More and more, I am bringing my two music loves - synths and guitar - together. I have an ST and 252hp of euro that I pretty much build complete tracks on, using Bitwig for sampling, poly and mixing duties. At the moment I am recording my guitars and chopping, effecting, dropping into samplers in Bitwig, which is all well and good but, like many, I prefer using hardware as much as possible.
I have been looking at pedals like Hologram Microcosm as a way of getting guitar-based pads, soundscapes etc into my productions but would much rather do this with the OT! The sequencer would obviously be a huge plus, as would the midi sequencing.
I use it but as a flex and thru rather than looper. Itās awesome. I heard a concert where a guitarist used the hologram, like so many digital guitar harmonized looper things I dislike something about the high frequencies. I suspect you will be watching a lot of sezares awesome videos ce soir.
At the moment I am recording my guitars and chopping, effecting, dropping into samplers in Bitwig
sounds like Octatrack is more what youāre after than Microcosm. You have very limited control on the Microcosm for each of its effects: basically two mysterious macro controls. You definitely canāt slice things up and do things with the slices. It is a competent loop pedal (itās probably bottom of my list for loopers I own though) and it makes things sound REALLY nice, but I donāt see it as a device that you can do purposeful sound design on. Itās more a ādo I want this part to have some Microcosm on itā kinda thing.
The Octatrack does let you do all kinds of stuff with material recorded into it, but the Microcosm is definitely āhigher fidelityā with its FX. They really feel like incomparable devices to me - I donāt think youād get results from either that sound like the other, but you can at least go and fiddle with every parameter with Octatrack (and it can do so many other jobs for you - Octa + Expert Sleepers FH2 is the best eurorack controller going). Octatrackās actual looper (pick up machines) is one area Iāve never really explored, though from everything I read itās particularly fiddly as far as loopers go.
Alternative loop pedals which go further with what you can do with looping are Blooper and (if you can find one) Loupe. These have their limitations/trade offs too though, but thatās just hardware life for you.
I donāt have the OT yet, but it would obviously pair well with the ST - thereās sooo much it would offer over the microcosm, but I like the idea of something ādedicatedā alsoā¦.
Thatās super useful, thank you. I guess what you have said points at the real dilemma - do I want to sit there playing and looping or do I want to build soundscapes away from the iMac and take them to my tracks after? I think the latter - as the whole point of what Iām trying to do is combine fiddling with synths with guitar. Iām also really into recording my own perc and stuff.
And, I already have an FH-2 to control the modular from my STā¦
I think I can see where this is heading - an OT and a sweet delay/reverb pedal
FH-2 with some expanders is godly with Octatrack - I have mine set up to take 4 pitch/gate pairs and 16 CV outputs that I can plock or send LFOs through. And thereās the super powerful Octatrack MIDI arp too, which will be the major advantage over Syntakt in this situation (plus not losing your ST tracks for MIDI tracks - Octa is 8 midi tracks, 8 audio tracks full stop). Thru machines are basically sequenceable (and plockable!) VCA/envelope combos and you can record into a presliced buffer and rearrange your audio on the fly. FX are not exactly cutting edge, but you can do some surprisingly interesting things with some of them (esp comb filter). Itās very deep.
Depends on the patch! Sometimes Octa sequencing four mono voices, or sometimes multiple pitch/gate pairs listening on the same midi channel to get around the lack of buffered mults in my system. Occasionally Iāll have FH-2 sending out 8 gates from Octatrack to control 8 channels of drum samples in Assimil8or. FH-2 + expanders was one of the best investments I made for my system - because of the Octatrack it means I donāt need any pitch sequencing capabilities in the case and I could swap a lot of utilitarian modulation sources out for more fun stuff, just keeping creative/wacky CV sources in the case. 24 LFOs on the Octa is great - still have a bunch left over to send to Digitone or guitar pedals. It can really be the brain of a setup, controlling all sorts of things and then chewing up the audio theyāre all making.
I like using the OT for guitar looping a lot (and donāt even own another looper anymore) but for me personally at least, gettign a good guitar sound through it was hard. An external preamp helped but I ended up having to go all the way to using a miced amp to really be happy with it. Plugged direct it sounded like going straight to the line input of a cheap audio interface, with no preamp or DI or anything. So not a good direct sound, a sort of lifeless, dull direct sound that made it physically harder to play well.
But getting a nice DI/preamp might be more practical than a Microcosm, since you already have the OCtatrack and a good DI has a lot more uses than any single effect pedal (even though itās not a very fun or interesting thing to buy).
EDIT: youāll also want to get a programmable MIDI footswitch, too, if you donāt have one.
@Supercolor_T-120 iād be curious to know how you replaced any traditional looper by the OT. Iāve been originally buying the OT as a looper but i find it really cumbersome and not so direct/efficient while playing an instrument.
I recently thought about adding a MIDI foot controller but struggle to see how iād use/program it. Would you give examples of some concrete possibilities?
For mangling even the live input, OT is the king though.
I agree 100% on the sound of a guitar into the OT, dull sound., +1 for a good preamp.
As a looper, forget the MC. It is nice it offers this possibility but itās more like a great bonus to build on than a looper to rely on.
You could potentially realize similar FX/mangling on the OT but that would need a lot of time, several tracks to achieve the same results.
The foot controller was mandatory. It definitely depends on how long you ned your loops to be, though. If you need to have long, multitrack loops then a dedicated looper might be better.
Iāve got a project set up specifically for live looping. The guitar goes to a thru machine, and I have three tracks with pickup machines set to different lengths all recording from that thru machine. The foot controller is set up so two of the switches are equivalent to the REC1 and REC2 buttons, and thatās all I need to control the pickup machines. Two more buttons select the next or previous track, and the last two set the regen level of the pickup machines to 0 or -6, which isnāt necessary but itās nice to have hands free presets for overdubs decaying or not.
Iāve got the other four tracks set up the exact same way, but with the other pair of inputs and outputs so itās like having two independent, three-track loopers with input effects. Iām also using a Faderfox UC4 to control the track levels, since my favorite looper of all time is still the old EHX 2880 (itās not that deep but it has the best UI of any looper Iāve ever used or heard of, by a big margin) and I needed to replicate as much of that workflow as I could. I definitely recommend it but you also definitely donāt need it.
EDIT: the overall way I use the foot controller is pretty much straight out of one of the examples in the manual, with a couple extra thigns added because I had more switches to use.
Thanks for the details. Can i ask which foot controller are you using? MC6/8?
I come from using a Boomerang looper so i guess i would also try to replicate its UI since iām so used to it but it has only 3 tracks the way i use it and iād need more.
So far i was either slaving it in MIDI to the OT with its 2 differents outputs going to 2 different inputs of the OT to be able to resample.
Then i thought i should try the OT as a looper and in the idea to be even more compact. Then i thought about a foot controller but iād loose the compacity to only use the OT and i wonder i iād really gain instead of the first formula OT+Boomerang.