Sweden-based Teenage Engineering makes merchandise for a really, very particular viewers. Take, for instance, the corporate’s $250 toy car or its TP-7 tape recorder with a spinning wheel to track through recordings. None have spoken to me as a lot as its newest venture, a medieval-themed sampler board referred to as the EP-1320. By the look and sound of it, it might provide the perfect alternative to convey on-the-fly, on-brand music to my Dungeons and Dragons classes.
I by no means thought there’d be a sound product that made me perk up as quick as a Medieval-age sound sampler and transportable, simplified groove field. The $300 EP-1320 is mostly a reskin of the $300 EP-133 K.O. II, nevertheless it appears designed to offer the Renaissance faire reject in me an opportunity at sampling scores. If I’ll by no means cease my lazy streak and study to play the lute and reenact courtroom scenes of the 14th-century English king Edward II, maybe that is the following smartest thing.
There are samples in there for some basic devices of yesteryear, particularly the citole, shawn, flute, trumpets, and my private favourite—the hurdy-gurdy. The board additionally accommodates foley results together with the sound of swords clashing or arrows flitting throughout a battlefield. Teenage Engineering says it accommodates sound results for a dragon you possibly can lay on prime of the 9 onboard demo songs.
The gadget is meant to have a redesigned suite of punch-in FX. Different stated sound features embrace “torture chamber reverb,” “dungeon echo,” and “bardic ensemble.” To not put too effective some extent on it, the corporate’s video promoting its new product is maybe much more wild than the gadget itself.
The sampler is dear when you take into account it a mere music toy, although it’s lots low cost when you have been working it as your predominant transportable sampler system. The EP-133 Ok.O. II was a follow-up to the Swedish firm’s $100 PO-33 Ok.O. micro sampler, itself renown for its capabilities in comparison with its miniscule measurement. The newest medieval sampler is barely packing 128 MB of reminiscence divided up with 96 MB of ROM sounds plus 32 MB left over for person samples. The stress and velocity-sensitive keys and multi-function fader slider ought to permit for a substantial amount of versatility altering pitch, results, and time changes.
The design of the medieval sampler with its thick, textured plastic is equally historic, akin to a number of the first Mac computer systems or consoles just like the NES. The textual content on the buttons is equally on-theme. Every of the letter buttons is styled with an air of Carolingian font as if Charlemagne himself is setting as much as drop a thick beat on some heathen Saxons. As a substitute of “fader” you will have “fædr.” Different buttons are equally rethemed, like “tempus” for tempo or “codex” as a substitute of document. Teenage Engineering is promoting the board alongside a “Medieval quilt bag” in comparison with the Ok.O. II’s shoulder strap bag.
Maybe my favourite embellishment is the lone monk sitting on a small throne like an digital piece of marginalia. The monk sits subsequent to a reasonably easy LED UI exhibiting you which of them devices and the assorted tracks you will have chosen. If something, it might entice me to hit up the barber to get that tonsure look going, if nothing else than to finish the ensemble.
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