If you’re reading this, and if you care about controllers at all, you’ve probably got one. Now the question is, what are you missing? LaunchControl XL is coming with a whole mess of handy faders and knobs if you’ve got more controls than you can map.
In fact, while it would make an utterly horrid marketing statement, I would dub the slogan of this hardware like this:
Twist knobs without having to constantly press shift and select keys or give up having some faders.
There’s Push, of course, the Ableton-controlling flagship, complete with pressure- and velocity-sensitive grid. There’s AKAI’s former APC, which already has a full complement of faders, encoders, and triggers. Beyond that, we’re talking about various combinations of faders and knobs and triggers in smaller controllers in some combination. For example:
There’s the Novation Launchpad – built like a tank, dirt cheap, just a grid.
There’s the new AKAI APC mini – grid with faders, but no knobs.
There’s the Novation LaunchControl – knobs and some pads, but no faders.
Well, now Novation is back with the LaunchControl XL. It’s knobs, yes – but more knobs. And those knobs get their own colored indicators so you know what they’re controlling. And now it has faders, too. And if it doesn’t sell like hotcakes to everyone, betcha it sells like hotcakes to people who have just a Launchpad.
24 knobs in three rows of eight – which maps conveniently to Live
Multicolored indicators on the knobs for multiple functions
Driver-free (so if you’re using Bitwig or Renoise on Linux, you’re in, too)
16 multi-color buttons give you track focus, mix controls
Works on iOS, too, via Camera Connection Kit
£159.99, coming late August, which is also roughly when we should have one in for review.
More pics and a video… (though I didn’t personally take the musical style in the vid, maybe you will – )
Significantly, whether that video is your cup of tea or not, you can watch an in-depth video here on how they did what they did and download the set to have a look. So, we can all get back to making weird, dancefloor-clearing IDM if we really want to. (Hey, if she or he is still on the dance floor, that may be the one for you. Nerd love. The best.)