POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Discuss music production with Ableton Live.

What should it be then?

Maschine
60
74%
Akai MPD 18
2
2%
Akai MPD 32
6
7%
Akai MPC 500
1
1%
Akai MPC 1000
4
5%
Akai MPC 2500
2
2%
Other (Specify in a post)
6
7%
 
Total votes: 81

Cool Character
Posts: 340
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by Cool Character » Thu Jun 30, 2011 7:18 pm

23kon wrote:VERY nice link showcasing the real capabilities of using an MPD32 as a full-on controller.
Great tune too. Had a quick watch while i was "working" at work but will study it in more detail later.

Looks like he's assigned knobs to go through his banks of sounds perhaps?

Kinda looks like a lot of the actions he makes don't actually do anything.

23kon
Posts: 357
Joined: Sun Feb 25, 2007 3:08 pm

Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by 23kon » Thu Jun 30, 2011 8:12 pm

Cool Character wrote:Kinda looks like a lot of the actions he makes don't actually do anything.
Nonsense! Did you watch it all?

This set he's playing here is more indepth than anything i've seen anyone doing on Maschine on youtube other than programming a beat then looping a couple of samples.
The only exception to this would be jeremy ellis with his crazy fingers!

starving student
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by starving student » Fri Jul 01, 2011 3:48 am

23kon wrote:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qKqZALPeCA

Nice tune but this video doesn't convince me that Maschine is a "live performance" tool.
These guys are only using Maschine to trigger a loop.

For keys he's playing a keyboard.
For effects they've got a kaoss pad.
and why ... so everything can be tweaked/keyed at the same time.
I don't see being able to tweak this many parameters at once on one controller as possible.

Hence why I think my setup of ipad with touchable allowing two of the following at one time
keys, pads, clip/scene launch, effects
plus just a wee nocturn is a better setup for live performance reasons
plus maybe some rubbery pads for laying beats live rather than playing ipad screen pads.

i DO see Maschine as a good studio tool. not knocking that at all.
just fail to see any advantage of using it as a live performance tool because it seems restricting.

this saturday i'm going to local music shop to get a (hopefully) long showcase of maschine to see what its all about.
I think you don't really get what maschine is yet, no harm in that you're talking to the person on this forum who had the hardest head difficult time actually getting what maschine is. Firstly let me say that in the video the keyboard is triggering maschine you didn't know that was possible right.... ok secondly all of our opinions aside, maschine factually has heaps more capability than the mpd, there is no way that the mpd can out perform maschine I don't know whether you really speced out the two side by side but as a midi controller, the maschine is far superior to the mpd, and as a drum sampler of course maschine is superior as well........................ I'm not saying these are reasons to get maschine over the mpd32 if the mpd is what you want that's what you should get cause we're talking about music here, I'm only mentioning these things because It sounds like you watched nosaj on the mpd and thought that he was doing something that he could not do on maschine, that is simply not the case.

maschine can mimic the manome, the mpc, and the machine drum, it's a hardware stepsequencer too, and it can do it all without stopping, in addition to that you can automate clips where as with ableton you cannot, and as a midi controller it's pads are the most responsive on the market right now, next in line would be the korg pad kontrol, this means that you can have an incredible amount of expressiveness in your playing from beats to ambient stuff. also as a midi controller maschine has more capability than any other midi drumpad controller on the market at this time.

starving student
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by starving student » Fri Jul 01, 2011 4:16 am

a 6 part series that might be revealing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJ2vFF_Tufg

here's one of exile not even using maschines software just to show what I mean as maschines prowess as a midi controller, but this type of thing is also possible using maschines software.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cy6Njb9SgmU


starving student
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by starving student » Fri Jul 01, 2011 4:42 am

but like I told you I prefer the mpc for live performance.....that's just me though.

and like you said maschine is dope for the studio too

esky
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by esky » Fri Jul 01, 2011 7:29 am

Ok, one more MPD Video with a guy called Baths...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpZScE07 ... re=related
I don't know whether you really speced out the two side by side but as a midi controller, the maschine is far superior to the mpd, and as a drum sampler of course maschine is superior as well
Isn't Ableton Live a "drum sampler" in itself too...? When i checked out Maschine i thought "well, i have everything twice now...a sound engine, an editor with a controller..." and so on. I still don't understand whats so superior to a Live 8/MPD combination.

23kon
Posts: 357
Joined: Sun Feb 25, 2007 3:08 pm

Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by 23kon » Fri Jul 01, 2011 8:29 am

starving student wrote:It sounds like you watched nosaj on the mpd and thought that he was doing something that he could not do on maschine, that is simply not the case.
Not to be rude, but it kind of IS the case.
At the SAME time (dependant on his multi-tasking skills) he can trigger one of 16 pads, slide one of 8 faders or tweak one of 8 knobs.

To repeat, I DO see Maschine as being a good studio tool for workflow but NOT as a live tool for the amount of hands-on controls that i'd like at any one time.

So, like Esky, I also don't understand (for live performance) whats so superior to a Live 8/MPD combination?

