What's the Octatrack's role in your setup?

Elektron Gear Octatrack
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Friends at the forum,

I’ve been spending the months with the idea of letting the Octatrack not only by the heart of my rig, but also the only part of my rig, in the end.

I’ve got a number of instruments that I sample, where I create beats, one shots, sequences and whatnot, and it all goes into the Octatrack. It’s a wonderful way to work, but it does for me have one glaring limitation to which I can’t ignore anymore.

Being mainly a composer and sound architect, and less of a audio wizard, I’ve found that my abilities to elaborate on a composition when a track is falling into place, is difficult in the Octatrack. Well, duh. It’s a sampler, not a synth with chromatic pads, polyphony, tuneable oscillators and stuff. So obviously, the limitation lies not within the Octatrack but with the way I look at it and the way I like to work.

Nevertheless, I was hoping that the sample pattern-based approach would generate other means of being creative that would compensate for this desire to work with notes, chords, scales and stuff.

But it doesn’t and when I sat down with my Tempest yesterday, returning to some of the original sequences that’s spurred the track I’m working on now, I found that just being able to quickly compose new harmonic variations and patterns that elaborate on the song itself, was what’s really satisfying to me.

So I’m abandoning the idea of letting the Octatrack be my one stop solution, since I would miss too much the ability to quickly compose additional material to a track, play with harmonics, new sounds to complete these harmonics and so on.

I’m curious what the actual role of the Octatrack is in your setup?

For those of you who use it as a one stop solution - I know you’re out there, don’t be shy - how do you look at the material you put in there, and how much do you work with clear harmonics as opposed to beat sequences, noise and other such wonder stuff?

And for those of you where the Octatrack is part of a larger rig (anything with more than one device is a larger rig in this context), what role does the Octatrack have for you? Looper, drum machine, noise maker, a little bit of everything?

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In the end, I failed to find one and gave up the struggle. I was lucky enough to swap for an A4, which is wonderful for my needs.

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role in my setup

  1. creative mindfuck
  2. visiting forums and admiring users with better workflow & talent
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1 stop solution? Not for me. My sort of sounds and approach don’t work with the OT’s limitations to make it that one stop shop.

I struggled with the OT for many months. It’s such a strange little box. Even if I didn’t use it regularly I’m not sure I could part with it - it genuinely feels like a bit of history to me. Like one of those instruments someone will see me using in 10 years+ and go “holy shit you still have an Octatrack. Cool!”.

How do I use it? Right now, it took adding the Rytm and AK to my set up get the most out of it. At the moment, I effectively use it as a mixer for the other Elektrons and my laptop for send FX and on the fly recording of loops I like for mangling. It acts as my hub for pattern control/progression and is loaded with a few samples that I use on the fly.

How don’t I use it? I could never enjoy doing drum patterns on it with one shots or loops. Just didn’t seem fun to me though I really appreciate the tricks of those using sample chains and the likes. I also found it too convulated to try and make it sing like a synth. Too much work to be fun. So that sort of explains the AR and AK additions.

How will I use it going forward? Well, that’s the question. Overbridge has really caught my attention and is going ot be amazing for the AK/AR. It will probably stop me using the OT as mixer and central hub for pattern control (Push and a TBC addition to my set up will do that). So where does that leave me? Not sure actually but I can see me using it as a send FX/record box with the audio coming back into my DAW on the fly. I might actually use it’s live performance capabilities more this way. Yes, I can do sends in Live with less latency, but this way is more hands on and fun. It also gives me that option to get away from the PC when I want to just keep it simple for a time.

No one can tell you how to use yours but do stick with it and give it a chance. I’m sure you will find a role for the OT to play.

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[quote="“rozzbud” date=“2015-01-26 11:59:35"”]
role in my setup

  1. creative mindfuck
  2. visiting forums and admiring users with better workflow & talent
    [/quote]

Haha! Wish I had read this before typing my response. Sums it up nicely!!!

1 Like
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Hello,

I use the octatrack for the next points:

1- Mix my AR a A4
2- Launch samples like atmos, soundscapes, impacts, FXs…
3- Finalize the mix using the Octatrack compressor
4- Use the Octratrack FX to create variations of A4 and AR sounds

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interesting, i wouldn’t have thought of OT as a MB compressor. Is it any good or just for live situation?

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Yes. It is my live setup.

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Lots of good stuff here and it confirms my own pains.

I’ve heard a few one-stop shop productions done on the Octatrack, and while some of them are really good, they’re all very peculiar, not necessarily a musician’s version of a live DJ set but definitely a sound manipulation show of one kind or another.

I’m considering to bring in complete songs into the Octatrack, put them on one of the eight tracks and then add the final layers of noise and production on the remaining tracks, keeping the last one (number 8) as a master fx track.

For example, I got something going on the Tempest, I’ll record it and put it all on track 1 in the Octa. Then, I’ll pimp it with whatever makes sense on track 2-7, and use track 8 for compression and perhaps some EQ, or reverb or whatever.

But that’d mean that what I put on track 1, is for this purpose “finished”, as in mastered as much as it’s possible before it goes into the Octatrack. I’ve found that the machine performs as its best when the samples have already been treated as much as you can before you put them in the Octatrack.

