MOTM

> However, I occasionally use Recycle to lift MIDI out of drum loops.  When
> Synthesis Technology finally releases the VC Pulse Divider, I'm thinking I
> could use it with DIN sync to roll breakbeats :)

Yes, a pulse divider and a MOTM-440 filter will be a very useful tool
to create analog bass drum and tom sounds.
I was very "anti drum machine" in the past, mostly because I'm not
good at programming drum patterns, and I'm not very skilled to record
drums by hitting pads either. So for my first CD (that was around 1998)
I used a very simple clock source (basically extracted the beat from a
pre-recorded bass line with an envelope generator module - *not*
envelope follower, but this is another story), a 8-step sequencer
and a VC-divider. Tweaking the divider factor with one
hand, and the cutoff frequency of a SSM2040 filter with high resonance
with the other hand, I got my drum track in real time. It was a slow,
sparse drum orchestration, and I had to do a second run for hihats
and the like (noise thru a resonant HP-VCF this time), but I liked
the result a lot. The sound generation is very similar to the classic
analogue drum computers, only that I had not several instruments
in parallel, but reconfigured one and the same filter for different
instruments on the fly. This is *bad* if you want to repeat the same
pattern several times, of course, but it's *good* if repetition is
something you want to avoid. Actually the reverse of adding
randomness to a perfect repetition: My trying (but failing) to
make exact repetitions just created the "right" (to me) "controlled
randomness". And the *one* thing where I would have been
completely helpless (keeping the exact timing) was of course taken
care for by the prerecorded master clock: The VC divider allowed
for variation, but not for missing the beat.

> Oh, I'm thinking of getting a FAT controller, but there is no way I'm
going
> to go buy a new digital delay.

I don't want to sound like a TC Electronic sales man, but after a long time
of fighting the thought about spending more than 500 Dollars for a delay,
when the decision was finally made, I could not await to get my D-Two.
There actually was a shortage in Germany, and I called Thomann every day
why their web page said "available" and they could not deliver it. (;->)
This box is really awesome, and if I could only keep *one* delay, I'd
probably sell my collection of BBD boxes and the Deltalab, and keep the
D-Two. (Ok, I would probably not sell my Roland RE-201.)


> Right, you should spend all your time working on MOTM modules ;)

Then Paul would have to hire 10 people to make the layouts and the
mechanical
parts to keep track (;->) - This is no stupid self-praise; it's just that
the
circuit is only a small part of the whole thing -, and with such inflation,
MOTM might go the sad way of Moog and ARP and other great companies ...

JH.