> he's showing how placing different objects on the resonators changes their tone
"Have you ever thought re-patching your modular synth was too easy? Here, now your drum machine can be even harder to recreate the sound you liked last week!"
A joke, but was immediately what jumped out as scary. Not gonna lie, looks like a fun machine, but for that money, I tend to buy stuff I can use and recall old patches with. Although except for the modular obviously :/
You nailed it. Cool idea. Nice design. Great demo. Fun toy.
I'm sure I'd have a good time playing with it for an afternoon and come up with some sounds I like. And, in principle, I'm all for more ways to create music existing - especially ones which are interactive and tactile. But the reality is, if I bought this device it would end up spending most of its time in the basement graveyard with all the other cool tools that are too narrow, too big, too hard to interface, store/recall patches, etc.
I decided several years ago to refocus on a stack that's purely microphone (or other a/d converted input) + MIDI controllers to a DAW driving infinite layers of internal real-time digital synthesis, analog modeling and effects plug-ins. There are fabulously expressive MPE (MIDI Polyphonic Expression) controllers now which can capture every nuance of input my hands, feet and breath could ever provide. As you highlighted, the feeling that creating in a digital audio workstation is "too easy" or maybe somehow 'soulless' - is all in my head. That lurking suspicion analog circuitry or electro-mechanical waveforms are more authentic or pure is just magical thinking.
Always believing that the next new box's cool-looking tactile input, novel interaction model or unique set of opinionated constraints will unleash my creativity - is just getting in the way of actually sitting down and making myself create with all the insanely powerful, wildly creative, infinitely flexible, hyper-productive digital tools I already have. Being able to save and recall entire racks worth of patching at the press of a button isn't soulless or limiting - unless I let it be. Feeling like I need just-one-more new device to inspire me with its defaults or constrain me with its limits - is the limiting constraint I finally realized was holding me back.
You can change the actual resonator shape (it says it comes with 3 different shapes) to affect their sound. Like actually unscrew them and screw different ones on. Since this is just a piece of metal I see endless hacking opportunities here.
What an insightful comment. I've always considered art as something that can't be recreated, as it involves the state of mind the creator was at the time of creating it. I would worry no more about recreating a sound on this synth as I would recreating the exact pitch of an acoustic guitar I made last year.
Your take is obviously a valid one though. I just find it infinitely interesting how there can be so many valid viewpoints about something like this.