Does anyone use their mpc500 for other styles of music?

inflict3 wrote:hey, have you used psprhythm?? its a sweet psp app, its been out for a while, and its updated regularly.. how is beaterator?? i know traxxpad sucked azz

Never got into PSP homebrew, but I hear Beaterator is better. I've used Traxxpad and Beaterator shits on it. You could only get your own samples into Traxxpad with the mic, which sucked, and there weren't nearly as many onboard samples to work with.

I used mine recently for 70s Disco and Funk.
It can be used for any music.
Think of it as a sampler with 12 or 16 pads.
The groove quantising makes it great for hip hop beats, but I have used it synched with Cubase , and sampled drums, bass and keyboard/string sounds on all sorts of styles.

learog wrote:I used mine recently for 70s Disco and Funk.
It can be used for any music.
Think of it as a sampler with 12 or 16 pads.
The groove quantising makes it great for hip hop beats, but I have used it synched with Cubase , and sampled drums, bass and keyboard/string sounds on all sorts of styles.

thanks mate, that's good to know. Can't wait to start playing with it tomorrow! I just want a nice sounding synth now.. Looking at microkorg xl and waldorf blofeld mainly.. Both similar price although I will have to use a keyboard with the blofeld module. Blofeld has over 1000 sounds to the 128 on microkorg xl, but the korg has a vocoder and has a keyboard! Grr I want it all lol don't know which will be more useful. Can't find out whether the blofeld has many acoustic sounds that could make it more versatile. That would be useful. I want orchestral sounds, piano AND nice analogue sounds in one box haha..

Microkorg XL is based on the Korg Radias synth engine , which I found a little too thin and "fizzy".
Blofeld I found the same too, nice dance pads, but no speak wrenching low bass in my opinion.
Virtual analogue can be a bit less fat than real analogue
The Dave Smith Mopho ( mono)and Tetra ( 4 notes polyphony) is great for synth basses and leads
If you want good strings and real sounds, check out the Roland Fantom XR rack , or if you are on a budget the Roland Sonic Cell
Roland strings on this are great

Fantom XR strings - my old band
http://www.ramjetproductions.co.uk/music/family.mp3

Hope this helps

ps I meant to say Fantom XR or Sonic Cell has all your requirements in one box.
Real strings, keys and synth sounds
http://www.rolandus.com/products/produc ... ductId=897

and I dont work for Roland
)

learog wrote:ps I meant to say Fantom XR or Sonic Cell has all your requirements in one box.
Real strings, keys and synth sounds
http://www.rolandus.com/products/produc ... ductId=897

and I dont work for Roland
)

thanks that's very helpful, I did notice the sonic cell and thought it looked interesting! Might be a better bet as more of an all-round sound module. I have been listening to loads of demos and sounds of microkorg, xl, blofeld, Micron etc and I must say I do still like the way the microkorgs sound. I'll look into the sonic cell a bit more now.. a microkorg does mean a lot of sampling though, due to the low polyphony and only 2-part multi, so sonic cell would be more useful so I can do more with midi sequencing and use the mpc500 for samples instead of having to sample everything and not make much use of the midi sequencer!

DNB and Dubstep using lots of old moog samples

Anewfoundglory wrote:

eimer wrote:The kaossilator uses the engine from the original MicroKorg, so go grab that!

I use:

Roland Juno-106
Roland MKS-50
Roland PMA-5
Roland tb-303
Roland tr-505
Roland tr-707
Roland tr-727
Roland tr-808
Roland tr-909
Paia Fatman
Korg MicroKorg
Korg N5
Korg 707
Korg DS-8
Korg Micropops
Gameboy w. Nanoloop
Commodore 64 synthcart
Commodore 64 MSIAH
Akai MPC-500
Akai MPC-1000
Akai XR-10
Doepfer MS-404
Jomox X-base09
Dr. Böhm Digital drums
Electro harmonix dr-32
Yamaha PSS-30

The rest is in the studio

you lucky b*tard!! Haha wow.. Anyway, you say the microkorg has the same engine as kaossilator, if that's the case I might sell my kaossilator and buy a microkorg xl. I want to have better control over pitch of sounds etc (ie keys!) and midi connectivity. Is the xl much better than the microkorg? I know the xl is 2-part multitimbral and has a better vocoder. I also prefer the way it looks. I just love amazing lead sounds with adjustable portamento and stuff, can't wait to start working with my new mpc though, it should arrive Wednesday!

I will definitely make use of the korg ds-10 once I start using my mpc. I don't like the limited looping on it (and the kaossilator) so as soon as I have the mpc with 128mb I will start sampling stuff from ds-10, kaossilator, old casio mini keyboard, iPhone etc then I should be able to finally start putting things ogether and see what I can create!!

I can't decide if I should get a rocktron banshee talkbox for £150 or a microkorg xl and use the vocoder on that. I *think* I prefer the sound of the talk box but that also means I need a good mic in order to record the vocals, whereas vocoder box would be sampled thru the microkorg straight into the mpc500. Talk box seems to be clearer than vocoding, anyone have any thoughts or suggestions on this?

Thanks to everyone for all their input so far!

I think that the original MicroKorg has a more personal sound. It has some flaws which you can use to get gritty dirty analog sounds. The MicroKorg XL uses the Korg Radias DSP Engine which is far more superior to the DSP in the Microkorg, which comes from The Korg MS-2000. What i'm trying to say is that i don't like the "clean" sound of the MicroKorg XL.

I think I am actually a fan of clearner sounds though. I like clean sounds without them sounding too 'digital'. So if the mk is a bit rough, it might not appeal to me personally. I will really have to try them both I think. I might buy a used mk and if I don't like it, I'll try the xl. If I don't like that, I'll get something more traditional and rounded like a Roland module!

UPDATE: just spent a couple of hours with my new mpc500 there are so many features to get my head round but I'm doing well. I had to check the manual a couple of yikes already but mostly it's been straightforward. I recorded a short sample and made a melody with it, recorded it into a sequence on it's own track and added effects, then sequenced drum parts on different tracks and made a 16-bar loop. I was quite impressed, since this is a totally new way of working for me an I'm very excited to see what I can do with it! Going to try midi sequencing tomorrow using my old djx as a test, then the real fun can begin once my RAM arrives within the next couple days

One thing: the pads are not very sensitive lol is it normal almost not to be able to hear samples when tapping the pads gently? When full levels is switched on, the samples are nice and loud, but with velocity sensitive pads I really have to hit them super hard to make a decent volume! Is it normal practice to edit the samples so they only go from say 50-137 velocity wise, or do you keep them at the full volume range 0-127??!

Oh , I found this Java based MPC drumkit creator which is free and great
Easy to use and create velocity layered kits etc

http://mpcmaid.sourceforge.net/