The MPC 2000. The 2000XL. The 500. These old Akai boxes inspired countless live sets – and many devoted fans still make them the centerpiece of their rigs.
But Akai abandoned the standalone hardware market for years. Native Instruments came along with Maschine, making the hardware just a controller for software running on a computer. And the MPC lost its place as the machine synonymous with the drum machine/sampler device.
Now, that looks set to change. Akai is back in the standalone hardware business with a new angle – get all the capabilities of a computer, running the same software, but without having to have a computer plugged in at all. And that goes up against Elektron’s own new standalone hardware – and Native Instruments’ own mature Maschine lineup back on the computer.
The toughest audience for the new MPC, then, has got to be those dedicated Akai MPC users. Ideally, you’d find some who are still using the older MPC onstage. And, ideally, they’d be German – well, partly because criticism sounds cooler than in English, and partly because of Germany’s wonderful culture of being honest, reflective, and articulate with opinions.
Berlin videojournalists did just that, and took the flagship Akai MPC X to the trio FJAAK (on Monkeytown Records). The result is exactly the sort of hands-on review I’d want to see – thorough, personal, musical.
They take a hard look at the “best-equipped MPC of all time.” (That sounds fair.) They express some reservations about all those expanded capabilities, but give the unit a great shakedown.
(Don’t worry – English subtitles.)
I think it’s nice to contrast this with the more limited approach (and smaller price and form factor) of the Elektron Digitakt.
For me, I’m still holding out for some quality time with the MPC Live, which seems to nicely bridge what you want in a standalone device with what you want in software (and works as conventional software/controller when your computer is connected). But the MPC X is big, beautiful, and a nice option if you’ve got the budget.
More:
http://www.akaipro.com/product/mpc-x
As a German native I have to say that the subtitles don’t convey the true spirit of the conversation. A lot of filler words like ‘like’, ‘huge’ and ‘awesome’ have been omitted. Jesus, I just can’t listen to these guys. Though I like the idea of a review panel.
I didn’t mind them so much, though bringing in artists is always a challenge.
Yeah, I’ve noticed that – the quality of subtitles is often not so strong. I don’t fault the people doing the subs – more likely there just isn’t the necessary time and resources to do this properly. It’s funny actually they didn’t do the interview in English given most stuff for Electronic Beats is.
I’m open to some new ideas here. This was fun to watch for me because I’m a fan of the artists. But I have a general resistance to video (as a writer first), and … I’d love to see us come up with better ways of doing stuff. This is obviously more important to CDM as a tech/practitioner publication than EB as a more general music publication, so … that’s on us to figure out.
Got my MPC Live last week, and while I love it I think that it still needs a bit of work. Makes sense considering they are still calling the MPC 2.0 a BETA. There are things that are just missing (using it as a Mutlitimbral instrument, being able to send MIDI over the USB ports, editing MIDI CC in standalone) that I am hoping makes it into software upgrades….especially since much of it you can do on a MPC 1000 with JJOS. That said, the hardware is awesome, the workflow in standalone is awesome, and the addition of things like clips and a looper is cool for live performance. Plus being able to bust it out anywhere (like when I’m sitting around waiting on my daughter’s basketball practice) is a game changer.
When you say multitimbral, do you mean having instruments with multiple sample layers/splits across keys, or just polyphonic playing of samples?
Very interested in your thoughts.
No, I mean unique instruments, or in the case of MPC 2.0, it would be the different programs you have assigned to your tracks. When MPC 2.0 is receiving MIDI data from another sequencer, it just sends it to what ever track you have MIDI selected. With multi-timrbral synths/samplers you can access multiple tracks programs/patches (usually 16) at the same time by assigning them a MIDI channel.
Aah, I see what you mean. That is a bit of a shame. It’s especially nice when live to have a midi keyboard connected on one instrument, and still be able to go into various tracks and make edits etc, but i guess it would always be following what track you have focussed. Or are you talking about the PC software instead of the live itself. Sorry I think I am a dumb.
What he talking about is a feature that has been standard on this type of instrument since the 1980’s there is NO EXCUSE for putting something on the market that can’t even get the basics right.
When you say multitimbral, do you mean having instruments with multiple sample layers/splits across keys, or just polyphonic playing of samples?
Very interested in your thoughts.
