My MPC X became the world's most expensive MIDI Controller

I got my MPC X because I wanted to untether my MPC Renaissance from my Macbook Pro.

Returning to a standalone MPC since my former MPC-2000XL just made sense to me, because I didn't want to be chained to a computer screen anymore.

I even developed a system that worked for a while where I would start a beat off in standalone mode and then when the beat was at a certain point, I'd take it into controller mode where I would further expand my production using my extensive collection of plugins and virtual instruments.

This was efficient and it worked as it should, but then something changed.

I stopped sampling.

Why?

Content ID algorithms.

Check it out, I can chop, flip, and layer samples with the very best of them.

No cap, I'm nice.

Yeah muvaphuka, I said I'm nice, because I'm nice.

I'm from East Flatbush, Brooklyn where cap will get you phuked up if you front.

So when I say I'm nice, I mean it.

Anyway, I don't know if someone was reporting my videos, or if I was being targeted by these major label publishing arms, but I was getting strikes from Facebook's and YouTube's Content ID algorithms like crazy.

Sh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!t, I got dinged for a phuking snare drum.

This wasn't just annoying for me, it became a major impedance to my social media activities so I had to change my production style.

NO MORE SAMPLING!

Oddly enough, shortly after I made this conscious decision, MPC Sofware 2.8 with MIDI Multi was released. I was also in the middle of renovating my home studio and I ordered new MIDI controllers like my Alesis Drums Surge Mesh Kit, Akai EWI, and Mallet Kat.

I decided that if I'm not going to sample anymore, then I'm going to play my virtual instruments as they should be played, using MIDI controllers designed for those instrument types this way I get the best performance and feel.

When you hear vibes on my track that sound and feel like real vibes, it's because I played them with my Mallet Kat. My flutes and horns are played with my EWI, my Drums with my Surge Mesh Kit.

I'm creating original Boom Bap music.

Standalone mode doesn't allow for me to play the many kick, snares and cymbals Superior Drummer and BFD provide me.

Standalone mode doesn't let me take full advantage of UVI Falcon, SampleTank, or Kontakt.

Standalone mode as fun as it can be is very limiting in many ways for a serious composer and musician.

Controller mode has become my best friend.

I have the entire universe right before me in controller mode, there are no hindering blockades when creating a new composition. I have all the information right before me when I look at my MPC X's touchscreen and the OLEDs above my Q-Link encoders.

When I bought my MPC X, it was $2,200 plus tax.

It's a shame that MPC Software doesn't have certain features like multi-output instrument support, proper sidechaining, plugin delay compensation, to name a few, but I got skills, and I can work around these things.

I was supposed to unplug from my computer, now I'm attached to it, and I'm actually happy with my investment, despite some of its flaws, I realize that my MPC X is worth the money.

Even if it's the world's most expensive MIDI Controller...

So the ultimate question is "do I even need an actual MPC unit anymore?" I have been thinking about stand alone vs the software lately myself... i could sell the damn mpc, buy a 32bit soundcard and an mpd and i'd likely be better off.

Im actually tempted to build a new pc stick it in a rack mount case and slide it into my rack for just that purpose.

The pc isnt limited by ram, processor, storage, plugins etc etc etc. Why not just build my own MPC machine if they wanna give us the software? I could plug that pc into my tv and be alot more comfortable too...

I'm torn as to whether i should love the modern mpc or FKN HATE IT.

I dont do much sampling either, i try my best to generate new stuff with instruments. Have been doing it that way for 18 years or so. I like sampled music as an artform but it just isnt me. I like you enjoy a stash of hardware.

I do however use drum samples and one shots from the expansions quite a bit since i got my mpc though... i feel ashamed... where's the originality in that... i need to drum synth more.

I dont sample basically at all anymore. I used to make DNB as a kid, so I already knew about how sampling works and dealing with it regarding putting out music. I decided to write all my own with synths. I basically only use synthesizers with my mpcx. I will use 2-3 synths, and when i get to a point where the beat/song is sounding busy enough i will then export as a ALS into ableton.

These days i find i half work like that and half work with my synths going into ableton and my mpc's just on the side for my drum loops.

I have an mpclive2 aswell, and I use that for more standalone/sample based music. Alot of the time i record jam sessions into the mpc or ableton and then chop them up in the mpc.