The Carpet Cleaner
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Location: Paris

Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by The Carpet Cleaner » Fri Jul 01, 2011 8:30 am

Maschineis awesomeforstudio but forlive performance live and apc are much better

Cool Character
Posts: 340
Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 3:48 am

Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by Cool Character » Fri Jul 01, 2011 11:41 pm

23kon wrote:Nonsense! Did you watch it all?
Do you mean "did I count how many times he spammed throwaway pushes/holds on those bank buttons?"
I don't think I have the attention span for it; I would appreciate if you told me though!

I actually thought they were just garbage actions. Wow, you mean he's really going through that many nested functions?
Pushing A-B-C-B-A is a specific preset on his MPD? That's incredible! But how come the controls still seem to be doing the same things to all of the tracks?
It must be such a deep set that he doesn't even want it detectable that he's actually doing anything! He WANTS you to think he's faking it. Incredible.

starving student
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by starving student » Sat Jul 02, 2011 12:38 am

23kon wrote:
starving student wrote:It sounds like you watched nosaj on the mpd and thought that he was doing something that he could not do on maschine, that is simply not the case.
Not to be rude, but it kind of IS the case.
At the SAME time (dependant on his multi-tasking skills) he can trigger one of 16 pads, slide one of 8 faders or tweak one of 8 knobs.

To repeat, I DO see Maschine as being a good studio tool for workflow but NOT as a live tool for the amount of hands-on controls that i'd like at any one time.

So, like Esky, I also don't understand (for live performance) whats so superior to a Live 8/MPD combination?
first lets separate what we are talking about here, ok it looks like you two prefer the mpd and thats cool
I prefer the mpc and thats cool too, those are our preffs.

now did you guys really compare maschine as a drumsampler with abletons drum racks as a drum sampler because you're talking like you did but I'm having a hard tim seeing that you would come to the same conclusions about them...... you ask isn't ableton a drumsampler yes it is and their are many more drum samplers out on the market but abletons drum racks are not even lightyears close to the workflow of maschines drumsampler........ now I love Live and you can do anything with lives drumracks given enough time, but lives drumrack +drumpad controller does in no way equal the experience of maschines drumsampler +maschines hardware ........at all in any stretch of the imagination. thats why I wanted to clarify what we're talking about here because you couldn't do anything that you see in those maschine videos with the bald dude I posted ... with ableton and an mpd, just look at the video and then try it and see but it should be super obvious.

maschine excels at the workflow to the point of turning workflow itself into a feature that ableton doesn't have

maschine excels at automation, and on the fly automation in it's clips

maschine and ableton excel at routing but maschine excels at routing with it's hardware over ableton routing with an mpd

and f@23kon seriously the mpd is not superior to maschine as a midi controller, if you're saying that it is because the mpd has faders and maschine does not then you should say thats what you really want is a fader box, because maschine has more buttons and knobs and more midi functions than an mpd with out using a third party midi translator to help out with extra functions.
the mpd can not go in an out of Live mode so that you are controlling maschine one second and then controlling live the next second without skipping a beat and with out stopping anything.

the mpd cannot give you the visual feedback that maschine gives you either
to me all of this makes maschine superior to an mpd, doesn't mean it makes me superior to nosajthing but that controller is weak sauce in comparison unless you use some deep third party midi programming translator help and then you'd still be lacking.

and in the event that I wanted to mimic what nosaj was doing on the mpd it would be extra simple.
heres how, I'd route 8 tracks of maschine into 8 tracks of ableton live, then to get the use of faders that the mpd has I would just slip in and out of midi controller mode, it's only one button press and doesn't stop anything....in midi mode I would use the knobs to mimick the faders, and it wouldn't disturb anything I was using the knobs for otherwise.

reeloy
Posts: 195
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Location: berlin

Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by reeloy » Sat Jul 02, 2011 10:28 am

... i was playing shows also in pre laptop times....cases all over the place, cables everywhere, more than hour to set it up all fine...those days....

And it's funny to follow this discussion...
What i saw now, in the tube links is....

The maschine perfomers don't perform...it's more like playing videogames....and thats what they sound like...

The mpd guy is really an artist, with his own unique sound and way to perform that...

One thing i've learned in twenty years of gear porn...

Don't go for the "i can do it all" tools....
The "i do only this one thing and nothing else"tools are allways better and everlasting....

starving student
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by starving student » Sat Jul 02, 2011 1:39 pm

are you implying that if nosaj used maschine he wouldn't be an artist?
personally I think he'd do the same thing no matter what he used.

we're not comparing artist who use maschine and artist who use mpds
we're comparing midi controller capabilities, what are your thoughts on
the two midi controllers (that's all they are) ?

delicioso
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Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by delicioso » Sun Jul 03, 2011 12:07 am

esky wrote:I still don't understand whats so superior to a Live 8/MPD combination.
The much more efficient and inspiring hands-on workflow; the ability to be completely mouse-less and not having to constantly stare at the computer screen. It does make all the difference. It's harder to grasp if you've never used hardware like MPCs.

reeloy
Posts: 195
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Location: berlin

Re: POLL: Maschine / MPD 18/32 / MPC 500/1000/2500

Post by reeloy » Sun Jul 03, 2011 1:46 am

....all i'm saying is....the maschine videos sound all a bit overloaded and faceless...

And.....the mpd is "only" a controler....
Maschine is a sequencer, controler, effectboard, soundlib, discolight, synthesizer, sampler and last but not least a mpc ripp off....

You choose....

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