Re: Repeater

[Kim Flint <kflint@annihilist.com>]

At 9:47 PM -0700 7/26/00, Mark wrote:

> >> While it's true that trainspotting will show the Electrix modules all 
>over
> >> DJ rigs, the modules are getting great use in home/pro studio setups 
>as
> >> well.
> >
> >By all means; this is why I referred to the unit as being geared
> >seemingly towards a "DJ/producer" approach, as opposed to a "live
> >performance" approach a la a Boomerang or EDP.
>
>Ahh... Okay. I misread the slash as you grouping the two together.

I think he was grouping them together. Correct me if I'm wrong Andre, but I
think Andre is contrasting the rather simplistic sort of looping done by
your average electronic dance music producer and spun by your average
electronic dance music dj, with the more adventurous stuff most people here
seem to be interested in -  sampling and creating the loops live in
performance, while extensively manipulating and interacting with them all
in real-time. (from your previous description of yourself Mark, I got the
impression this is more in line with what you are actually doing. you'll
probably feel right at home here. :-)



> >As Damon from Electrix
> >just pointed out, it's designed with the studio musician in mind.
>
>Yeup.
>
>
> >I'm not saying that the only use for an Electrix product is for a DJ.
> >I'm suggesting that the Repeater seems to be less geared towards live,
> >performance-oriented looping and more towards studio-based production
> >work.  That's all.
>
>Oh. I read your words as just the opposite. It looked like you were saying
>that Repeater was geared toward the live crowd.

Isn't it?? I would think that's a good thing. Live looping tools are the
interesting product, and the thing in hot demand. In the studio most people
use their computers for non-real-time loop compositions, there isn't much
interest in hardware for that. What people want are ways to easily take
this creativity live, with musically oriented interfaces for intuitive
performance. They want the spontaneity of live improvisation and an
intuitive interface to enable it.


> >At any rate, I think it's a bit premature to get too deep into a thread
> >on a unit that was just premiered at NAMM.
>
>I disagree. I thought that Electrix may be watching the list and Damon's
>response to the list shows that they are.

Actually, like you, they just joined this list today. Looper's Delight has
been here for years discussing the ideal feature sets for loopers, and the
list archives on the website have it all there with about 45,000 people
visiting each month. Hard to miss it - a perfect opportunity for market
research. :-)

I find it amazing that it took Electrix this long to arrive here when they
are already so far into the design of a looping product. From my
perspective, they have made the same mistake that several other companies
recently made, showing up here only after they had already designed all or
most of their looping product and missing a perfect opportunity to discover
what a huge customer base really wants. For those companies, the feature
sets showed it IMO; we'll see how electrix fares. Other companies have been
active participants here for years, and their products tend to reflect that
depth of understanding of their customers.

don't get me wrong, I played with electrix stuff a bit at the jan NAMM.
They have some nice products. I don't really know anything about this
repeater product yet, hopefully they will do a good job with it.




>Therefore... :)
>
>If we get into a discussion about what may or may not be cool about the
>Repeater (or _any_ product from _any_ vendor) then who knows what can make
>it into the first production cycle.

I think we are all aware of that, we've been doing it here for almost 4
years now. Glad you could join us. :-)



>The box isn't due to ship until November, and the cabinet at the show was
>clearly _production_ class. That would indicate to me that they have a
>pretty good handle on the mechanics of the machine, and that they're
>working on the software.

Not necessarily. As Matthias and I have discovered many many times, it is
really hard to add another feature in software when you've already used up
all the buttons in the hardware. :-)



>Let's say that we end up in a discussion about how cool it would be to be
>able to do ________. I would bet that, given it's not an impossible task,
>that you would see the feature in the unit.
>
>I've been involved with many companies of this size that, because of their
>small size, can react very quickly to user suggestions.
>
>One great thing about digital machines is more times than not, "it's only 
>a
>matter of software".

haha! I wish that were true! Unfortunately, you can't program more CPU
power, more address space, more DSP processors, more knobs, more audio ins
and outs, a different display, etc. The hardware is what it is. When you
architect a system like this, you make a lot of choices that greatly narrow
the possibilities in the future. You do this intentionally since you are
creating an interface between musician and sound that is ideally targeted
at that specific application. You want it to work perfectly and intuitively
for that thing, which means it will not work well for anything else. This
is quite the opposite of general purpose platforms like a PC, where
software gives you the possiblity to do a great many things, all with an
interface that is not well suited to any of them.

anyway, welcome to LD.

kim

______________________________________________________________________
Kim Flint                   | Looper's Delight
kflint@annihilist.com       | http://www.annihilist.com/loop/loop.html
http://www.annihilist.com/  |