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and AR could be a master compressor for the studio?

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I don’t record another hardware in octarack ussualy. Only to create some variations of the root sound. Yo can use octa to mix the tempest with the octa efx and another sounds, without make recordings. No?

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As a sketchpad.

[li]As a sequencer for my Bass Station II and iPad apps[/li]
[li]Record loops from said instruments for arrange and/or wrangling[/li]
[li]Record loops from Maschine and arrange / wrangle[/li]

1 Like
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I use it as the final chain in my rig. My A4 and some of my other synths go directly or indirectly into it. I record sounds from my modular stuff, shove it in my OT and use my OT rather than my modular when I go out and about. I use it as my main drum machine.

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The OT is the midi brain for my studio set up but I don’t use it as a sampler until I have my track partially composed.

I start tracks in my Tempest and then once they’ve partially built, I sample the main audio parts into the OT for manipulation / adding variation later on. Then I usually add what I call “auxiliary percussion” to the Tempest drums via the OT - these are usually manipulated slices and samples that I’ve field recorded that are sequenced and chopped / sliced / mangled / effected in the OT.

I then build the basic sequence of the track on the OT adding parts from all of my other gear (midi sequenced to the OT) by recording synth lines etc into the OT midi tracks.

Once the track has most of it’s parts and all the machines are moving along nicely I record everything to my DAW - to back it up as much as anything. I do the final sequencing on my DAW (I add guitar and vocals so I need to get out of the OT anyways) but any audio file in the final stage that needs … something … gets put back in the OT for manipulating.

Final effects / compression / eq happens in the DAW.

For live play I essentially do the exact same thing except I reverse engineer the track from the DAW and into the OT (recreating the DAW effects in the OT and having some tracks as backing etc).

2 Likes
15

it’s a performable sampler … capture, loop, manipulate live stuff and more besides, it can do a lot with ingenuity if you’re prepared to put the time in, it forms a natural hub for so many reasons, mind bogglingly flexible !

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I have the AR, A4 and OT. I sample/record sequences from the A4 into the OT to the point where I can take the A4 completely out of the performance/arrangement equation. Now I’m only performing/arranging with the OT and AR.

The OT also plays back other samples (voices, FX, etc.)

The AR provides drums and other things while the OT plays back samples - easy.

The AR sends the master clock to both the A4 and OT.

the A4 and AR go into OT inputs AB and CD.

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The Octatrack is the all powerful matriarch of the family who lets her partner the MS20 feel like he’s the boss despite him being completely under her control except for some filtering. Together they have raised a family of orphaned samples they’ve scooped up over the years including a charming round robin sampled TR-330. The Microkorg comes by to visit his folks sometimes but spends most his time in therapy dealing with his virtual inadequacies. This year’s NAMM really set him back actually.

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I’ve been using mine in my darkwave/noise/industrial project. Here’s how I work it:

OT sequences everything. Some songs have long samples which are chopped and used as backing tracks. Some songs OT is the drum machine. Some songs are pure MIDI output with a sample or two looping.

OT is racked alongside a Moog Slim Phatty in a custom shallow rack I built. Phatty is used for basslines and arps mainly. I run an Electribe EM-1 for lo-fi percussion. For leads & pads I have an ESQ-1 which is also sequenced by the OT.

Everything is run thru a small A&H ZEDFX mixer. I use the AUX sends to send signal to the OT at times… for vocal loops, live sampling and tweaking, FX on the synths or vox, etc. I like having the flexibility to send whatever I like to the OT.

The OT is fun, especially now that the arranger works. If I added anything, it’d be a simple MIDI sequencer (like MMT-8/MPC or something) so I could get some more complex chords and compositions going. But I like how small our setup is.

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greetings forum, been using the OT a couple of years…basically I use it as a DAW, I do everything with it and find that its more fluent and faster to use than Logic. I do sequencing, recording, overdubbling, editing, sound design, drums. I read some people here like to go back and forth from the OT and say Ableton but I dont really see the point when you can do it all on the OT. One thing that has been a revelation for me working with it is that building a track becomes a process, like I start making a track, this turns into something else, I use this a basis for a new track, bounce it to track one, add some more stuff, use the fader, record a performance, use this as basis for new track. As I record and resample stuff the memory is filled up with sounds that can be edited and slices and used as the project develops…there is just such a natural flow to it (very similar to genetics anyway), its very enjoyable.

As the op said it is not so easy to do melodies in the OT, but you can do incredible sound design with it. And of course you can sequence a synth melody, sample it, add effects, resample again and so on.

Usually just record demos right to stereo (mr1000) since I am to lazy to do multichannel into logic. Of course end up with lots of badly mixed stereo tracks lol.

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It’s role is to make everything else boring and obsolete.
I have tried to make music using Logic, Reason, Bigwig, Ableton and Renoise with Komplete 10 and a few other VSTs. Panorama P4 as midi controller. Nothing made me sit down, shut up, and make music like the Octatrack. A4 is my next purchase in hope its equally satisfying to use.

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