I follow what you mean by pre-slicing. Because nothing is faster than dropping a sample into ableton Simpler and going to slice mode. There is truly nothing better or faster.
On the OT, you can sequence a track ahead of time, and whatever you record into a buffer will be played according to those settings. You don’t need to touch anything once it is setup. I have yet to find a way to tell Live “I’m going to sing into that microphone, and then I want you to mangle it as we rehearsed, on your own”. I’m guessing I just don’t know how to do it, but still, on the OT I find it to be really fast and relatively straightforward to automate such behaviors.
ps: please prove me wrong, I want Ableton Live to do it
I don’t feel qualified to add much here as selling DT that you have a relationship with should not be underrated and you could definitely regret the move. That being said, it sounds like your use case is a good one for OT and you have thought this through. You will just lose the immediacy and fun factor if DT, but OT seems to do what you want to better.
I have the utmost respect of what you’re trying to pull off here btw! If you ever record the performance, I would love if you shared it here. Good luck and have fun!
+1, I have never user the DT super extensively, but I moved from the model:samples to the OT and I’m glad I kept both. The m:s is a super fun, immediate sketch pad, while the OT is a powerful machine but requires setup.
Fun fact: I do a lot of single cycle waveform sequencing to use samplers as synths and the OT sucks at that; it is so hard to tune samples precisely on it. Also the Digi and model series’ ability to separate sample pitch and chromatic notes is extremely useful for one shot samples and I miss it on the OT.
I just make a sequence with a M4L sequencer. A lot of them have a ckip button that automatically makes a MIDI clip when you find a pattern you like (AICD sequencer does this)
Then I record whatever I want in an audio channel and drag that into Simpler which is sequenced by the clip, and use auto slice mode.
That’s also what I do, though I usually just save MIDI clips in Live’s browser and use them on a Simpler track. My issue is that I have to record audio on another track and drag it into the Simpler device by hand. If you could just record into Simpler (and sequence it to start and stop recording automatically, as per the arrangement), I would probably get a very similar - or identical efficiency - as I do on the OT.
The fact that the OT lets me record audio and immediately hear it sequenced when recording stops, while I can keep both hands on my guitar is very useful to me. This immediacy is broken by having to drag and drop the sample across tracks on my laptop.
ah, yeah thats not a huge issue for me so I don’t mind. It takes 1 second…lol. But I was looking at my OT, and I was sitting on $1200, so I can live with little details like that and pocket the $$ in my case.
Oh absolutely! It’s very much an edge case, but one that I think can appeal to live/loop based performers. Also, I fully support getting rid of gear that stopped being useful to you. Enjoy the monies and extra studio space from letting that OT go!
This is a leap of faith but you have thought it out carefully and I wish you luck. It’s too bad you can’t try one for a while to make sure, but I have a feeling it will turn out well.
I have this working (not in Simpler though). Using Expert Sleepers Crossfade Loop Synth (plugin), and a few M4L devices, I can sequence record, play, and clear buffer trigs, similar to Octatrack.
It doesn’t pre-slice, or do any slicing. You can record and playback from a buffer at the same time though, and mess with sample start point etc.
Works pretty much the same as Octatrack once set up!
I will record the performance, and there will be several of them in the seattle area.
I think my DT has served it’s purpose, and my musical style has changed since i got it. I don’t need the immediacy as much as I want the flexibility
@lopodyr, never had an issue with my dt screen… the performance should be between 20 and 35 min. I will keep the M:S on my mind, in case i miss that immediacy.
@Aevai, I would like to keep as much contained to one device as possible. the OT would be hooked up to a laptop to help time/trigger visuals, but I don’t want to deal with any daw during this performance
@plragde, thank you, yeah it is not something i take lightly, and i agree i think it is time to grow