I find at times i do not need the mpc but it really depends on my mood. Do I want to make a straight beat? then im hittin the mpc. If i want to do something more ambient or something more like a movie score than I will just use ableton.

I do not like vst's very much. I bout some last year and honestly could of used that money to find a Moog Subharmicon or a Mother32. I do not like the vst world much but I do use them after my hardware synths at times to bring in a different element.

I like the mpcs but I also think about selling them. I know I would miss them tho.

Right now I got only 4 tracks left on my computer to finish and then i gotta export another 20 beats out of the mpc into the computer to start that cycle again. BTW I dont feel very limited in the mpc. The only thing Im not too fond of is the way the record automation. I like the automation lanes in ableton more, they are alot smooth.

Things they should just add because its just common sense at this point...
-Visual EQ
-Proper Limiter
-MultibandCompressor
-Spectrum analyzer

Very hard to believe that these were never added with the screen we have on our mpcs.

Fre$hBreath wrote:I stopped sampling.

Why?

Content ID algorithms.

Fresh, if your samples are getting dinged for copyright infringement, no offense but - you're doing it wrong. You need to change and manipulate those samples so deep that they are unrecognizable. Either that, or clear your samples and pay for their use.

If sampling is your love and you're good at it, and you enjoy it, I absolutely would not stop. Just - change the way you sample.

EnochLight wrote:

Fre$hBreath wrote:I stopped sampling.

Why?

Content ID algorithms.

Fresh, if your samples are getting dinged for copyright infringement, no offense but - you're doing it wrong. You need to change and manipulate those samples so deep that they are unrecognizable. Either that, or clear your samples and pay for their use.

If sampling is your love and you're good at it, and you enjoy it, I absolutely would not stop. Just - change the way you sample.

Peace Enoch,

I’m not gonna engage in any back and forth with you on my sampling skills, but have you ever considered the fact that Artificial Intelligence plays a major role in the content ID algorithms which are based on the database provided to these social media platforms by ‘WhoSampled’?

Have you thought to inquire what exactly I got dinged for?

I will share with you this: I was never jammed up for anything I ever chopped, flipped, or layered, I however, got dinged for turntable scratches of rappers vocals, and that pesky snare drum which was the decision maker for me because it made me realize how advanced the algorithms being used are.

Also, I have very serious composition skills. I don’t really need to sample, and my production skills is beyond Boom Bap music.

No, cap, I’m nice, and I’m not ashamed to say so because it’s true.

And no I don’t battle…

Fre$h have you tried tracklib, and if you have did those samples get dinged also?

I’m a fellow Flatbush Head, closer to the junction.

Fre$hBreath wrote:
I’m not gonna engage in any back and forth with you on my sampling skills, but have you ever considered the fact that Artificial Intelligence plays a major role in the content ID algorithms which are based on the database provided to these social media platforms by ‘WhoSampled’?

This is in correct. WhoSampledWho, is a website, that uses people like you and I to tell them who's sample is in which song. They don't use any recognition programs. Think of it like Wikipedia.


The Social Media platforms use companies, who's primary purpose is to determine what songs are being played on in a particular video and/or song.

For example you can pay ACRCloud (acrcloud.com) $26 a month to listen to an mp3 or video link and it list all the artist name, track name , the album , label and ISCR catalogue number of every track was payed. The major labels and labels all use these cloud services for track recognition. ACRCloud is 1 company of a few dozen that does this.

Nobody cares about WhoSampledWho except for us music nerds...

When you got a copyright strike, did they give you the EXACT song you had sampled from. These technologies are not 100%. I get copyright strikes all the time on Soundcloud and they are from me and my instruments, no samples. You simply write them back and contest that there is any copyrighted material on it and they take the strike off and make the song playable again.

Fre$hBreath wrote:Peace Enoch,

I’m not gonna engage in any back and forth with you on my sampling skills, but have you ever considered the fact that Artificial Intelligence plays a major role in the content ID algorithms which are based on the database provided to these social media platforms by ‘WhoSampled’?

Have you thought to inquire what exactly I got dinged for?

I will share with you this: I was never jammed up for anything I ever chopped, flipped, or layered, I however, got dinged for turntable scratches of rappers vocals, and that pesky snare drum which was the decision maker for me because it made me realize how advanced the algorithms being used are.

Also, I have very serious composition skills. I don’t really need to sample, and my production skills is beyond Boom Bap music.

