Project completion with octatrak

junomusic · 2014-12-24T12:13:17.000Z

Curious how many octatrak users in computer free song creation setups finish their songs without introducing a full blown daw?

I have an analog four and love it but also have a small collection of synths (midi and cv) that I am forced to go back into logic to craft into a final project. I’m not needing a sampler (would use it if I had it) but for all my searching I can not find a stand alone midi sequencer that would work with my a4 (tracking pattern changes). There are a few iPad apps but they all make me stop and think about their ui to much. There are also a host of dedicated HW seq (diy, off the self and older HW) - none seemed as good as the octatrak at a similar price or just not a good fit.

A little more background - I am very proficient at logic x but unfortunately I put in 9 to 10 hours a day at a highly technical job and can not will myself to boot up logic. I can however drive the a4 as my studio brain very far down the path without hesitation. With the a4 (even when building out a sequence) you feel like you are playing/mastering a true instrument.

To be honest I would pay elektron significant money to upgrade the a4 with a four track polygenic midi sequence but that doesn’t seem to be in the cards. I even went down the path of adding a cv to midi coverter to get one cv and one midi (monophonic) output from the a4.

Todd

bluewolfse7en · 2014-12-24T12:51:55.000Z

It’s absolutely do-able. Depends what style of music you’re making & what kinds of Track processing/Fx you want.
You’re not gonna have inter track relationships like the Kik ducking the Bass but then the same effect can be created with Plocks.

With the OT you can work at micro level, (control over ever note & nuance like a Tracker), or a more macro level, (loops/stems etc.).

Scenes & Parts would be invaluable in this scenario for creating variety & would add a different slant when compared to a DAW.

Some have criticised the quality of the recordings (A/D), on the OT but this has pretty much been proven to be down to poor gain structure. I have an RME UFX feeding a MacBook pro & the OT stands up very well against it.

The biggest drawback to doing everything in the OT is the lack of metering for me. It’s kind of good in way tho, you use your ears not your eyes a lot more.

I did everything in Renoise & was looking for a tactile controller when the OT appeared on the scene & I went that route instead. I miss some of the functionality but for a fast workflow with everything at your finger tips the OT is wicked, (well once you’ve mastered the button combos).

Most importantly, it’s a lot more fun than sitting in front of a computer

bryantalbot · 2014-12-24T14:40:22.000Z

""junomusic"":

Curious how many octatrak users in computer free song creation setups finish their songs without introducing a full blown daw?

It’s how I’ve done it for three years now. I used the DAW as a 2-track recorder.

But recently, I’m feeding individual machines’ output into their own DAW tracks to have better control over final mix, because I wasn’t quite happy with the sound. And while I’m in there, I might do a bit of overdubbing/post production. So, back to a hybrid approach for a while.

the_dreammer · 2014-12-24T15:18:05.000Z

Allot of the music I put online, is purely made on hardware.
I used to do it in a giant gear-only studio (didn’t even have a computer in there) …
I don’t have that anymore… these days its just an elektron-box or two on my kitchen-table.

Like bluewolfse7en mentioned, i miss metering too… and some other goodies I had. but purely looking at “making music”. A few toys + a fieldrecorder does the trick for me. atleast the field-recorder has a meter, so I know the recording didn’t clip anywhere (digital clipping sounds horrible on my recorder) and yes, working on hardware has a very high fun-factor…

once recorded, it just goes straight to youtube and various other sites.

If I choose to turn it into something downloadable on bandcamp. I do throw my recordings in reaper… and polish the sound with some vst’s.
I could do that in hardware form… but I do not… cause I don’t want to splash out about 600euro’s for the gear I need to get the sound I ultimately want. (think of tape-emulation and tube-emulation, bit of EQ and compressor plugins.)

Sidenote : Sometimes, I just want to make really really really complicated weirdly filtered / approached music… in that case. I do my stuff in renoise in combi with reaper.

andreasroman · 2014-12-26T23:25:05.000Z

Ironically, I just posted a similar question before I saw this.

I’m recording everything into the Octatrack and render the final tracks from there. I don’t even record them into a DAW, I just resample it all and copy the wav-file to my computer.

It’s a bit messy, but a lot of fun. I use mainly my Sub37, Tanzbar, Tempest, Volca Beats and Monotribe now, all into the Octatrack where I build the track. I even record stuff that doesn’t amount to anything, because you never know when they’ll be useful. So it’s like having a huge pile of cuts and edits, and it’s up to you to paste them together into something new and unexpected.