The upcoming genoQs octopus tabletop MIDI sequencer is one crazy piece of hardware: no fewer than 258 pushbuttons make up the alien interface of this device, with a healthy selection of endless encoder knobs, and a giant spiral of LEDs. Somehow, this setup gives you 144 pages of rhythmic patterns, up to 9 of which you can play at the same time, with polyphonic, shuffle, groove, and roll modes. You can plug in a laptop USB light via the USB port on the back (clever), and it has a full complement of MIDI I/O. The link below has documentation on how it works if you want to try to figure it out.
Let’s put it this way: you’ve seen the end of Close Encounters. If aliens try to make first contact on Earth and they need someone to sequence up a response with a rack of MIDI synths, this is the device you’re going to want to do it. And the fact that the price is TBD, well, what price saving Earth, really?
genoQs octopus tabletop sequencer [Analogue Haven]
I’ll be watching my mashed potatoes for signs that I should pre-order one. And while I’m waiting for buying advice from my starches, I’ve got plenty of other candidates. The octopus comes to us via the L.A. area’s superb analog instrument store Analogue Haven, and they’ve got plenty of other product news, too . . .
Analogue Haven has new stock in a lot of items. For one, they’ve gotten several Persephones into inventory, the ribbon-based synth/controller I raved about at NAMM. Also, lots of products we talked about earlier this spring are now shipping: the Moog Little Phatty, Metasonix S-1000 and tm-6, Novation SL-61, Dave Smith Mono Evolver, and lots of other goodies, analog and otherwise. Check out the Analogue Haven homepage for more details; I wouldn’t normally link directly to a store but Analogue Haven is an exclusive distributor for some brands, including Doepfer, which has a nifty new organ controller.
Another interesting device is the Memotron, a digital remake of the Mellotron. We got a good look at this keyboard at NAMM and it simply sounds and looks absolutely beautiful.
While we’re on the subject of Mellotrons, Matrixsynth links to a documentary on the original:
Mellotron Documentary on BBC (upcoming on Radio 4)