In a release that is sure to be as treasured a part of the computer musician’s Halloween as “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!” is to normal people, the electronic music world’s most insane “instructors” are at it again. Hilarity results:
Museum of Techno Halloween Special: MIDI Control [Novation Xiosynth ad site]
Be careful, as I think they’re trying to sell you a ReMOTE SL keyboard, and only I should be allowed to do that. (The apparent message of this video: “MIDI is too hard to understand! You’re drunk and on drugs! You’d better buy a Novation keyboard!”) Then again, if you’re like me, you’ll finish this video not with a desire to buy electronics but a sudden need to, I don’t know, listen to some soothing music and try to come back to a reality that isn’t completely tripped-out and edited with Premiere, a blindfold, and an axe.
Actually, I’m fairly certain I can explain MIDI drunk, speaking of things that are truly spooky. And I probably have — blacked out about some of those bits. I can see it now: “No, CC doesn’t really stand for continuous controller. It stands for Control Change, some of which are on/off messages like sustain pedal. And what do you mean, MIDI doesn’t have data resolution? Pitch bend has 16,000 steps and you’re leaving out most significant byte / least significant byte combinations.” Imagine that slurred, and you get a sense of what I’m like at parties, or how hard it is to be my significant other.
Thanks to the Museum of Techno for adding total irreverence and humor to the usually-dry world of music equipment adverts. Keep it up, boys.