You shouldn’t have bought it if it doesn’t do that basic stuff. People like you are the reason manufacturers think it’s OK to release unfinished and malfunctioning product.
Shame on you and everyone else that supports shoddy manufacturers
When it comes to making music and maybe creativity in general I believe strongly in a hybrid approach to creating, utilizing both good tech advancements while maintaining good solid methods and practices from the past that worked and continue to work so I find always find it a little ‘I don’t know what the word is’ when people describe maschine as the current/future or state of the art so to say and describe the mpc series as more of an out dated/obsolete or possibly not as necessary platform to work with…. None of the legacy mpcs can run vst applications so of course I would never make a comparison of the two based on that, I would however compare what they they both do do , and in that vein I find the legacy mpcs staggeringly non-obsolete…. if I said that one of these instruments can sequence tempo changes, record mutes, sequence time signature changes, convert multiple midi sequences into one/ midi merge, record sysex dumps and a plethora of other like features which one of the two would a typical user looking for the state of the art think I’m talking about?……. they certainly wouldn’t think it was the mpc, and if I told them that I was talking about the paltry mpc 500 of all mpcs being able to do things that they have to leave the maschine environment and go into logic or ableton to accomplish, something as simple as automating the tempo they surely wouldn’t believe it. I personally enjoy using maschine for it’s strengths but I do think that native instruments really does ride a niche wave of user bias against the mpc while at the same time not being able to do so many things that the mpc is capable of and allowing their user base to believe that these features are features that you only get in DAWs when these are the standard features of so-called obsolete groove boxes. I wonder what the people in the video would say if they were interviewed about the issue in this regard.
The whole business is based on BS’ing the consumer, I have a yamaha QY70, which is a little MIDI sequencer from 20 years ago.
It does twice as much as any sequencer on the market today, absolutely destroys any of the Arturia junk, it makes the Octatrack look like a toy, Then of course an MPC1000 or 2500 w/ JJOS is still the gold standard, not only not obsolete but actually makes newer gear look obsolete next to it.
And the MPC500 is still one of the best kept secrets in music, it was so funny listening to people whine for years for something with it’s exact feature set, then they went out and bought Beat Steps! HAHA!!
I like this for the same reason I like a lot of the Nick Batt reviews, lots of information about how it feels to use, rather than a list of features. Thanks for that, though now I kind of want one to be the heart of the studio when I didn’t have much interest before.
Do the new MPCs let you mixdown a performance as a stereo and/or stems?
this video kind of seems like a long ad for the product and the things they say are fairly obvious. as a collector of classic MPC’s if i had cash burning a hole in my pocket i would totally get this and or the MPC LIVE, the fact is all of these instruments lead you down different roads, it’s crazy how i’ll kind of approach something different on the 2000 than i do on the 3000, there’s just a feel thing, slightly different workflows. and Elektron boxes absolutely do this, the work flow leads you in very distinct directions, the Octatrack for instance really makes it’s mark on you more than you make your mark on it. so the hard part on your bank account is the fact that when you ask which one should you buy, the MPC or Elektron box the answer is both because they’ll lead you to different places. anyway, there’s my mini blog post crouching under your blog post Peter. 🙂
In case some of you haven’t caught on…..YOU DON’T NEED THIS, You don’t need a MACHINE you don’t need the latest version of Ableton or Bitwig you don’t need DSI’s Prophet 6 or Rev 2 you Don’t need an Octatrack……All you need is WHAT YOU ALREADY HAVE (If you already have the stuff I mentioned then great), These things are toys that will cause you to make LESS music, all this crap about “workflow” and such was invented in a marketing firm’s board room to convince you to buy things you ALREADY HAVE so you can re-learn to do things you already know how to do. Here’s an idea: BUY NOTHING FOR A YEAR, if you NEED to buy something it will be obvious (computer or tape machine breaks, synth or guitar gets stolen old MPC breaks down ect.) but other than that, show these marketing firms you aren’t as stupid and easy to manipulate as they think.
MPCX is the biggest pile of disappointment I have ever used. Unstable, unfinished and unintuitive. Lots of features missing for a “modern” sampler, all these buttons and still most basic operations require a ton of menu diving. In a word, this is a frustrating piece of kit aimed purely at sample chopping hip hop producers.