Key Of Grey

Photo courtesy of Native Instruments

March 22nd, 2009 – One of the big products to be revealed at NAMM was Native Instruments’ Maschine. Basically it has its own hardware, 5 gigs of onboard samples, built-in effects, and transport controls. It can also be used as a MIDI controller for such software as Ableton. Of course, the feature everyone is most interested in, is the drum pads. Could this take over the MPC as the modern producer’s go-to gear?

The videos I’ve seen of it are certainly impressive. The speed at which the users are able to create cohesive beats (it is designed for hiphop, and electronic music), is dramatic. I would imagine that it doesn’t take much time to get used to using the Maschine, and at around $700 US many will take the plunge. Future Music magazine has a Vimeo video of the Freemasons who were one of the first to get a unit. To me, the best feature I saw in the video was the ability to add effects to 3 different “layers” of sounds. You can add effects to one pad, you can add them to the entire bank (of which you have 8 possible), and you can add them to the master mix. For the money, it seems to be a pretty good solution, and its ability to work apart from the built-in software as a plain old MIDI controller makes it all the more enticing.

Maschine via Synthtopia