No, cap, I’m nice, and I’m not ashamed to say so because it’s true.

And no I don’t battle…

It's cool, man. I realize A.I. algo's are top notch these days, but I tend to manipulate my samples awash in effects and change pitch and chop so much that there is very little chance any algo will be able to knock them, if I published them publicly. I mean, you can't be the only one who has had trouble like this - have you talked to any of your contemporaries to see how they handle it?

It just bothers me that someone would have to literally change the way they make their art, just to avoid shit like that. If you love sampling, don't stop!

TrackLib is an awesome solution, but I wonder if you'd still get ding'd if you licensed your material? If so, you'd at least be able to fight it.

kaydigi wrote:Fre$h have you tried tracklib, and if you have did those samples get dinged also?

I’m a fellow Flatbush Head, closer to the junction.

The people from Tracklib approached me several times on Facebook about using their service. The thing is it doesn’t make sense for me a man who owns thousands of vinyl records.

Sampling is a blood sport for me, that comes from my being around turntable legends like Professor Paul, Howie Tee, Mixmaster Ice, and DJ Clark Kent to name a few.

Also again, I play several musical instruments.

As my graphic design partner GrafFritz would often say to me: “You’re like Prince, but without the blouse”.

You’re from around the way, right?

So you know the rules.

You’re gonna get Phuked up if you front or as the kids say today Cap.

So when I say that I’m nice, I mean that sh!t, I’m not trying to get my head flown over an untruth.

I’m nice, because I have to be.

You couldn’t be around the people I was rocking with if you didn’t have skills.

The legendary Professor Paul wouldn’t have allowed me into his basement to practice and spar with my now manager DJ AD (of Queen Latifah, and Fuschnikens) on his pink pair of 1200’s which Howie Tee customized himself if I didn’t have the skills.

Howie Tee wouldn’t never allowed me to borrow his beautiful custom built garage studio for an entire Summer to make the tracks I needed for my beat reel to secure my publishing deal with Midnight Music/Polygram if I wasn’t nice at what I do.

I’ve done a New Music Seminar Panel with Eddie Edmond, Large Professor, DJ Clark Kent. https://www.instagram.com/tv/CI5ECPYnsu ... =copy_link

I’m not new this, I’ve been employing musicianship into my music since my days working for Ted Currier on records for the Boogie Boys, Black Britain, and Tony Terry.

I’m telling you, I’m nice.

By the way the Flatbush and Nostrand Junction is comprised of the Vanderveer Park and Midwood neighborhoods.

I’m from the sector known as the “Dirty 30’s” in East Flatbush just outside of where Vanderveer Park begins.

I go way back when it was a majority were Irish and Italians fighting and stabbing each other every other weekend over bullsh!t to when the Jamaicans, Trinis, Panamanians, Guyanese, and Haitians took over due to “White Flight”.

My people who are still there tell me our sector is being gentrified like crazy and a white family originally from the Midwest now lives in the house I grew up in.

The last time I visited Brooklyn I saw a Target on the Junction where the parking lot my friends and I used ride our BMX bikes used to be.

Is the White Castle next to McDonalds still there?

We don’t got White Castle here on the West Coast.

Word life, I miss those little chicken sliders.

AG Productions which was a studio I used to work at with Bones Pikaso was right across the street from the White Castle and McDonalds on Nostrand.

Maaaan, we’d be working on music all into 3 or 4 in the morning and hit up that White Castle joint for food because they were open 24/7/52/365 and most importantly they were cheap!

That was a very long time ago, they probably replaced it with a shopping center or luxury apartment building by now….

renegadebliss wrote:

Fre$hBreath wrote:
I’m not gonna engage in any back and forth with you on my sampling skills, but have you ever considered the fact that Artificial Intelligence plays a major role in the content ID algorithms which are based on the database provided to these social media platforms by ‘WhoSampled’?

This is in correct. WhoSampledWho, is a website, that uses people like you and I to tell them who's sample is in which song. They don't use any recognition programs. Think of it like Wikipedia.


The Social Media platforms use companies, who's primary purpose is to determine what songs are being played on in a particular video and/or song.

For example you can pay ACRCloud (acrcloud.com) $26 a month to listen to an mp3 or video link and it list all the artist name, track name , the album , label and ISCR catalogue number of every track was payed. The major labels and labels all use these cloud services for track recognition. ACRCloud is 1 company of a few dozen that does this.

Nobody cares about WhoSampledWho except for us music nerds...

When you got a copyright strike, did they give you the EXACT song you had sampled from. These technologies are not 100%. I get copyright strikes all the time on Soundcloud and they are from me and my instruments, no samples. You simply write them back and contest that there is any copyrighted material on it and they take the strike off and make the song playable again.

Umm no, I NEVER used Whosampled and NEVER will because as it was explained to me by a good friend in the tech industry, 'WhoSampled' has a business-to-business subscription service where they sell access to their growing database to Major Labels and Social Media Platforms.

When YOU contribute to 'WhoSampled' YOU'RE helping these corporations kill our culture because YOU make it easier for the algorithms to get smarter.

I don't Fux with that 'WhoSampled' sh!t, don't lump me in with that sample snitching bullsh!t yo...

EnochLight wrote:

Fre$hBreath wrote:Peace Enoch,

I’m not gonna engage in any back and forth with you on my sampling skills, but have you ever considered the fact that Artificial Intelligence plays a major role in the content ID algorithms which are based on the database provided to these social media platforms by ‘WhoSampled’?

Have you thought to inquire what exactly I got dinged for?

I will share with you this: I was never jammed up for anything I ever chopped, flipped, or layered, I however, got dinged for turntable scratches of rappers vocals, and that pesky snare drum which was the decision maker for me because it made me realize how advanced the algorithms being used are.

Also, I have very serious composition skills. I don’t really need to sample, and my production skills is beyond Boom Bap music.

No, cap, I’m nice, and I’m not ashamed to say so because it’s true.

And no I don’t battle…

It's cool, man. I realize A.I. algo's are top notch these days, but I tend to manipulate my samples awash in effects and change pitch and chop so much that there is very little chance any algo will be able to knock them, if I published them publicly. I mean, you can't be the only one who has had trouble like this - have you talked to any of your contemporaries to see how they handle it?

It just bothers me that someone would have to literally change the way they make their art, just to avoid **** like that. If you love sampling, don't stop!

TrackLib is an awesome solution, but I wonder if you'd still get dinged if you licensed your material? If so, you'd at least be able to fight it.

First off, Nuff respect!

For me, sampling is a bloodsport.

There's also a personal factor to it.

Before I was forced to adapt to this new reality, I wanted my legacy to be known as a top sample-based producer in Boom Bap culture.

You have to understand my history in this music sh!t. https://www.thedaydreamsound.com/the-sa ... p-jg9za8ie

I'm a great creator, but not a great businessman.

Back in the '80s and '90s I literally went out of the way to avoid getting my picture taken at industry parties that I was sometimes forced to go to. I love the process of making music, but never really liked the business part. I never really wanted to be a part of all that, I like being in the studio and making dope music.

The studio was the party for me, I was in multimillion-dollar rooms working with the very best gear and learning from the best engineers making dope records.

That's what I cared about.

I helped numerous New York City musicians stay employed by hiring them on the labels dime to replay records I would sample or my original compositions and sometimes I was punished for it by corporatists like Peter Edge who was my A&R manager when I was signed to Full Force's Forceful Records/Warner Bros.

It's frustrating in a sense because I'm just as good as the people I was around, and I was lucky to witness Pete Rock (during a Busta Rhymes remix session at Greene Street Studios), Q-Tip (while working at Caliope Studios and Battery Studios), and DJ Premier (at D&D during the Group Home sessions while hanging out with Lil Dap and Guru) work in the studio through happenstance.

I'm just as good as any of those dudes, but no one will ever know because I never had the marketing machine that they have.

I didn't play the game as they said.

But once again I'm a musician who is not only a very bad man on the turntables, but I can play the drums, keys, guitar, bass, mallets, woodwinds, and brass.

This is due to my obsession with learning music.

Although I may assert the fact that I'm nice, because I am, I also refuse to proclaim myself a master, I consider myself an eternal music student.

My friend who is an actual scientist calls me a Boom Bap Scientist because of my obsession with music and applying myself to learn more about my craft.

I became SYNTH GOD because of my particular skills in that area, but I'm also DRUM GOD.


Like I said there's a deep complex history to all of this for me, but as I noted in my initial post, I'm not mad at how things turned out with my MPC X which is why I was poking fun at the fact that what I attempted to get away from ended up being my current reality due to outside circumstances.

Here's what's going to really bake your noodle, my new Isla Instruments S2400 is on the way, so what am I going to do with another sampler?

Sample me of course...

Fre$hBreath wrote:The people from Tracklib approached me several times on Facebook about using their service. The thing is it doesn’t make sense for me a man who owns thousands of vinyl records.

It makes 100% sense if you don't want to go through the hassle of properly licensing the content you're sampling from your thousands of vinyl records in a commercial release. I mean, just a thought? Wouldn't it be easier to do it through Tracklib? They do all of the licensing work for you.

Not only whosampled are snitches, its sites like here talking about it too. There will be someone or some bot learning our workarounds and shortcuts as you post them.

The algorithms of the sample-police has always been there since the introduction of software-based beat controllers. Thats why I refused the Renaissance at its first launch. Remember you could send Akai feedback through the program by accessing the happy smiley face. There could be a bot surveillancing the samples you put in there, know the sample paks you bought, monitored your movements sampling youtube. Thats why I was against the whole tethered-to-the-computer thing, they just want to micromanage our creativity.

My old trick was just to use old samplers, shift pitch tune the beat and record it to tape. But it seems they got wise to that a couple years back, so I been learning electric guitar since

EnochLight wrote:

Fre$hBreath wrote:The people from Tracklib approached me several times on Facebook about using their service. The thing is it doesn’t make sense for me a man who owns thousands of vinyl records.

It makes 100% sense if you don't want to go through the hassle of properly licensing the content you're sampling from your thousands of vinyl records in a commercial release. I mean, just a thought? Wouldn't it be easier to do it through Tracklib? They do all of the licensing work for you.

Not all items in Tracklib's system are as easy with the license as that to my understanding, I believe some of it entails further negoitiation and what you're actually doing is purchasing a preliminary license that makes it okay for you to perform the action of sampling in te first step, but you still have to get the sampling cleared before releasing your performance commercially or posting to social media.

I prefer to avoid the hassle overall and compose my own music and sample myself.

I'm telling you, I'm nice.

I know how to make an instrument sound and most importantly feel like it was recorded in 1961, sampled in 1991, and mixed in 2021.

I got the skills to literally pay the bills because I'm nice.

I'm not someone who just quit their day job a few weeks ago after watching a few YouTube videos to make beats, I've been making records since the Boogie Boys.

I've worked in nearly all the best studios in New York City during the '80s and '90s and early '00s before I moved out here to the West Coast. I bought my house based on my musical skills because I'm nice.

I have no regrets about giving up on sampling because even though I'm far more advanced than most sample-based producers I've ever heard, I've piqued over a decade ago because I've exercised every thinkable method that could exist.

This is due to my being obsessive with the process.

What kept me going is the blood sport of it all.

I wanted to have a certain legacy that I now realize doesn't matter anymore.

My new mission is to create new Boom Bap music with the sonic aesthetic of a sample.

I got the dopest tools and I'm nice with my production skills.

I'm going to be okay...

Ill-Green wrote:Not only whosampled are snitches, its sites like here talking about it too. There will be someone or some bot learning our workarounds and shortcuts as you post them.

The algorithms of the sample-police has always been there since the introduction of software-based beat controllers. Thats why I refused the Renaissance at its first launch. Remember you could send Akai feedback through the program by accessing the happy smiley face. There could be a bot surveillancing the samples you put in there, know the sample paks you bought, monitored your movements sampling youtube. Thats why I was against the whole tethered-to-the-computer thing, they just want to micromanage our creativity.

My old trick was just to use old samplers, shift pitch tune the beat and record it to tape. But it seems they got wise to that a couple years back, so I been learning electric guitar since

Maaaaan, I've been playing my Stratocaster a lot lately!

I mean phuking lot!

https://twitter.com/I_Am_SYNTH_GOD/stat ... 9466159104

I use the Fishman TriplePlay Connect to control my large collection of physical modeled and hyper-sampled virtual guitars because I don't have space for nearly 300 guitars and basses in my studio but when you play these physical modeled and hyper-sampled virtual guitars from an actual guitar your mind will be blown away by the realism you experience especially if you have all the best guitar amp and cabinet simulators to your avail.

Technology is so dope!