[Mike]

Hey, another Texan here! I in Dallas/Plano area, using an Octopus. Whereabout Texas are you?

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

sorry, it’s been up for awhile, posted to another thread…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lysBQ7EA8Oo

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

I use chained tracks all the time, one of the best features!

Regarding your issue, it works as it’s supposed to on my machine, but I don’t have the latest OS installed.

Here’s a question, does it do the same thing regardless of using PAGE repeat or PAGE length to make the page play longer?

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

I am working on a video tutorial that covers this very thing, I’ll start a topic when I am finished (hopefully tonight!)

but yes, it is possible to have 64 distinct pages play in sequence.

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

I like it, as long as it doesn’t interfere with setting note length in page EDIT mode (pressing one step then another to set length).

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

Check the OS version first, then upgrade if needed.

Then I would start with wiring the Octo directly up to a module, like the drumstation and maybe a synthesizer.

Then just put in a very simple sequence, don’t start writing a song first thing. Crack open the manual and start going through it page by page and actually perform the things described in the manual. You probably won’t get very far the first time through

You will probably want to skip over most of the advanced topics at first. Then I would start building a really simple song and reread sections of the manual as needed to complete the song.

Then hook the Octopus up to the rest of the studio.

At that point I reread the manual again, taking sticky notes and putting them on pages that had things I never tried to do. Then I set up a time to specific do the things I had marked even if I never had a use for them.

By this time you will be very fluent in "Octopus" and have it integrated well into the studio.

Things I think are most valuable to learn well are the EDIT mode for PAGES (to enter step pitch, velocity and length). TRACK multipliers and chaining, and dumping/saving the machine state.

cheers
ripe

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

maybe it’s best to just use one of the other forums? Vintage Synth, Harmony Central or gearslutz, or Elektron-Users.

I think I’ve seen most of you post to these forums already, and maybe we can entice other people to join the genoQs community.

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

What about the possibility to "separate" the MCC MIDI channel from the note events. On a normal channel they would be the same value, but if you wished, you could re-purpose the unused MCC messages from a track to match the MIDI channel for another track.

Maybe that was unclear… you could have:

___________Note MIDI ch______MCC MIDI ch
track 9_________1________________5
track 8_________2________________5
track 7_________3________________5
track 6_________4________________5
track 5_________5________________5
track 4_________12_______________12
track 3_________12_______________12
track 2_________12_______________12
track 1_________12_______________12
track 0_________10_______________10

cheers
ripe

Post edited by: ripe, at: 2008/11/24 19:26

[Mike]

I’m with zinoff on this, why do you need to quickly change a track’s length very often? In a musical sense, is it more likely that you would want to change the step length factor quickly or the track length?

For me changing the step length factor has more musical value, creating an effect similar to tweaking the envelope on a synthesizer.

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

I like MIDI… it’s fairly ubiquitous, it’s easy for hobbyists to implement and understand.

That it’s still in use is a testament to it’s flexibility and it’s reliability.

Downsides for me are speed, standard controller resolution, and in some cases, the rat’s nest of wires because it is unidirectional and doesn’t carry audio.

But, if MIDI was bi-directional and carried audio (like mLan) you would have a whole new set of issues routing because you wouldn’t have the flexibility, and higher requirements to implement.

Which brings me to my past feature request! It should be easy to implement the Elektron Turbo MIDI protocol in the Octopus (if it can handle the speed).

Also it makes me sad to see so many "MIDI" devices switching to USB only… it makes a hardware only setup very difficult.

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

I really enjoyed seeing Kraftwerk also, but yeah it didn’t matter what they were actually doing as I stood in awe…

I really wish I could have seen early front 242 concerts, the later years it’s a bit… weird, as they get middle-aged. Still love the music though.

As I DJ also, I will never switch to laptop anything, it has to be vinyl/turntables… I do use final scratch, but I still change records between mixes for appearance.

That is also part of the appeal of the GenoQs machines, it’s all about interface for me.

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

Yes, of course wanking has it’s place

I guess my context would be at a club or event where you are "competing" with DJs, who get to cherrypick the most exciting parts of all the best music!

Of the shows I can remember (of my style) some of the best were:
Orbital
Speedy J
Zombie Nation (from the MP3s I’ve heard)
Daft Punk (barely live set, better than their DJ skills)
Spacelings and Bassheads (never got popular I guess)
FSOL (if you call that live)

some of the worst "wanking" (not to say the artist is bad!)
Autechre (early 1994)
Acid Junkies (don’t care for their music either)
Plastikman at Mutek (I wanted to like it)
Prototype 909 (sometimes good tho)
Jeff Mills (really just 909 supplementing DJing)
Hardfloor at times

again, most of the artists listed I really enjoy official releases, just not live sets, just personal opinion.

Anyways, as it relates to the Octopus/Nemo, I don’t think anyone was suggesting just using it as a MIDI playback sequencer, but having a basic structure using page sets and clustering allows for freedom to tweak some synth knobs in addition to sequencer tracks

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

Yeah, didn’t reply to that one, but I strongly disagree as well. It may be OK for one song to "wing it", but to create an entire set with multiple songs and transitions, something more structured is needed.

Of course within the confines of that structure you get all the benefits of "live Octopus/Nemo tweaking".

If you don’t structure stuff for maximum impact, you get what I consider, long-winded, live "wanking" where the only excitement comes from "dropping the kick"

cheers
ripe

Post edited by: ripe, at: 2008/10/21 18:23

Post edited by: ripe, at: 2008/10/21 18:47

[Mike]

Sorry to be jumping in here as an Octopus user, but what is this loading of individual pages from flash functionality? Is this also in the Octopus?

Also regarding Gabriel’s message. I am currently in the process of building up a live set for performance, and it is very difficult to program 10 different tracks into a single machine state. The reason for this is because the GRID is really the only place where you can "arrange" song structure, using clusters. If you use the PAGE as a song, then you end up with "loops" rather than a structured composition. Because clusters require an empty "boundary" page you lose even more of your GRID real estate when setting up a song.

Another roadblock to multiple songs is that the TEMPO is tied to machine state rather than a PAGE or page snapshot. This means that the only way to change tempo between songs is to twist the knob manually, or use a master clock that the octopus slaves to and follows tempo changes.

This is also the reason a lot of my feature requests have been around the clustering functionality. If page snapshots are to be the mechanism to switch between songs, they need to store more information, such as tempo, cluster definition (in conjunction with arbitrary clustering of pages in a grid row), cluster repeats set to zero, etc.

Sorry for the long post!

cheers
ripe

[Mike]

I use two of the M-Audio MIDIsport 8×8 as a good routing/merging patchbay. It is discontinued, but they show up on eBay.

It can function in standalone mode, and only needs to be connected to the PC for patchbay programming. Of course it also works as a MIDI interface…

cheers
ripe

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