Also it has that bump in the mids that makes everything sound kind of artificial, or “modern” I guess?
I don’t know what frequencies, maybe high mid, high shelf…
But DT is simpler, have program changes per step, and the main advantage is pitch range imho.
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Yeah I hated that. And the melty buttons . So I sold my digitakt.
I sold it because it didn’t have song mode back then. Loved making loop based songs with it, it was really fun to use. But, my OT is more than capable for what I would use a DT for.
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That’s fair.
Gear wise, the main pieces are:
Medium sized modular setup
Vermona Perfourmer
Nord Drum 3p
Digitakt
Tasty chips gr1
Plus Ableton.
I guess the fact I’m using ableton regularly to work on tracks is possibly my issue, as whenever I’m wrestling with the OT, my main thought is I can do whatever “this” is, 10 times as fast in Ableton, and with plugins it will sound twice as good.
Id prefer to leave the one shot stuff up to the Digitakt rather than waste OT tracks on that side of things.
Recording bits live in, chopping, looping, slicing and midi sequencing the Perfourmer and the Nord Drum plus recording and the modular are probably the focus areas I’d be interested in, plus adding some stereo timestretched existing loops.
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Well, it sounds to me like Ableton is doing that the OT would do in your setup. So, no OT and keep on using Ableton if you like that workflow?
It 100% is. However I do enjoy those moments away from the DAW, and picked up the OT to try and capitalise on those dawless moments.
Well, the OT can probably do whatever you’re doing in Ableton, or at least close enough to work. But, is it worth it to learn the OT and figure out how to do what you want if you’re mainly using Ableton anyway?
Similar for me. Went all in on Hybrid/Bitwig but glad I kept my OT. Doing things live is fun. If you can’t justify keeping it around for live performance/jamming at home or those moments (they can last a week or more sometimes) then I wouldn’t give it too much more thought. I went like 9 months without using my OT. Same with other gear but when you need it, you need it!
It’s a fun mental challenge and it is very powerful if you let it be. Just as everyone else is saying, everything will seem slow at first but then once it’s muscle memory it’s lightning fast.
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Yeah, I like to think of my gear collection as tools, even if you don’t need one for a while it’s good to always have it available in case you do. And the best gear is the stuff you want to keep even if you don’t use it much at all, but when you need it nothing else will do.
OT is definitely a keeper 4 life.
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“If you love somebody set them free”. If you dont even love OT why hesistate. Former sentence is for human relationships though.
Exactly the same conclusion i kept coming back to when wrestling with a similar question to yours. I owned 3 (or 4?!) in as many years- used and enjoyed it some of the time, shelved it the rest of the time. Was always trying to work out if/how it should sit in my ‘workflow’ alongside whatever else i was using at the time, given that some of those tools (ie Ableton) get similar results with less hassle. Ultimately concluded that despite the good times it just wasnt really fitting in with me, and with it being a big ticket value (to me at least) i couldnt justify keeping hold of it.
There tends to be a lot of unhelpful hyperbole around the OT that then feeds into a narrative that if you dont get along with it youre doing something wrong, or youre not ‘getting’ it, which is just wrong. Theres no shame in admitting to yourself that maybe the OT isnt working out for you, and if thats the case then just set it free and use that cash/space for something that does work for you.
That said, i dont think youve said how long youve had it? If its a mere few weeks or even months then id tentatively suggest persevering a bit longer (which tbf you are doing with this post), but outside of that id suggest just get rid and move on.
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Ya for sure, Ableton can do pretty much everything as the OT, even if the crossfader and some other features on the OT make it a lot more fun to use. But, I think often the point behind those kinds of statements is people who wonder what the hype is often don’t think of the OT as a swiss army knife that can do whatever you want. They maybe wanted it for a specific purpose, and finding it unsuitable or too complex for that they think it’s just empty hype. But, if you dig deeper and figure out how it would fit into your hardware setup without a pre-existing role decided you really start to see it’s uniqueness. And then you can pick and choose the features and have it do like two completely separate functions at the same time, like playing a longer sample from a CF card and otherwise being just a performance mixer.
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Well, I feel I simply haven’t spent enough time with it. I want to force myself to at least utilise the fun things more than I have currently before which is mostly just playing downloaded loops and one shots so far. With a bit of thru tracks on the modular for effects.
I know it has more to offer.
Completely agree. I think this will my last chance to give it a go, and I’m very willing.
It’s been about 6 months. But I’ve probably only put a total of 20 hours into using it. And that would be using it mostly to play loops and sequencing some gear.
I’m usually very good at letting gear go that isn’t working for me, I just want to give it a fair run, which I certainly haven’t done currently.
I think this is actually where I stumble. It can do so much, I find myself asking “what should I do with it now?”
It’s like being in a restaurant when the menu is too big, you have no idea what to order.
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Well you have your setup, and then the OT. What are you missing? Midi controller and performance mixer? Do you want to use it for FX and use the crossfader to add flair and more control to how they behave? Mangle samples, use it for sound design and then incorporate them into your music? I don’t know, but I bet there’s always something you can use it for. Is it worth it to keep sucha an expensive item for what you actually need it for is a different matter.
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As a gigging musician I hate Ableton and this was just the cause I got an OT in the first place to play stems for my bands live set.
I can imagine if you just want to compose music the OT has some shortcomings in terms of flexibility.
But then again, it does what it does and forces me to get creative in a way a DAW will never do, at least for me. And BTW I am terribly slow when working with DAW as well. The overload of possibilities is the limiting factor there.
Playing stems for live situation (with or without the arranger) is one of the cool things the octatrack can do.
Not to mention that it can be a looper, a mixer, an fx box (I haven´t discovered all it´s intricacies) but it´s always nice to have box that has something to offer.
But, that is only true if you like this kind of challange and don´t want ony trick pony machines.
I personally like the way Elektron machines force my workflow to be - this is a conscious decision.
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I’ve recently used mine as a performance mixer and basically a glorified tape machine. I run prepared longer samples that I fade in and out, add FX etc. I have tape players I also use, but having 8 tracks and so much control over FX and fades with such a great UI makes the OT very good for that purpose. I also have a bass synth and Lyra going into the OT and an FX loop from Cue Outs back into the OT. Rytm goes straight into the Mixer with the OT and then into my DAW in stereo. OT controls the bass synth via Midi. A really nice setup for me.
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