Hologram Microcosm for making beats / How to NOT make ambient soundscapes
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- Опубліковано 27 тра 2024
- A while ago Hologram Electronics sent me their Microcosm pedal to check out. It's obviously great for creating lush pads and ambient soundscapes, but it packs more than that. In this clip I'll go through my favourite sound design tricks for making beats with it.
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00:00 Intro
00:56 Gliding chords
02:22 Instant vocal chops
04:09 Melodic background fills
05:02 Spiced up drums
06:15 Pitch-shifted delays
07:40 Buildup plucks
By the way, I push shorter clips on Instagram more frequently in case you want to take a look: instagram.com/whales.have.teeth/
Love how the vocal chops turned out! Interesting to finally see Someone doing sth different other then ambient music with this lil Maschine :D
Thanks mate! Yeah the vocal chop thingy is my favourite too. Been doing that a ton and often I manually chop them further in Ableton cause it can get a bit all over the place.
The vocal was instant hyper-pop! Great job on taking this pedal out of its comfort zone :P
Ayyy thanks!
I got Microcosm as soon as it got out. I think that most of the reviews online were focused on soundscapes and drones, while the unit can do so much more with transient/percussive sounds. Good people at Hologram did their best to throw in clocks locking, so all this “chaos” can be easily synched with your master tempo - or drift from it should you want to do so. Drums sounds amazing, both electronic and acoustic, when driven through tunnel, for instance (besides obvious glitch). Also, bass can sound so good with pitch shifted bit crushing. I kinda find this pedal to sound like Qu-bit Data Bender sometimes, although the two are way different.
This is great, thanks so much for making this vid. Do you have the pedal synched to midi clock?
Nice 👌. Would love to see more of the microcosm do justice to beats and vocals
👍👍
Thankyou. Really useful tips and thoughtful demonstration.
An amazing and creative musical exploration! Thank you!
Thank you!
Great video!
Very interesting use cases you have shown.
Thanks man! Have to step up my game with the voiceover tho 😅
Solid effort! Love what you did. Between this and the CB Mood mk2 the world is wide open
Ayyy thank you!
Sweet channel! This is a must. I definitely just subscribed. Keep em coming!
Thanks mate!
Great video. Love the Microcosm and it was fun to see it used in such a unique way. Subbed!
Thanks and welcome onboard!
really enjoyed to see this this workflow
Glad to be of service!
Just landed here for the first time. Great video. New subscriber!
Thanks mate, welcome!
Woah! This was a really inspiring video on the Microcosm. The pedal is amazing and I love seeing varied uses of gear that show new sides to it. Also, love the vibe of the track! Nicely done! Do you have a favourite in terms of what you like to process with it or do you end up sending most anything through to give it some more life and character?
Great Video ❤
Thank you! Trying my best out here
It can be funky too! 😍
Yes for sure!
Love this video! And been looking for videos for what the microcosm can do outside ambient/lofi stuff. Somewhat unrelated but would love to know how you’re routing your tracks through Ableton into microcosm and back
Thanks! I have audio going from Ableton to Microcosm through my audio interface’s inputs and outputs, and have Ableton’s External Audio Effect on the track that I’m sending. The inputs and ouputs in question are selected in the External Audio Effect. I think it’s not available in Ableton Lite and Intro, but you can just route the track inputs and outputs and enable monitoring on the receiving track. This is simple to do but a bit hard to explain lol
I was wondering the same thing! What kind of interface are you using?
Keep em coming. That magic box. Singin into it helps a lot figuring out what the algos actually do. Much easier for monkey brain then with guitar or instruments… cmon hologram, how bout a firmware v2.0 with alternate algos? Or a editor to tweak them? See more and mor hitting the used market for belo 400 here in germany… breath new live into it! Best from berlin
Damn, that singing idea sounds genius! I think I'd still learn a lot from this by doing so.
Yeah, this is an excellent idea, thanks! Wil also encourage me to, y'know, sing!
