Jamming on a plane with a Syntakt

[AFunkyRhythm]

Cool. I was in A&E a while back and got chatting to the guy sat next to me. Next thing you know we’re talking for ages about the Octatrack. You never know…

[thermionic]

@SouvlakiPlaystation

Bringing gear on a plane feels akin to the guy who shows up at a coffee shop with an MPC. Probably pleasant, but kind of cringey and embarrassing.

I’m a neurotic mess sometimes but thankfully being a big ol’ nerd in public not harming anyone I stopped worrying about decades ago.

At worst people seem curious or interested when I’m head down and bobbing around on a plane.

I find people are more judge-y about what books I’m reading in public and feel obliged to comment on my choice of personal enjoyment (and would inevitably be worse if I was more femme in presentation.)

Favorite experience there was at a bus stop reading Camu’s The Plague well before the ongoing pandemic and having someone attempt to make some comments about “pretension” that I was too busy with my own life to engage with.

Not speaking to you, but all my favorite tasks, creation and enjoying stories are “cringe” to someone on Reddit surely, but people should feel comfortable existing in public spaces. I can’t be arsed to worry about what people who go nowhere and seem to actively hate being around others might think about me.

I love being in areas where people can exist in public while doing their own mostly-private things. Especially since I don’t feel as comfortable in my usual dank sweaty clubs, I can bring a Model:Cycles to a brewpub outdoor table and relax on a nice day

@obscurerobot

The bigger problem with bringing music gear on international flights is that customs may decide that you are a Professional Musician trying to sneak in on a tourist visa, and that can land you in a world of hurt.

Thankfully I’ve never gotten grilled about that by customs even while flying with keyboards, guitars, and other ephemera, I’m paid via grants from my home country.

@khapankov

Don’t be that person OP. You are setting up yourself for miserable experience with the possibility of being an inconvenience to others. You don’t want to explain to airport stuff what this 1.5 kg steel box of circuitry, buttons and cables is and why you need it in your carry on luggage during flight. Also, setting up on reclining table would be a chore while using your laps would be uncomfortable since Syntakt runs too hot.

Airport staff in particularly paranoid areas have not given any fucks, the only questions I’ve ever gotten of interest were about spouse’s tattoo in Germany (reference to a book from an explicitly antifascist author, but I got the concern for signifiers.)

I might be concerned about others if I had open-ear headphones or did not have a way to turn down the blinkenlights for an overnight flight, but there’s no default reason why this is rude.

Like fuck, when I last traveled to Vegas some bros were apparently watching porn on their laptop. Quietly blooping is not intrusive.

[khapankov]

@thermionic

Quietly blooping is not intrusive.

I was referring more about the setup process. Some cabin crews wouldn’t give a damn, but in my experience having a backpack on the floor or under the seat was considered a no-no. Thus all the hassle of finding your bag in the chaos of overhead storage, bringing out the syntakt with decksaver, cables, powerbank and headphones, setting up in a seat for a few minutes with constant shifting of stuff between seat, table and magazine pocket until finally you’re ready to click-clack your tunes. But oh, no, there are food and drinks shuffle-shuffle-shuffle, and oh, there is a toilet break shuffle-shuffle-shu-Excuse me, could you?-shuffle, and of course, a couple hours later when the jamming is done you would need to put everything back in the bag.

I mean, maybe it is because I’m tall and very mindful of every inch around me in planes where I constantly feel tight. But if I were his neighbor on a flight I would have felt fairly annoyed. The exposure to stereotypes about dawless jams in public places doesn’t help either.

I am surprised by my own strong reaction to it, honestly. If it was something light and compact I wouldn’t even cared. But the personal experiences with both flights and Digitakt makes the idea of uniting them completely ridiculous to me.

[thermionic]

@khapankov

I was referring more about the setup process. Some cabin crews wouldn’t give a damn, but in my experience having a backpack on the floor or under the seat was considered a no-no. Thus all the hassle of finding your bag in the chaos of overhead storage, bringing out the syntakt with decksaver, cables, powerbank and headphones, setting up in a seat for a few minutes with constant shifting of stuff between seat, table and magazine pocket until finally you’re ready to click-clack your tunes.

Obviously I respect your dislike of imposing on others, the devices I bring are smaller and with the same amount of cables (AC or battery, headphones) as any laptop and they’re fairly welcome on any flight.

But oh, no, there are food and drinks shuffle-shuffle-shuffle, and oh, there is a toilet break shuffle-shuffle-shu-Excuse me, could you?-shuffle, and of course, a couple hours later when the jamming is done you would need to put everything back in the bag.

Books/tablets and trays, bringing anything you have to take out and put back in, the only flights where that’s not awkward for me are when I have no seatmates

I suppose I’m also stuck taking longer flights outside the US when I travel at all, so it helps with nerves to be able to create with a smaller device.

[GravityFeeder]

Grab a Model Samples or Cycles. They aren’t clicky and run flawlessly off a regular battery pack.

[dhunterrr]

Baseck went full modular on a plane

5th clip along…

https://www.instagram.com/p/CnaMWKrPSHj/?igshid=MWI4MTIyMDE=