It’s about time – shuffled time. For all the beauty of quantized machine beats, what the world needs now is something that can shuffle and trip. And that’s just what this new teaser ahead of Superbooth promises.
It’s called the Stolperbeats, and it’s a pattern generator with loads of CV and MIDI control. They pitch this as a Eurorack module, but it sure looks like it’d be just as useful with desktop gear. And with separate triggers for drum parts – or, frankly, whatever you want – you can both spawn different patterns, tuplets, and swing feel. And those in turn are all under CV and MIDI control, too – so you can really make something fairly complicated fairly fast.
It’s a clever idea, and nicely laid out. Plus while technically speaking you could do something like this with an array of LFOs and clocks and things, it sure is more musical (and takes up less space) when it’s all on one panel. I’m a little foggy on exactly how it works from the teaser, but musically it’s doing lovely things and absolutely is up at the top of my Superbooth list. If I can muscle in, I’ll have a play.
Here’s what they’ve got to say:
What started out as a tiny little seedling of a project, our secret pattern generator, has grown into its own and hatched as a full-grown Eurorack module! Stolperbeats, roughly translating to “beats tripping over themselves”, is a drum trigger sequencer designed to create shuffled beats influenced by artists like FlyingLotus, HiatusKaiyote and JDilla. We’ve always been fascinated by taking our beats offgrid to give them more fluidity and life. This module allows you to easily dial in and seamlessly switch between all the shuffle, feeling and groove we would, in the past, painstakingly nudge together in a DAW.
Stolperbeats is heard here triggering Eurorack drum modules, including the fantastic Prok Drum available as a DIY kit from Thonk doing the obiwankenobi dragon call, Tiptopaudio’s One playing the @beatsbykabuki STRIKE audio card through @rocket_not FenixIV phaser and an unreleased Making Sound Machines prototype called PercussiveMaintenance, played through @serge_by_random_source ‘s wavemultiplier and with added oomph from @tomwhitwell’s MusicThing Minidrive. The performance showcases switching from a nonuplet groove to a quintuplet shuffle in the blink of an eye.
Stolperbeats features CV and MIDI control over trigger patterns for Kick, Snare, open and closed Hihat and 2x Percussion, as well as control over the depth of shuffle applied. It outputs trigger signals for use with Eurorack drum modules, and MIDI suitable for drum machines and synthesizers.
The module is not in stores quite yet but you will be able to play it at @superbooth_berlin 2022. And you might have noticed a sneaky little peak of it in a @divkidvideo already : D
One shuffling tip of the hat to Gearnews for catching this before I did.
