Analogue-sequencer

I'm afraid I'm partly responsible for taking up mr nagle's valuable
time with the octopus over the last few weeks; I suggested to it's
makers that he would be the best person to get it into SoS, & he was
as good as his word in giving the thing a good thrashing.
thing is, there are so many things changing within the octopus- a lot
like the p3, in the sense that extra functionality & operational
alterations are driven by a hard core of users... (hello tom!)
 
paul's review will give people an idea of the experience of using the
thing, but not all of the current thinking was available to him in the
test machine.

the main point that comes across is that the octopus lives or dies on
how well the user can manage without the comfort-factor of having
everything spelled out in a nice display. 
paul, for one, may have found a display helpful. this is where he & I
differ; I can actually manage the octopus better without a display,
since I treat it as a physical instrument. I would find a display as
distracting on the octopus as on a fender precision bass.

one typically arrives at a basic configuration, pre-populating the
pages with one's personal tweaks, & then it's down to the matter of
dropping notes in, either by pressing the excellent buttons or
recording a keyboard. it is a hugely tactile experience- there's no
getting away from that. it will strike people as being similar to the
mighty notron- in some ways, using it is similar, in that one uses
both hands & no display, & it becomes a physical experience. but it
goes so much deeper than the notron could hope to, & it's actually
built properly. I mean gerard & dave no offense, but the notron feels
cheap next to the octopus. I stopped using mine after it started to
disintegrate after maybe ten gigs. the octopus will outlive me.

by way of a more local comparison, & even to try that is a stretch,
the p3 is a machine for considered data-entry, even when one is
designing patterns that morph or interact. the display is essential
simply because the control surface is so much more compact, & conceals
a far greater deal of complex functionality. the octopus is less
flexible in some areas, but somewhat more powerful in others. it is
slowly emerging (here at northern echo-south, anyway) that the two
complement each other... more on this after I've had more time to work
with them together. & tom will chip in too, I'm sure.

& if you get bored listening to what it's playing, turn it down &
watch the lightshow! :-)

duncan/r.m.i