u/ccgenoa

I want to share some thoughts, friends.

While peak-time techno is being played in stadiums, modern dub techno is starting to sound more and more like lounge music, and industrial techno seems closer to bands like Ministry than to the roots of Throbbing Gristle — do you feel that an underground lo-fi scene is beginning to emerge in techno as well?

I see an interesting parallel with what happened in house music, where the lo-fi underground sound eventually became a huge success.

I don’t dig very deeply into contemporary music, but I’ve noticed that artists like ngly, TM404, Evigt Mörker and many others seem to be moving in a direction that’s not about a commercial, polished, powerful sound, but rather something more textural, noisy and lo-fi.

And do you see a parallel with post-hardcore in the ’90s? When bands like Fugazi shifted the focus away from labels and toward DIY culture and the underground?

Do you see any signs that this kind of tendency is emerging in techno?

Which artists or projects would you describe as “outsider techno”?

And, as a musician, would you actually want to be associated with such a tag?

Hey everyone! Maybe this is not the most typical question

here.

I've been making electronic music for about 12 years, but I've never really been interested in DJing. So whenever I perform, it's usually a live set. I normally do everything straight from Ableton and don't bring hardware synths to gigs. Although, to be fair, I don't own that much hardware anyway — just an Arturia DrumBrute and a Behringer Crave.

A few days ago I was unexpectedly offered a last-minute slot at one of the biggest and coolest underground clubs in my city. On top of that, the live set is going to be filmed for a broadcast.

The problem is that I've been spending the last couple of months finalizing a new 12-track album, and I basically have zero preparation for this live set. The offer really came out of nowhere.

So here's my question: what would you do if you had one week of evenings to prepare a one-hour live set?

I have a bit of a mental dilemma.

Option 1: Take all the tracks from the album, put them into one Ableton project and work on transitions between them. This seems like the easiest solution, but I'm wondering whether the video could potentially get blocked once the album is officially released. Also, is it even a good idea to tease the album before its release?

Option 2: Make 8 tracks of generative blips and bloops and perform them together with a live drum machine. This also seems relatively straightforward, but:

I've never done anything like this before.

I'm afraid it might end up sounding like something I put together at the last minute.

Option 3: Go in a completely different direction and make something ambient/noise-oriented. But I'm worried that this might be disappointing in the context of my usual style.

Option 4: Download 5–6 sample/loop packs that fit my style, pick 4–5 bass loops, 6–7 leads, 10–20 percussion sounds in compatible keys, and basically improvise by switching between them while playing the drum machine live.

Some important context:

I have a Push 2, and stylistically I play minimal/raw techno. Not the modern, super-heavy kind, though — something closer to outsider house and minimal techno.

Sometimes I jokingly call my style “outsider techno” haha.

Anyway, that's basically it. I hope it makes at least some sense. Feel free to ask questions if you need more context.

I'd really love to hear about your experience and how you would approach this.

Thanks everyone in advance, and sorry for the machine translation!

Hey everyone! I’m looking for a compact, ideally foldable pair of headphones for studio monitoring, casual part-time mixing, and other audio engineering work.

I’m a sound engineer and also perform techno live, so it would be great if the headphones were good enough for proper monitoring during live sets as well.

So far, the most suitable option I’ve found is the beyerdynamic DT 270 PRO. It seems to tick quite a few boxes: compact, lightweight, closed-back, and designed for monitoring.

Are there any other cool alternatives I should consider?

One important thing: I live outside the EU and the US, so very recently released models or products that are mainly available on the Western market probably won’t work for me, simply because I won’t be able to buy them here.

Hey everyone! I’m looking for a compact, ideally foldable pair of headphones for studio monitoring, casual part-time mixing, and other audio engineering work.

I’m a sound engineer and also perform techno live, so it would be great if the headphones were good enough for proper monitoring during live sets as well.

So far, the most suitable option I’ve found is the beyerdynamic DT 270 PRO. It seems to tick quite a few boxes: compact, lightweight, closed-back, and designed for monitoring.

Are there any other cool alternatives I should consider?

One important thing: I live outside the EU and the US, so very recently released models or products that are mainly available on the Western market probably won’t work for me, simply because I won’t be able to buy them here.

Thanks in advance for any recommendations!

Hi everyone! I’m looking for a small, vintage-looking backpack for commuting to work with a laptop, audio interface and MIDI controller.

Good laptop protection is important to me, but I’d like to keep the backpack fairly compact — ideally around 15–18L. A vintage/retro look would be a big plus.

Right now I’m considering the Fjällräven Kånken Laptop 13 or the Uniqlo Multi Pocket Backpack.

