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Few years old but OMG



Good interview with the manufacturer here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVUW1VqkGMw

Sounds sweet
I'm curious how does it synthesize the transient part of the kick drum. Isn't that just a sample?

Not really a proper tech head, so can't answer that. But the guy who made it in the second link goes through his products in depth, showing the different PCBs that go into each one, if that helps?

I've owned an MBase 11. Amazing percussion synth. It can do a bit more than kick drums...bass hits...tune percs like tom toms...really intuitive despite the lack of knobs. Don't pay 350 for one...I pages like 200 for mine. Pretty sure the transient isn't a sample. The more impressive one is the MBrane...which does more snare like sounds...the amount of control you get is really impressive. But as far as end product goes the time spent on the MBase making an 808ish kick didn't yield anything sonicallyn superior to a gold baby sample. If you are going all hardware and want to link this to am electribe via midi its a beast

It also has a two octive range so you could program baselines or make your kick a melodic element

This is the most praised kick module ever built. The initial attack is probably just noise.

I had an xbase for a while, that thing produced some scary kicks as well. Sequencer was great too.

AxeD wrote:This is the most praised kick module ever built. The initial attack is probably just noise.

I had an xbase for a while, that thing produced some scary kicks as well. Sequencer was great too.

Yes Jomox is pretty much the tits when it comes to drum synths

Ive been wanting one of those for ages... could never afford/justify it... but man, does it make some sexy kicks....

Mad EP wrote:Ive been wanting one of those for ages... could never afford/justify it... but man, does it make some sexy kicks....

I loved it when I owned one, but I couldn't justify it. There is really no difference to my ear between my Gold Baby M.Base samples and what I could do with the M.Base. 1s and 0s, analog. It sounded the same.

I even set up my rig to trigger digital versions of my patches through my monitors, then I'd trigger the M.Base itself run into the same monitors. No difference. If you could get one for really cheap...like 150...I'd say go for it...or if you are running some kind of live PA... if I were doing some kind of live Techno thing, I'd love to have one of these in the setup.

One thing to keep in mind is this also uses X Trigger, not just MIDI...which may or may not be a useful tidbit.

If I had an extra 400 laying around, I wouldn't mind having the M.Brane in the studio for a while, it gives you a surprising amount of control for sculpting snare type sounds. But honestly, I've probably got 300 awesome snare sounds on my HD.

Jomox also make the Xbase999 drum machine which is famous for it's kick drums sounds too. Barker and Baumecker used it on their album on Ostgut Ton a lot. As well as now including a Dave Smith Tempest in their live sets it seems.

They talk about it here http://www.residentadvisor.net/feature.aspx?1642

So what can this do that you couldn't do on a normal synth?

This looks really cool, never done any analog synthesis of drums myself. I programmed a drum synth (not a VST and it had no graphic interface ) once.

Simulant wrote:So what can this do that you couldn't do on a normal synth?

It's hardware with a hands on way of creating sounds which is always nice.

Then as any synth does it has it's own characteristic sound wise and synth architecture.

It's not that it does something new. It's about how it does it and how it sounds

wolf89 wrote:

Simulant wrote:So what can this do that you couldn't do on a normal synth?

It's hardware with a hands on way of creating sounds which is always nice.

Then as any synth does it has it's own characteristic sound wise and synth architecture.

It's not that it does something new. It's about how it does it and how it sounds

I agree with the hands on part, but do you really think this sounds different enough from 808/909 samples...or hell M.Base samples (as both Wave Alchemy and Gold Baby offer packs with M. Base kicks) to make it worth it for the average producer? I mean, let's face it, at some point your tunes are going to turn into 1's and 0's anyway.

I'm all for analog synths and gear. I believe they tend to have more character than *most* VSTs. But...after spending a year with my M.Base I just wasn't convinced I was getting anything out of it I couldn't get from the samples I had purchased or those I'd recorded.

I'm not sure what I'm trying to say. I'm probably just bored.

Don't know I've not used it. However using samples of it gives you no control over it really. I mean watch the video and you can see he's changing the sound. Using a sample only gives you the control offered by your sampler and vst effects rather than the instrument.

I mean I'm talking about it as a more general thing as to why you could buy a drum machine rather than use sample packs as I haven't used this one specifically.

Personally with Jomox I'd rather have the Xbase999 over this as this does only really do one thing but nevermind.

wolf89 wrote:Don't know I've not used it. However using samples of it gives you no control over it really. I mean watch the video and you can see he's changing the sound. Using a sample only gives you the control offered by your sampler and vst effects rather than the instrument.

I mean I'm talking about it as a more general thing as to why you could buy a drum machine rather than use sample packs as I haven't used this one specifically.

Personally with Jomox I'd rather have the Xbase999 over this as this does only really do one thing but nevermind.

Fair point! I can't really argue with that.

And if I'm honest I'd love to have one of their full on drum machines : )

I'd love a 999 as well, but in that price range I'd probably get a Tempest.

Looking at a Quasimidi 309 this week. Think I'll pick that up. Seems to be great money/value.
I mean it's not of great quality, but at least I can make some acid stuff with one analogue unit.
Then I'll start looking for a decent mixer and some pedal fx.

just sounded like a kick sample pack to me...

$350 for some kick drums! looooooooool you'd need a screw loose to spend that sort of money, tons and tons of samples online, plus you can make your own with ANY synth!

wot duz transient mean?

Paddy McMurphy wrote:$350 for some kick drums! looooooooool you'd need a screw loose to spend that sort of money, tons and tons of samples online, plus you can make your own with ANY synth!

You are just making trouble everywhere aren't you?

Take the cactus nearest to you