Max Ventura Posted April 30, 2001 Share Posted April 30, 2001 The DISMA Music show ends tomorrow. The new trade show area is twice as big as NAMM. Everybody is here except GeneralMusic, Novation and the small, analogue brands. This is quite a big show in Europe. I won't cover software or computer-based stuff, as I dont give a damn about it and I unsderstand little of it. EMU wasn't able to bring their desktop modules yet. They have no clue as to when they'll arrive. They do have a Proteus Custom, though, which is basically an empty shell for EMU expansion cards. Very smart. I predicted this earlier this year. Yamaha was showcasing the new Motif workstation (which, to me is just a restyled EX-5 on steroids but just as cryptic) and the new grooveboxes AN-200 and DX-200, which, also, I did not particularly like because of their stiff and grainy sounds and infuriating interface. Their new sampling groovesequencer, RS-7000, is also on display, and it's basically a RM1X groovebox with an added A-4000 sampling engine. That is certainly gonna topple MPC 2000 off the top shelf. Roland has yet another groovesampler on display, the SP-505, which is an hybrid of the MC-303 and the SP-808 housed in a BR-8 case. It's cute and it's probably great live. I was REALLY impressed by the VS-2480 audio workstation. It outputs a shitload of screenshots on a standard computer monitor, it makes look Cubase 5 like a freeware. The possibilities are vast, and it's solid as a rock and steady as a train, you can almost do realtime scratching on it. The day it'll do MIDI, it'll do at least 64 tracks of audio, and it'll read plug-ins from CD-Roms, you'll say bye to computer setups. Akai's DPS 24 is similar, but it did impress me less, visually speaking. Akai has a new analog filter, called MFC, which has a mono and a stereo section, and it looks somewhat like one of the Electrix filter modules. Waldorf has the Micro-Q as keyboard, now, although that was only a beta, and they plan tho ship it early in Autumn. The Waldorf chief programmer, Wolfram Franke, who also did the PPG Wave TDM plug-in, is a friend of mine. About 28 yr. old, thin and dyed blond, with a lunatic look in his eyes, he looks like Bowie in his middle '70 Thin White Duke/ Nazi stage. Last nite we went to dinner with other guys and he got roaring drunk. And he never wants to listen to my suggestions. I keep telling him to get rid of the endless pots on his synths and put regular knobs instead... Korg has the Karma, which did not impress anybody also because, for that sort of price, they should have fitted a better keyboard in it, and the new Electribe M: if you have $ 400 to spare, buy one of those. It smashes any other techno devices you can think of, either as a drum machine and as a monosynth generator. I will post again tomorrow. If you need me to look for anything specific, ask me today on this thread (I'll look at it tonite my time, and I'm 6 hours ahead of New York) as tomorrow is the last day. Ciao Max Max Ventura, Italy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anderton Posted April 30, 2001 Share Posted April 30, 2001 If you describe the general mood of the show and trends as well as gear, that would be great. What's getting people excited? What kind of music is dominating? That sort of thing. Thanks for the show report!! Craig Anderton Educational site: http://www.craiganderton.org Music: http://www.youtube.com/thecraiganderton Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/craig_anderton Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Ventura Posted April 30, 2001 Author Share Posted April 30, 2001 The most of the show is side-shows, with some major session players blasting away at each booth, this year an emphasis on rock instead of electronica. I've seen the most of the people around the Roland stage which was really well-designed and they had EVERY SINGLE ITEM on catalogue up for people to grab it and play. To be honest (non-biased this time) the software stalwarts weren't nearly as busy as last year, and their displays were much more subdued. I don't know why is that, but last year DigiDesign had an arena-sized area, as well as Steinberg's importer , and this year they were reduced to the very back of the last pavillion, making basically no waves. In my opinion, the big excitement about soft-anything was spent in the past two years, as there's too much of anything on offer by now. A big crowd was gathering around the German synths booth, with Waldorf, Access, Jomox and M.A.M. relly drawing a lot of people. But also because it was a major holiday break here, we got a lot of non-music related people at this show, which was inexpensive enough for anybody to get in, and we got to see more plump girls in skimp clothes promoting ANY kind of vaguely-music-oriented services or products than music and gear itself. However, I ended up buying 2 Yamaha A-4000's, loaded, one Kurz digital piano, two of the new Yamaha desktop synths which I don't even like, some cheap but punchy Yamaha grooveboxes, and some new turntables from Vestax. And optioned one Roland VS-2480 workstation. Max Ventura, Italy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curve Dominant Posted May 1, 2001 Share Posted May 1, 2001 COME STAI, MASSIMO!!! ELECTRIBEM??!!! What da...sounds like shumptin for the Curve. BTW, does the Roland 2480 do MIDI? Chi centiammo domo... curvedominant Eric Vincent (ASCAP) www.curvedominant.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nawor Posted May 1, 2001 Share Posted May 1, 2001 Q. What does ALITALIA stand for? A. Arrived Late In Turin All Luggage In Athens! This message has been edited by Rowan on 04-30-2001 at 10:30 PM "WARNING!" - this artificial fruit juice may contain traces of REAL FRUIT!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Ventura Posted May 1, 2001 Author Share Posted May 1, 2001 Curve, ciao. No, the VS doesn't do Midi... Curve, buy the Electribe M, you won't be sorry! And also, buy the Yamaha DJ-X BOX, and you'll be even more happy; that thing goes for probably $ 250 retail, and it KIX ASS LIKE A MADMAN!!! Expecially in drum patterns, r'n'b and hip hop style. Ciao. Max Ventura, Italy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curve Dominant Posted May 1, 2001 Share Posted May 1, 2001 Ciao, Massimo, come stai...tutto posto? Tante grazie amico. I'll check the Yamaha DJ-X, and the E-TribeM. I'm gonna send ya a tape of the latest E-TribeS mixes, my brutha. That chumpy is off da f*ckin' hook. The basslines...oh Lordy. Chi centiammo domani... curvedominant Eric Vincent (ASCAP) www.curvedominant.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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