62HP beats groovebox

Hello,

I wonder if someone could give me some advice regarding a new modular setup.

I've had a larger modular setup for a few years, working in conjunction with an Octatrack. TBH I've struggled to get as much out of the modular setup as I would like, certainly in comparison to a "simpler" machine like a Digitone. I think this is because the modular is "boundless" - I seem to spend my whole time rebuilding it, rather than accepting its limitations and working with it.

To this end, for 2022 I've decided to split it up into more "playable" units (Intellijel 62HP) which will focus on doing one thing well and one thing only (rather in the spirit of the Perfect Circuit 54 series)

I'm going to start with beats -

Some of this stuff I already have (generally the voice stuff - Befaco, Erica Pico) and some is new (the sequencing side - Grayscale, Euclidian), for which I took heavy inspiration from @mylarmelodies -

What I want to know is - does this setup make sense, as a beat focused groovebox ?

• I want minimum three voices (kick vs Kickall, snare/hats via Pico VCO and Perfcall, claps and glitches via Pico Drum)

• on the sequencing side, I want the box to be able to generate interesting stuff on a standalone basis, and not always be triggered by the Octatrack; in particular I want Euclidian style rhythms (almost opted for 2 Euclid modules)

And questions -

• what are the best 1u module options for a box like this ? (I have zero experience of 1U and simply copied Mylar here)

• MIDI is very important; although my initial use case is standalone or simply clocking via the Octatrack, I want to retain the option of driving the box fully via the Octatrack, including modulation via MIDI CC messages or other

Am I missing any tricks here ?

Many thanks in advance :)

EDITED Jan 4th 2022, 20:34

Sorry, I can't help you, as I've avoided drums in my rack, but I did want to take the opportunity to make the pun, "106hp beats that".

I think you might find this a frustrating exercise as 62HP is just too small, I'd at least go to their 104 HP palette, but I thought I'd give it a shot anyway. So, voila!

1) Pam over Algorhythm, no question here at all even if you lose some manual control it does a ton PLUS euclidean so we get several HP back and lots more triggers.
2) Swapped a Disting EX for the Erica FX, it does so much it's silly.
3) Swapped a 1U pique and a Duatt for the Quadratt, your Percall can already do mixing (1 and 2 + 3 and 4 are normalled) and Pique is a great module that does a ton and it will be a secret weapon here to add modulation and character
4) Added Ladik's quantized 4 step sequencer to make things more melodic, but kept the other one as well for things like chord progressions (using your disting as a precision adder for example) or controlling euclidean rhythms on the Pam (Pam channel set to / 64 triggers the Ladik non-quantized sequencer which then feeds back into Pam's CV input1 which you can set to adjust euclidean offset, count, etc)
5) Added a System X ADSR cause it rules and you don't want only AR envelopes, and it means you won't always be using one channel on the Pique for that.

Hope this helps!

EDITED Jan 2nd 2022, 21:19

Wow great colour - so much to digest. Thanks so much for taking the time to reply :)

You can totally make a cool groove box in 62, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise! I've got a percall-based drum rack in 48hp and it rules.

I think the pallette case only has 12 headers (probably you can extend somehow, but not sure), so that might be a limitation.

my notes w/ it:

-The kickall looks badass, but you can make a pretty sweet kick w/ a vco + percall + attenuation if you wanted to save a module. If you ran the envelope out from the percall into the pitch of the VCO w/ some attenuation you can get a good kick timbre.
-I do white noise for 'hats' channels 3/4 and combo a mult of it with the pico vco for a snare (which sounds good).
-A simple drum machine w/ percall could be: VCO + Pico VCO + Percall + Attenuation + White Noise + Triggers. a module like the Junction (or a triplatt, etc.) can mix the noise and do the attenuation. For this i went with:
- Percall / 1u VCO / Pico VCO / Noise Tools (which can be the sample and hold and a slew!) / Junction
- with the 1U midi, that leaves 43hp and four headers of room for whatever sequencing, voice, effects you are interested in! The pico drums could hop back in as well.
Trigger Sequencing: There are tons of ways to go. I like things that you can 'mute' to make it for fun to play, so i'd go with something like a Tempi, Permutation, or a Running Order. I put in the Maestro, which I haven't tried, but think it'd be cool in this set-up, given that it can trigger or make complex (and mutable) modulation
-Just to 'finish it off' I also put a domino as a voice and a Milky Way for effects (and mixing). For cv sequencing the domino, i thought quantizing (the disting) a LFO (attenuated by the junction) from the maestro would be good way to get melodic cv.

-Other cool sequencing options I could see: Marbles (which would be another way to get melodic cv) and the Kompass for drums. Though, these don't have 'mutes'.
-Honorable Mention: Dark Matter. Running percall into that is pretty savage.

I think i'd prob have fun with this:

https://cdn.modulargrid.net/img/racks/modulargrid_1819734.jpg

EDITED Jan 26th 2022, 03:08

Actually, you can make a very workable one in LESS than 62 hp + tiles. The build below is designed for a 4ms 48X Pod:

Temps Utile for basic sequencing/clock, Delptronics LBD-2 set which contains a number of classic electro-style circuits, Doepfer Quad Decay to give percussive envelopes off to the Mazzatron Quad Lowpasses, which can process up to four of the drum sounds from the LBD-2, then this all gets mixed down to mono with an Erogenous Tones Levit8, and the mix then has a Zlob 3-band "tone stack"-type EQ at then end to manually emphasize various different timbral accentuations.

Pretty easy, really. Took all of 10 minutes. HOWEVER...with the Pod, this would run you over $1k. And THAT is one of the big reasons why drums belong in drum machines.

EDITED Jan 26th 2022, 04:31

I bought a 1010Music BitBox. It responds on up to 16 triggers, or I can avoid the mess using MIDI (some sequencers output MIDI as well as CV). There are four outputs so it's decent for separating my outs if I need that. I can add new samples to the SD card, and with a little bit of XML editing on NotePad++, I can quickly put together whatever I need and avoid doing things slowly on the front panel.

I have some other stuff capable of percussion like the BIA... but sample playback seems to offer the most bang for the buck. There are plenty of samplers and ROMplers out there. You don't have to go with BitBox. But I would just rather sink resources into other areas besides percussion.

EDITED Feb 27th 2023, 07:09

I have my drums setup in a 64hp 4ms Pod. Currently it looks like this...

But I am not super happy with it. It requires external clock input and while Kompass is pretty great it only has three triggers out and I need more than that so I am still pulling more triggers and gates from Pams in my main case.

This is the dream that will eventually be reality.

The Shakmat Clock O Pawn is awesome and the Time Wizard is great too and provides all the triggers I would need and is super playable. I have really liked what I have heard/seen from the Prok drums and I have one Disting mk4 for samples and one for effects. The vortices mixer is overkill, but the feedback looping you can do with it is crazy. Ochd is just there to modulate things. The only thing I am missing is a way to sidechain the kick.

I LOVE Palette challenges! This is a rig I did and yeah it's for techno, but there's a way to set up Pam's so that you can use the CV in to change the loop length and you effectively end up with Turing Machine style generative patterns. Couple that with Euclidean for some fun. Add a Ladik Dual Probability Skipper for even more variation. You can also use Pam's in the same way to generate quantized CV patterns!

Also, for 1U take a look at the Mosaic 1U drums...they are really good. I use the Bass Drum and their Low Pass as a sub bass sometimes in addition to normal drum duties.

I would just stick in a Squid Salmple and Pams for starters and then go from there. Probably as much modulation I could cram into the remaining space.