MPC and techno music with some melodies

Someone told me that what I need is a MPC but I feel confused about it. Please, help me with this tough decision.

I need something that would be at all in one solution to do simple stuff, techno music. I thought that MPC was only for hitting the pads and record in real time hiphop beats, but after watch some videos with JJOS I think this can be used to my purposes.

I tried in the past the electribe ESX1, and I loved it, because I get lots of visual feedback and it was fun to program. However its editing is bad, and it only have two melodic parts. MPC seems to have even USB port, and a good sample management. This is what is doing me I question if I should go for it instead an ESX1.

My needs are:
- 7 or 8 drums samples playing simultaneouly
- 2 or 3 melodic parts playing simultaneously, some of them with glide
- Pattern automation of parameters like resonance
- Delay effect, and distortion effect
- DEAD EASY & VISUAL PITCH AND NOTE LENGTH EDITING
- Easy and always accessible mute/solo functions
- ADSR for AMP & Filter.
- 1 LFO that could be used for different parameters like cutoff/pitch
- TRx0x-like programming
- NOT TOO MUCH MENU & SUBMENU
- Midi feedback to use it with something like BCR2000
- Stable SO

Two things I fear from MPC are that the couldn't have enough feedback like electribe esx1, or be as funny as them. What do you would recommend me?

Thanks!

welcome to the forums!

one first question: you said "do simple stuff, techno music" do you mean produce in a studio/at home or for a live setting?

there is a big difference in that, and while the mpc and the electribes can do both things they cannot do both things the same way!

the mpc sampler cannot be used in a live setting, because you have to stop the sequencer to assign the sound to a pad.
if you however put all you samples and programms into the mpc before a live show possibilities without having to stop the sequencer are endless... this also goes for all midi information the sequencer in the mpc is capable of receiving or sending.
midi recording and sequencing is possible without having to stop the sequencer, if you plan on using some sound modules.

in the studio i would say the mpc is a beast as a sampler/sequencer for audio and midi.

what is more fun depends on you, if you have the chance to try before you buy then do so.

and don´t let you ever fool again that any kind of musical instrument is for one genre only... everything is music!

peace, jo

Thanks you for the welcome

I mean with do simple stuff: use the MPC/ESX in anywhere without a PC as a sketchpad, so when I have a good idea finish it on my software sequencer. I'm not interested in live settings, however my experience says that hardware/software oriented to lives are more intuitives and easy to use.

I want to do simple acid or techno music, make few patterns, mute/solo parts, switch between them muting/soloing parts and tweaking filters and have some fun

However I don't know how to program pitches and lenghts (instead recording them in realtime) with JJOS. Also I don't know if the distortion effect can be assigned to more than one sample.

I need some info, but I didn't find nothing.

first, there are no sounds inside the mpc! only what you put in as samples.
there is no xox style sequencer (except maybe in jjos) but the sequencer is very easy and intuitive and there is a grid edit mode that lets you place your notes visualy on the grid.
you can also do step recording or editing and punch in note by note.
note value editing in sequence edit mode is also very easy.

there is no real distortion effect only a bit grunger that can give some distorted sound, but you can always connect a guitar pedal distortion to one of the outputs. there are two effect slots with different effects in the mpc. some of them are only on one of the effects, e.g. delay is only in fx2. the filters are not selfoscillating so there is no real acid sound in the machine.
you can assign some parameters, but not all to the sliders and knobs for realtime tweaking.
if you feed it good samples maybe you can get around that. mute and solo is no problem.

download the mpc manual and see if you can deal with the concepts and the limitations of that machine.
to me it sounds as if you were better off with a xox style machine with nice filters and builtin synth.

if money and space is not an issue maybe look at the mpc5000 which is basically a mpc2500super + alesis micron 8voice analog modeling synth + 8track harddisk recorder from alesis fusion in one package. with more knobs and a bigger screen.

peace, jo

I have never touched an MPC 5000 but it sounds like you could do it on there. I have heard that the synth on it is pretty weak and there are lots of rumors about bugs on it.

I have been working on a setup for minimal techno for a while. Honestly software is the easiest route for me, but I really like the hands on feel of hardware so I have been trying to expand that area of my "studio".

You should try out the electribe EMX 1. It has 5 synth parts so you can have plenty of melody and harmony. The synth is lacking overall in terms of polyphony and thick sounds, it is not to be underestimated though. Really fun and intuitive to use. And you can program filter sweeps and FX changes into the sequences. I like to use it in conjunction with my mpc 500 because the drums in the emx are fixed. I like to sample my own. I want the mpc 2500 though so I can have my drums and other samples going to individual outs so I can add different effects to each, then into a mixer where i can easily cut them in and out.

selecta jo wrote:note value editing in sequence edit mode is also very easy.

Do you mean using JJOS? Do you know any video where I can see how is the note pitch editing on a MPC1000?

selecta jo wrote:to me it sounds as if you were better off with a xox style machine with nice filters and builtin synth.

I only know about Korg EMX, but it doesn't sound good. I tried it and I didn't like its sound and its note editing. Also, I need use voices.

selecta jo wrote:if money and space is not an issue maybe look at the mpc5000 which is basically a mpc2500super + alesis micron 8voice analog modeling synth + 8track harddisk recorder from alesis fusion in one package. with more knobs and a bigger screen.

It's a issue and the space I need too. Anyway I heard that mpc5000 had lots of bugs, that crashes a lot...

Esquilo wrote: I like to use it in conjunction with my mpc 500 because the drums in the emx are fixed

Well, I need to have everything in just one machine. Thanks for the tip anyway!

MPCs are brilliant machines for making techno.
but it probably won't work exactly how you imagine you want your workflow to go.
it is it's own machine - rather than a better substitute for some other machine or software you're are already using.

not sure what you mean by midi feedback. but the 1000 has 32 midi channels. anyway, it's all listed in the specs.

Esquilo wrote:I have never touched an MPC 5000 but it sounds like you could do it on there. I have heard that the synth on it is pretty weak and there are lots of rumors about bugs on it.

The 5K's synth is far from being weak:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKZoZoX2DsI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-8mOnclzcs

Rumors
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGEtvMfure0