Need some help with equipment, kaossilator pro, kp3 or sp 40

[pelle]

Hello, I'm a psy/goa trance addict that would need some tips from some of you guys or girls that make electronic music. I am a REAL newbie so help me out eh?

For a few months ago I bought a korg kaossilator (a dynamic phrase synthesizer) and I started doing some tunes on it, I think its great for making small loops but I lack some things:

• Playing music that is longer than 16 beats without restarting/clearing the song
• Modifying the sound in various ways since
• Better sound quality, compared to the drum/synth/general sounds in a normal song a kaossilator sounds much worse

What I want is some solution so I can play:

• equipment that doesnt need a computer or screen
• that I can play the music live without pre recorded stuff, just start playing. This is mainly because I love to just sit with some friends and take turns to make some tunes.
• I would rather not use a keyboard but prefer to use the arpeggio functions since its faster, but I can play a bit... (or is it needed?)

I am not interested in programs like Abelton live or Fruity Loops, since I dont particulary enjoy sitting in front of my computer when making music, neither do I think that it should take such time. I like the "on the fly" way much better.

Then I started to research different "sound machines", like in this song the guy uses a kaossilator, kp3 and sp 404 to make good tunes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdyZNm8U7dE
I think he uses the kaossilator to give sound, and as a synth using the arpeggio. Then he uses the sp 404 to save clips of the song (since its a sampler) and the kp3 to modify the sound.

Since I aim to make music that has the same style as my favourite artists like shpongle, kraftwerk and astral projection I think I would need a mixer/effects sampler to make the different goatrance sound "morphs" and also a sampler to make something longer than a few seconds and to join different parts of a song. It also seems I would need to either get a kaossilator pro because I dont particulary like the kaossilators sound quality.

The question I have for you is:

• Is my assumption that all three equipment types are needed to make EDM music?
• And is there any alternative gear in the approx same price class? (each of these components costs about 350USD)
• Do you have any experience with the quality of these equipments?(sound quality)
• Some of these products have overlapping functions, is there any way to avoid that?
• Does the kp3 support mixing of each of the four tracks individually?
  Can I adjust the volume on each unit individually?

[ellaguru]

in order to make trance/house/techno a nice and cheap alternative is the roland grooveboxes (check mc303/505/307) and the korg electribes (emx, em, etc), they don't sample but you can create your own drums+synths+bass beats and coltroll them with fx,lfo,mute,filters etc in real time.

[pelle]

Hello and thanks for the answer ellaguru!

Since my music vocabulary sucks I decided to throw up a small page with the sounds that I would like to make with my future "musicstudio" when playing around.

I recorded some bits from some trance songs and put them up on http://gambit.0sites.net/music/
And if you know the proper terminology for the sounds just tell me.

You gave me the very nice idea of looking into the grooveboxes, they seem to be the "professional" version of a kaossilator, and I like it alot.
It is hard for me to find the old mc 303/505/307 since they are on the used market and I live in Sweden, but the EMX1 is in my local store for a reasonable price.

But how does the EMX1 compare to the sounds of the oldschool MC 303 (I listened to it and LOVED IT!)

And you say that the kor electribes don't sample but http://www.korg.com/product.aspx?pd=158 says that it has a sequencer, isnt that almost the same as a sampler?

Im also quirious if the EMX1 has any special effects like the KP3 since that would be perfect, or do you recommend getting "fx,lfo,mute,filters" <-- I dont really know what they are...

[ellaguru]

hi again
if your pourpose is to make that sort of music, then i think that the grooveboxes/electribes (but also the yamaha rmx1 and the dx or an 200 too) are ok for you.
the mc303/505/307 (and also the ugly roland d2 that i got) got almsot the same sort of system and sound. the got many sounds of the '90 (d'n'b, trip hop, techno, jungle etc).
the emx1 is relatively younger and maybe more techno trance oriented in sounds. other differenc is that the emx1 is only monophonic (with 5 synth parts) but i would like to hear other cats about it...also about the effects question comparing to the KP3...

the "fx,lfo,mute,filters " thing is the way you can groove or add variations to those sounds , with mute/unmute tracks, filtering parts or knobing the LFO (Low frequency oscillator), or effecting the sounds...other variations the grooveboxes/electribes can offer are the arpeggio and the groove quantize (i talk about the roland machines, don't know about the emx1)...

one advice:
download the manuals of those machines in order to make you a little culture, hear many examples in sounds (not all the youtube examples 'cause they are not the real sounds, check some mp3) and then choose the best for you...

ps
it's hard to find one of those machines new in a shop, maybe the electribes is more easy to find new, the other one (the mc303 is from the 1996...) are harder, so check ebay or other sites....

ps2
the sequencer is the fact that the machine (a sampler, a drummachine or a groovebox) can "sequence" sounds in line with the patterns you write: with that you can perform songs/tracks scrolling the patterns you have compose before...for ex: a song could be composed by 3 or 4 patterns and the inner sequencer make you be able to play/perform those patterns (bass+synth+drums for ex) properly...

[pelle]

Hello again.

I just wanted to say that I bought my EMX-1 a few days ago and I feel
very happy with it! Thank you for the great advice and.

When I came home with the Box I felt like a little boy again playing with my new toy
Sitting there and testing out all the settings was pure joy, and the machine sounds soo nice compared to my kaossilator, I am so happy that I asked on the net before buying since I wouldnt have found out this machine without you guys!

I already managed to get some groovy tunes together and I like to work with the EMX-1.

[ellaguru]

cool!
hope you enjoy yourself with and try to post some sounds too!