SP404 mk2 production tips/tricks/problem solving/bugs

A few things that I learned:

(1) Pattern chain mode is great! What was not obvious to me is that you can use the “repeat” function live to get one pattern to play repeatedly. So if you have a 4-bar pattern, but want that to be 8-bars, I first tried to just put the same pattern twice in the chain, but surprisingly that doesn’t seem to work. Then I went the long way around and resampled the pattern into 8-bars and made another pattern to replace the one in the pattern chain. It turns out you don’t need to do that you can just toggle on the repeat pattern function live as you resample.

(2) If you are going to layer stuff, there is a handy function where you can make the original sample not go through any effects (to avoid doubling up effects). Remain + Pad, until the pad turns white. I’ll definitely be using this a lot.

There is also a function called “grab effects” that looks handy, I’m going to try that next time as it can be tricky to duck effects in and out as you resample.

(3) When grabbing something from the autosampled thing (why can’t I remember what that’s called), don’t trim it exactly unless you are sure you know it’s exactly like you want it. Take a generous amount and set your start/stop points after it’s sampled on a pad or you risk losing this work if it doesn’t loop perfectly. For instance, I had things that either didn’t loop right that I had to redo or things that did loop, but didn’t loop on the downbeat, so they didn’t integrate well with my other patterns later (so I had to do some extra work to fix them or scrap them and start over).

(4) This one I need to double check, but it seems like if you make a pattern and later move the source sample to a different bank or pad to tidy things up, that sample becomes disconnected from the pattern. I was hoping the machine would be smart enough to follow pad exchanges, but it doesn’t. So basically I had a pattern that was a pain to make, later moved some samples around, and went back and the pattern was blank. I couldn’t remember where the samples were originally so I couldn’t move them back and the pattern itself doesn’t show any information about what’s in the pattern so you will have no info as to how to fix it.

Basically, it’s a good idea to come up with a good workflow for where you put your samples and be very careful once you are at the stage where you are making patterns.

In general, I use one bank as the bank I resample into and then once I finish resampling I move those samples to where I want them to permanently live. I also have another bank that I think of as the storage closet. I delete things that I know are messed up, but if I have left over bits that I may want later, I move them over to the last banks.

(5) For pattern chains, you only get 16 slots so you can run out, but remember you actually have 16 banks of pattern chains, so you could make two separate pattern chains, resample those and then either make those into pattern to chain or just resample them together into one sample.

(6) There’s been a lot of complaining about chromatic mode not working in pattern mode, but for now there is a pretty easy work around if you find it difficult to get your timing right playing live using the resample method. Basically once you’ve played around and know which notes you want (it’s probably not that many), just use resample to make a pattern chain of those three or four notes, chop those to notes pads, and then go into pattern mode and you can play them in with the luxury of undo and erase.

(7) If you are doing something complicated it’s easy to run out of mutes. I haven’t found a work around to that other than be efficient and don’t waste mute group slots. I wish you could have 32 pads per mute group instead of 16. It would make things a bit easier.

For long time SP users maybe some of this is just common sense, but this is all new to me.

5 Likes

Not sure if that would suit your aim, but are you aware of the “duplicate pattern” function in the pattern edit screen?

1 Like

Ah, cool man. That would have saved a bit of work for sure. For laying out songs, the repeat pattern thing has the advantage of only taking up one slot, but that duplicate pattern function will be great for building different versions of patterns, so will be a timesaver!

It’s good to talk this kind of stuff out with people as it’s easy to get stuck in one way of thinking/working.

I need to get a new project going as I’m sure a different style of track will bring a lot of different revelations/problems. Plus, I need to cement the muscle memory. Most things I’ve come across are pretty intuitive once you see how it’s done, but there are a handful of functions I still need to crack the manual for.

2 Likes

I believe I wasn’t clear. The duplicate pattern function I’m talking about has nothing to do with pattern chains, it doubles the length of a pattern and duplicates it’s contents, so a 2 bars pattern becomes 4 bars and sounds as when you played the two bars one twice.