Love this video, thanks! I was wondering if you could explain how you have it running through ableton, sending tracks through it etc. I'm pretty inexperienced in physical gear but would love to be able to route my microcosm like this so I can mix and add effects live. im a logic user though
You would need an audio interface with an extra set of outputs and inputs. Outputs would be stereo out from Ableton Send to Microcosm, Inputs would be stereo out from Microcosm to Ableton audio input track. Logic works similarly to Ableton. Use a Send and an input track.
1) I have Komplete Audio 6 as my audio interface and I have the song in Ableton.
2) I select that interface's outputs as my track output in Ableton
3) Audio cables go from Komplete's outputs to Microcosm and other cables from Microcosm's output to Komplete's input
4) I have an empty track in Ableton, input is set to Komplete's inputs and the track is monitoring input. Then I record to this track.
Alternatively, you could use Ableton's External Audio Effect plugin.
New subscriber, so interesting content and very clean presented 👌🏻
Could you please tell how do you connect it to Ableton? Also, I am doubting in between this pedal or LVX from Meris. LVX could make some things like that too right? Loved the vocal chops!
Thanks mate! Here's the process:
1) I have Komplete Audio 6 as my audio interface and I have the song in Ableton.
2) I select that interface's outputs as my track output in Ableton
3) Audio cables go from Komplete's outputs to Microcosm and other cables from Microcosm's output to Komplete's input
4) I have an empty track in Ableton, input is set to Komplete's inputs and the track is monitoring input. Then I record to this track.
Alternatively, you could use Ableton's External Audio Effect plugin.
I don't have experience with LXV so can't chime in on that one unfortunately. Happy to hear your experiences if you decided to get it though?
@@whaleshaveteeth Thanks for the kind response! I ended buying both Meris LVX and Mercury X.
Still trying them with my guitar and waiting to buy some cables to connect them to my sound interface as you said 👏🏻
@@RenoFriends Damn, that's a sweet combination!
Supernice! How did you route this in Ableton?
Just added the External Audio Effect device on the track where I had the original sound. Then had an empty audio track for recording, with the input set to the original track with the External Audio Effect set on.
Thnx
How often do you use this in your productions after 7 months now? And for what things do you use it now? Just curious!
Might be a basic question but how are you going out of ableton into the microcosm then back into ableton?
1) I have Komplete Audio 6 as my audio interface and I have the song in Ableton.
2) I select that interface's outputs as my track output in Ableton
3) Audio cables go from Komplete's outputs to Microcosm and other cables from Microcosm's output to Komplete's input
4) I have an empty track in Ableton, input is set to Komplete's inputs and the track is monitoring input. Then I record to this track.
Alternatively, you could use Ableton's External Audio Effect plugin.
Have you tried to record a loop in the Microcosm with sync on with Ableton? When i record a perfect loop on the tempo of Ableton, it trims off the end of the sample. I wonder if this is something i can change…
You have latency in ableton, you arent doing it right.
how did you hook it up to ableton ? just through audio interface?
Yes, just through the interface. I have a Native Komplete 6 mk2.
What’s your chain looking like though?
1) I have Komplete Audio 6 as my audio interface and I have the song in Ableton.
2) I select that interface's outputs as my track output in Ableton
3) Audio cables go from Komplete's outputs to Microcosm and other cables from Microcosm's output to Komplete's input
4) I have an empty track in Ableton, input is set to Komplete's inputs and the track is monitoring input. Then I record to this track.
Alternatively, you could use Ableton's External Audio Effect plugin.
Hologram really are the best. Folk be happy to pay $300 for a plugin that sounds garbage and get bored so use a preset.
Do you think it's worth the massive price tag? btw its hard to hear your voice
it is a nice video and lovely sounds, however, it is super super hard to listen to your voice explaining stuff coz it is so low and soft over the louder beats :(
Damn, I know. I typically do videos with captions but some people suggested that a voice narrative is easier to follow -which is probably true - so I thought I’d try one. I have to up my microphone, mumbling and mixing games though.
Update: just figured out how to enable subtitles. Hope that helps a bit.
@@whaleshaveteeth thank you! :)
OMG 🙏🏿🙏🏿🙏🏿🙏🏿 I hate ambient!!
“beats…” 😂😂😂😂😂😂 What a dope…