I realise this could end up down a massive rabbit hole but bear with me.
I was watching an Instagram Live video with John Mayer where he’s using some device - or devices - to make electronic music. He’s tapping little pads on it to lay down a drum beat and then doing stuff on the top of it - keys and some ambient kind of sounds. It just kept going in like an infinite loop that he kept layering up.
What are these devices called? I know nothing about electronic music at all but he was getting some cool sounds out of it and I imagine you could have hours of fun doodling about on it and then noodling on the guitar over the top.
He was using a small midi keyboard in addition to whatever this other thing was. Any ideas?
Comments
You can sample or record loops from the guitar, vocal tracks, etc.
The MPC Live is the latest, but the OS is still being finalised.
Love learning about stuff like this!
One thing: IME, they seem really hard to get a handle on, but once you understand how and what they can do, you can make all sorts of music very quickly. Mike Acosta's videos of the Roland MV-8800 show how easy it is to use the built-in samples and add a traditional instrument, chop it up and use the raw materials to play something:
http://intro.novationmusic.com/harry-coade
Band Stuff: https://navigationofficial.bandcamp.com/album/silhouette-ep
I use ableton and a novation launchpad
https://www.native-instruments.com/en/products/maschine/
Remember, it's easier to criticise than create!