ASR - 10

NearTao wrote:Another reason for the tone with older gear... you don't always get to dial in sounds to such a fine granularity... plus some of the menu diving can be a chore so instead of fixing it 'properly'... you just reach for the options in front of you. This can lead to what today would be considered heavy handed decisions.

Case in point... auto sampling a key group in the new MPCs is bone head simple... you just dial in the sound you want, make a few adjustments to length... and just "Do it"... it is mostly a machine time operation, freeing up your personal time to dial in what you want to sample, make some tea, whatever... On something like an S950, you are the sampling process... so if you want to value your time you need to consider how much time to spend naming samples, how many you want, how long they should be... let alone how much time you want to spend managing your memory! This leads to a split in mentality and approach which absolutely has a direct impact on the tonality of your sound.

It's why so many people who've used the older gear don't necessary lust for it... but have a better appreciation for what it means to work with. You can always apply similar process and get reasonable facsimile results, but that requires understanding where and why things were done the way they used to be.

This is very true when programming music, which is much slower way to compose music. It's much more an engineering mind state when it comes to creating. I was always told to buy gear for the time that you live in. The main reason is the gear is old and the cost are a premium.

Ajax wrote:
I hear you, and totally agree. For what it’s worth, it’s part of the reason I’ve held back from buying a lot of additional hardware (FX processors, etc)... it seems completely unnecessary to me when I have the X (and DAWs, I suppose, although I really dislike DAW use generally). I copped the ASR because I just couldn’t help myself. It was too good a deal to pass up. If I wanted to I could flip it on eBay right now and quadruple what I paid for it, but I’d rather have that piece of history and try to find a good place for it in the rig.

From what you listed, you have enough gear to get the sound you desire. This is actually why people bought large format consoles. It has the EQ/Filter, Pre Amp, and Compression all wrapped into one. So the only thing people really had to buy was effects.

The ASR's are good for processing sounds but they are clunky and the menu diving is cumbersome.

Fre$hBreath wrote:I own the ASR-10, ASR-X-Pro Turbo, and the ASR-X Turbo and I love them all for the way they capture the low end and add a certain depth to my samples. They are also great synthesizers.

What do you think the machines are doing to capture that low end?

I don't know if just looking at the ASR as a "color" box is fair at all to the machine. Personally, I find it as one of the best synths I used. I think the added sound design features are just as bonus, as in any color it adds. I dig the sample based hip hop made on the machine especially stuff like this:


However I think it's more of one of them things where people just want the hardware to get "that sound" or that a machine will magically make the beats for them. Im just some amateur with too much gear on my hands but the asr is something I don't see myself selling. It's my master keyboard and when I'm up and running ill be using it a my main synth module.

Cockdiesel wrote:I don't know if just looking at the ASR as a "color" box is fair at all to the machine. Personally, I find it as one of the best synths I used. I think the added sound design features are just as bonus, as in any color it adds. I dig the sample based hip hop made on the machine especially stuff like this:

However I think it's more of one of them things where people just want the hardware to get "that sound" or that a machine will magically make the beats for them. Im just some amateur with too much gear on my hands but the asr is something I don't see myself selling. It's my master keyboard and when I'm up and running ill be using it a my main synth module.

I hear you. I’m not necessarily planning on using it only as an FX module/color box, it just seemed like a natural way to incorporate it with the X. I want to get everything possible out of it. I’ll probably take a fair amount of time using it as a primary sequencer just so I can try to learn it as well as I can. To the extent I can use it as an extra synth in the rig, that’s great... and I’m sure I will.

As for hoping that it will magically make beats for me (to the extent it was aimed at me, anyway), I think you misunderstand me. Although I took a hiatus for awhile, I started making beats as a hobby 20 years ago (with an XL) and have continued off and on since then. I have a fair amount of learned amateur experience with various machines... I don’t expect it to make me some production genius overnight or anything. I’m just trying to get a sense of how best to utilize it when there’s no way I’m going to move away from my X as the centerpiece. It seems clear that it can and should have a substantial place in my rig, which is great. I’m optimistic at what it can do.

No it wasn’t aimed at you or anyone Ajax. Please don’t take offense. It was just a general statement about people’s attitudes towards vintage gear

I agree.

People do too much gear chasing. "I just need this one extra machine and suddenly I'll be a famous producer and make awesome music!" Then rinse and repeat until they have a sampler museum.

Give me an MPC 1000, a crate of RANDOM records roulette style, a cheap 4 track cassette recorder and I'll make better music than your $8000 SP-1200 and your $1,000 S950 and all your asr-10s and gadgets.

Plus I'll run circles around you. While you're waiting 60 seconds for each sample to normalize in your ASR-10, I'll already have 3 more samples resampled through internal fx truncated and chopped.

It all depends what you’re going to use it for. I don’t think it makes sense to use any vintage gear as your main workhorse and overkill if you just want it as a glorified effects box.

However I do think that in some cases these machines have a place in modern studios. Much in the same way other vintage instruments have a place. Nothing wrong with vintage Juno or prophet in a studio why not for some of these other units. Those days may be dwindling as the new sp2400 has shown us and the mass amount of emulations.

Cockdiesel wrote:No it wasn’t aimed at you or anyone Ajax. Please don’t take offense. It was just a general statement about people’s attitudes towards vintage gear

Totally. And I couldn’t agree more. It’s not the gear, it’s what you do with it.

Sense-A wrote:I agree.

People do too much gear chasing. "I just need this one extra machine and suddenly I'll be a famous producer and make awesome music!" Then rinse and repeat until they have a sampler museum.

Give me an MPC 1000, a crate of RANDOM records roulette style, a cheap 4 track cassette recorder and I'll make better music than your $8000 SP-1200 and your $1,000 S950 and all your asr-10s and gadgets.

Plus I'll run circles around you. While you're waiting 60 seconds for each sample to normalize in your ASR-10, I'll already have 3 more samples resampled through internal fx truncated and chopped.

Ha. There had to be at least one.

Cockdiesel wrote:I don't know if just looking at the ASR as a "color" box is fair at all to the machine. Personally, I find it as one of the best synths I used. I think the added sound design features are just as bonus, as in any color it adds. I dig the sample based hip hop made on the machine especially stuff like this:

For those type of sonics, it does take much achieve it. Sample dirty records, Increases the noise floor and record to low quality cassette tape, with no noise suppression.

Cockdiesel wrote:However I think it's more of one of them things where people just want the hardware to get "that sound" or that a machine will magically make the beats for them. Im just some amateur with too much gear on my hands but the asr is something I don't see myself selling. It's my master keyboard and when I'm up and running ill be using it a my main synth module.

If it works for you what you need it to do then use it. It just depends on the tones that you're looking for.

Some guy on facebook had a video he had like 10 samplers but his beats were straight up trash. pFucck him.

Welcome to 2021. Every washed up 50 year old man reliving his run dmc glory days cashes in his stimulus checks for 3 samplers and thinks he's Dr. Dre. A bunch of Peter Pans.

Hey now... you're starting swing a little close to home Sense-A

Sense-A wrote:Some guy on facebook had a video he had like 10 samplers but his beats were straight up trash. pFucck him.

Welcome to 2021. Every washed up 50 year old man reliving his run dmc glory days cashes in his stimulus checks for 3 samplers and thinks he's Dr. Dre. A bunch of Peter Pans.

It's not about age or gear, but it's definitely about skills. Some people just like to collect, make beats, and that's it.