What's your workflow//How do you use circuit bent instruments

[SearchAndRescue]

How do you use the instruments you've built? What's it like in the studio setting? Live?

[nochtanseenspecht]

most bent stuff i never use  "serious" 
it just doesn't fit in my usual style (dub)
sometimes i use circuitbent drummachines in my tunes
i do use homemade fx etc

most stuf i bended is collecting dust on the shelf, i guess i like more the actual bending than the result soundwise

[Circuitbenders]

personally i find circuit bent stuff is perfect for dub, but i never use it live.
I've got gigabytes of samples of every conceivable circuit bent noise that i tend to reassemble into drum kits made from different machines or individual FX noises triggered via midi.

I'd rather spend hours making loads of weird noises and then go through it and pull out the exceptional bits for use elsewhere, than try and play a bent machine live.

[selfpreservation]

i wouldnt use circuit bent machines live they tend to have too much of a dynamic range and would rip cones out of speakers , i only have bent drum machines and i usually use them to create loops and single hit sounds , or via midi i usually only use them sparingly maybe just a hat sound or whatever just to give a larger sonic pallate , i cant understand circuit bent music its just nuts so less is more really , also i like my circuit bent instruments to be used in factory mode as well so they will never be sat on the shelf

[Bogus Noise]

I also record far too much audio of random noodlings and sift through it for good bits. Then I'll have them ready for putting into Geist kits, mangling in Kontakt/Alchemy, or just drop and slice and process in the Logic Arrange page.

I'll also sometimes record freestyling over a looped section of a tune project, and slice + tighten the best bits. Also done similar with the Barbie Karaoke delay, recording the results of sending a vocal through it and putting back into Logic for more work.

Have tried sampling a vocal into the SK1 and glitching it up in there a couple of times, but didn't end up using the results as they weren't quite satisfactory.

Eventually will be sorting out MIDI control for some of these boxes, which will help too!

[SearchAndRescue]

Seems like everybody does a lot of bending and then sampling the results. Hmmm. That's exactly how I work.

Makes me wonder if anybody has any tips for a faster workflow when sampling. I use Ableton Live, and I just record a bunch of stuff onto one audio track and then auto-slice it with the exceptional "Slice to new MIDI" function. Any reason to buy an additional sampling VST? I would like to share my samples with other folks but I don't want to make .WAV or .AIFF files, I would just put up the .adg instrument files for Ableton users. I think this would work...If anybody has any tips, please let me know, and if anybody wants some samples, I'd be happy to send you the instrument files for Ableton, unless someone lets me know about a stupidly easy way to make .wav files en masse.

I'm also wondering...since everyone here seems to bend for studio use, does that impact the control layout, etc, of your piece? I am really interested in the aesthetics of certain benders (Kaiser, Gij Gieskes, and...Please don't hate me...the wooden end cheeks on S-CAT's stuff). Does the fact that you dont' take your stuff out to gig make you focus on the aesthetics more? Less?

I know there's been a lot of questions posed here...sorry!

[Circuitbenders]

sampling VST? ................. PAH!  

I'm so 'old skool' i use hardware samplers and Wavelab/Recycle over a SCSI connection. There seems to be a weird general assumption these days that everyone uses computer based production. Yes, hardware sampling is more of a pain in the arse, but to my ears it sounds a lot less generic and bland than computers. Computers may sound 'better' or tighter in some ways, but they also sound boring. Its an entirely subjective thing though i guess.

As a lifelong gearwhore i've always been a sucker for a cool looking instrument but that doesn't take precedence over usability. I'd rather have something that works, than something that looks sexy. I'd always try to make something as usable as possible and unless i have a brilliant idea the whole thing is being built around, the aesthetics come second, but that doesn't mean you can't make something look like a professional job.

The only major difference i've noticed between people ordering drum machines or samplers from circuitbenders for live or studio use is that they tend to go for switches rather than a patchbay if they want it for live use. Although if you have a piece of gear with a patchbay on the end of a cable you can make a switch box and a patchbay box and swap them over for different uses.

Don't get me started on wooden end cheeks. Ok, if you have some expensive analogue desktop synth like a Doepfer Dark Energy, or you're mounting a TR606 in a new case with a control surface, then end cheeks are cool, but on a VL1? It just looks ridiculous

[Bogus Noise]

I'm an overproduction whore and love the granular features and extra processing you can get with Alchemy. I always use the Macro knobs as well to make the sound easily morphable. Kontakt I use less but it's handy to have available.

The slice to MIDI feature is great - Logic has it but I never get around to using it... very handy though! The thing with sharing the Ableton files is that you're limiting their use to people who use Ableton. Don't know if there's an 'export adg with samples' feature, or if the individual samples are kept in the Ableton project folder? May also be worth looking for a convertor.

Control surface wise - I try to make all my devices feel like an instrument. I do like to cram in a lot of controls, provided all the bends are worthwhile, but when I've worked out what to keep I'll spend a bit of time working out the interface. I'll blue tac the knobs and switches into place to test how it'll look and feel, placing controls in logical places and representing signal flow where possible, but also fitting with the overall shape of the device. Even when the bends have been finalised this process can take a while in itself. If something doesn't feel right I may leave it for a couple of weeks and come back to see how else it could work, and there's also repositioning and refining along the way. It's not unusual for me to have something with extra long wires soldered and pots stuck onto the front of the casing with blue tac.

[selfpreservation]

i love the sound of my old school samplers i have akai and ensoniq , the asrx i have can make any old sample cdrom drum kit sound like gold its so upfront and crunchy, its a pain in the ass sampling into them,turning on my pc cause apple decided to stop supporting scsi WTF,  scsi into wavelab, then trim, rename and back to the sampler and on to the zip drive pheew, but i do use battery a lot mainly cause i have lexicon reverb plugins then i put through my analogue desk and compressors it can sound pretty sweet

[Dylan]

personally i find circuit bent stuff is perfect for dub,

Couldn't agree with that more. When I do dub stuff, instead of a siren, I tend to use a delayed bent device. Mainly a speak.

[nochtanseenspecht]

hey i like to here some of your dubs with circuit bent sounds , guys
i'm realy interested 

so far ive only used pss140 samples and hr16 in my tunes
i'm about to welcome a bended tr626 in my setup, wich could be nice and usefull

for my toykeyboards etc i found not much musical use, in fact i want to get rid of them 
i can imagine speak&spell is nice for dub

[Dylan]

I know Igor Amokian does a lot of dub style DJing and uses his bent devises over tunes. They're very versatile for it.

[SearchAndRescue]

sampling VST? ................. PAH!  

I'm so 'old skool' i use hardware samplers and Wavelab/Recycle over a SCSI connection. There seems to be a weird general assumption these days that everyone uses computer based production. Yes, hardware sampling is more of a pain in the arse, but to my ears it sounds a lot less generic and bland than computers. Computers may sound 'better' or tighter in some ways, but they also sound boring. Its an entirely subjective thing though i guess.

You also can't take your S2000 on the bus or to class, but a MacBook Pro running Ableton and a little Akai MPD fits in a backpack just fine...I mean, I throw some of my shorter sounds and drum breaks on my Akai, but that shit is really confusing to me. I still have trouble even saving samples to floppy. I've found the user's manual to be really self referential, and I keep re-reading passages that never explain what I need to know. If i could figure out how to set up keygroups etc instead of one sample spread chromatically across the keyboard, I'd use the sampler more often. Also, mine came without the optional effects card and 8 separate outs, so I'm just holding on to it to bend it...and sample it with Ableton...

As for the wooden end cheeks on a VL-1...everything looks ridiculous on a VL-1.

I was thinking something like a Casio SA-35 with the speakers cut off and the ends capped with nice (read: cheesy) laminate end cheeks. IDK, there's something about it that I think looks cool.

So...I guess if anybody has any tips on using the S2000, that would be, well, super. Because the manual sucks.

[Circuitbenders]

The S2000 is the most difficult Akai i've ever failed to use. Honestly, using the S2000 is going to put you off hardware sampling for life. Akai-wise the S01 and S20 sound a lot better when bent in my opinion anyway. What you lose in complexity you more that make up for in bent sounds.

I think the problem with the S2000 is that they've taken something just a little less complex that the S3000XL and given you a two line LCD display to work with. I've never really been able to get my head around it, but then i've always preferred EMU and Roland samplers anyway.

I've always wondered how much the Akai design team actually had to do with the S2000. The interface and design is different to any other sampler Akai ever made, and navigating the operating system is a farce compared to other Akais.

Sorry we're completely off topic now...........

[SearchAndRescue]

I'd like to know what hardware samplers allow you to assign a different sample to each key. I think the S2000 allows for 16 keygroups, which is kind of lame. I think the Ensoniq ASR-10 keyboard sampler is one such, but I'm thinking it'd be nice to know what my options are, especially since the ASR-10 is still going for about $500.

Getting back to workflow in a roundabout way:

I think that for me, the hardware sampler with a different sample on each key is a good sketchpad for working out musical ideas, but the amount of work of setting up a keygroup for each sample, etc. is more work than it's work when sampling in a DAW goes at least 10 times faster. Plus, all my hardware is sequenced with an Alesis MMT-8, and the resolution of the sequencer is not very high.