That happens on the pattern page.

It seems to yield the same result as what you did with resampling twice the length and putting the resulting sample in a pattern, but I’m of course not sure it is :blush:

1 Like

Yes, I appreciate your detailed post!

1 Like

Maybe this has been addressed already but I’m discovering that when I change patterns longer samples, which should play into the next pattern, aren’t being triggered. Also, samples with gate turned on aren’t playing back the way I recorded them onto the sequencer. Are others experiencing these issues?

I haven’t noticed the second point (I am still in discovery)

For you first point, to be sure I understand, do you mean that if a sample longer then the sequence is playing, it stops when you launch another sequence?

Another thing I noticed is that looped samples that I record into a sequence, when they are the same lemgth as the sequence (more or less, given that I loop them by ear and they may be slightly shorter or longer than the amount of bars at the given tempo), play only every other iteration of the sequence.

When I turn loop off, all is fine.

1 Like

Ah, is that why that happens sometimes. Good catch. I’ll remember to turn off loop!

I’m not sure if that’s a bug or by design to have the tails cut off. How does that work on other SPs?

I haven’t tried sequencing with gate yet.

Yeah, I only started using the sequencer today and that’s what I experienced on a few occasions.

I’ve had the 303 and 404sx before and as far as I can remember both samplers allowed the tails to cross into other patterns. It definitely seems like a bug. Hopefully Roland will fix it cuz it makes the sequencer severly limiting, imho.

2 Likes

In the mean time, I might try sequencing the sp with my m8 or octatrack. Has anyone had any luck doing that?

That’s good to know. Thanks!

Sure!

These mk2’s have the potential to be really awesome, not to say they aren’t great already, but if roland can iron out all the bugs and maybe fix some of the clunkier aspects of the workflow, I can see these things garnering a lot of love from the sp community.

4 Likes

I’ve heard about that (it’s my first SP) and am with you here. Seems great to be able to put a long sample in a sequence and launch other sequences while this long sample keeps playing… Great way to construct a track!

3 Likes

Yeah, I think that’s one of the many strengths of the sp workflow. A lot of music I make is a kind of abstract so it’s nice to be able to utilize the sequencer for a basic structure but then layer longer evolving samples for a more organic sound.

1 Like

if you have a sample gated it will play for as long as u hold it on the seq.
if looped it will stop when its time to loop. these are quite useful in live context for mute variations with a single pattern (of 99bars pes se, hahahaha), back when there was no copy pattern without a tedious workaround trick.

i also get bugged by the stupid cutoff on samples when chaining patterns. thats a bug for sure and it needs to be fixed!.. roland

1 Like

Do I understand right? You say that a looped sample will play once entirely when sequenced, then stop?

if loop is on it will stop when its the 1.1 in patern mode… i wasnt clear enough is as if you have a looping sample in normal mode and you trig it again, so it will stop
so if you want in a 99bar pattern you could have a looped sample play indefinitely till you program just one trig to stop… that was nice when you had a perfectly looping sample…
it was designed for live purposes probly, or just bugs that we utilized in unexpected ways

1 Like

Got you, sure, makes sense! Triggering a looped sample, as with pressing a pad, stops it!

Brings me back to the perfectly looped sample ;). Got to try this reverse loop method I read in the other thread.

oh and keep the gate on when u try to find that click. it helps a lot. also ow there is the envelope, so u have to keep that open too… hope u manage.
but anyways my advice is to sometimes embrace the quirks.
in my opinion the whole sp404 hip hop style of beatmaking is not about the vinyl sim, but embracing those inconsistencies, in timing, small errors and a bit of muddy low end… and well overcompressing to hell too
have a listen at https://youtu.be/jWclD20N3lk
or https://youtu.be/WPYyiS2Sa9s
for example. thats the true sp style (not my beats)

5 Likes