My budget is strictly up to €100, and I’m only looking at options available in Europe, preferably without long shipping times.

I’d really appreciate any recommendations!

​

Hey everyone! I wanted to ask for some advice about doing a hybrid live set.

I’m currently travelling and have my Mac, audio interface, and yesterday I randomly picked up a DrumBrute Impact at a flea market.

As it happens, I was suddenly offered a chance to play at a party as a guest from abroad.

The thing is, even though I’ve been making electronic music, techno and electro for almost 15 years, I’ve never really been that interested in DJing — at least not in the sense of actually being the guy standing behind the decks.

I could obviously pick some tracks I’d like to play and make a few edits, but I’m a bit worried about fucking something up. The last time I played behind decks was probably around two years ago, and that was an ambient set.

Normally I play live sets consisting of my own tracks, using a laptop and Push 2.

So I started thinking: what if I just do a minimal live set with this brand new DrumBrute Impact?

Do you guys have any ideas how I could set this up and structure a one-hour live set, probably mostly improvised?

My initial thought was to prepare some synth and pad loops on the laptop, switch them using the trackpad, send the master tempo over USB to the DrumBrute, and play the DrumBrute live, improvising and building the set on the fly.

To be honest, I haven’t really figured the DrumBrute out yet, but it seems pretty intuitive.

Do you have any ideas or advice on how you would approach this?

Or should I just stop trying to be clever and play a DJ set?

Oh, and the gig is in two days...

Would really appreciate any advice!

Hi everyone!

I'm looking for a small lightweight backpack for work cases.

I'm working as a sound engineer so usually I carry a mbp14", some audio interface, 1/2 mic's, recorder and a huge amount of little things like cables, adaptors, eternal memory, bottle of water etc.

I travel a lot with public transport.

So I'm looking for a lightweight small waterproof solution with great organization possibility.

I used an aer city pack 16l but it was too rigid, designed more for flat things inside (like paper, tablet, book) and heavyweight by himself so I sell it. Years ago I had a Thule (en route I think) it was not bad, but lacks of waterproof especially in the bottom and has some spaces that i just didn't use (like the pocket for glasses).

Now I'm using a Thule lithos 16, it's great but basically too simple and lacks of organization pockets.

Any ideas?

P.s I'm living in Eastern Europe so most of the US brands are not present.

Hi everyone!

I'm looking for a high-quality alternative to Ray-Ban.

I've been wearing glasses for over 20 years. For most of that time I bought cheap mass-market frames, which, unsurprisingly, would bend or break pretty quickly. I wear my glasses almost 24/7—I sometimes lie down in them, I work as a nurse, and they inevitably get bumped, dropped, or knocked around.

About a year ago I bought my first pair of Ray-Ban frames. Honestly, they didn't even feel better made than a cheap Uniqlo-style pair I'd owned before. And after a year of daily use, they've aged much worse than I expected.

I'm also not a fan of modern, ultra-thin, or "updated" frame designs. I strongly prefer classic, vintage silhouettes.

So I'm looking for a durable, well-made brand that focuses on timeless designs and can actually stand up to everyday wear.

One more complication is that I live in Eastern Europe. I know there are lots of small American brands making excellent frames, but most of them aren't available here.

I've looked at fairly common brands like Polaroid and Carrera, but they lean too modern for my taste, and I'm not convinced the build quality is much better.

Any recommendations?

Hey everyone!

For the last 10 years I've been focused on making music, and almost everything I do is in the box with Ableton. Even so, every release is built around a pretty limited palette of tools and sounds.

Most of the time I use generative sequencers, 185-style sequencers, sampled drum machines (things like the Tanzbär or Legowelt's sampled 909), and just a handful of soft synths: TAL-BassLine, u-he Pro-One, Poly-700/MonoPoly, plus Ableton's stock Sampler or Granulator loaded with either '90s sample CD material or my own field recordings.

My projects are usually only around 8–10 tracks, so the whole workflow is very minimal. I also genuinely like a slightly lo-fi, stripped-back sound.

I've gotten so used to working with just my MacBook keyboard and trackpad that, despite owning an Ableton Push 2, I probably use only about 10% of what it can do. I mainly plug it in for live sets, where it's mostly used for launching clips and making small adjustments with the knobs and faders.

About five years ago I tried going DAWless. At the time I had an MS-1 and an RD-8. It was fun, but I still ended up programming everything from the laptop anyway. That project wasn't even my main techno project—it was more old-school electro with female vocals.

Lately I've been getting offered more live gigs, and it's made me think again about trying to write a whole album using hardware.

Right now I'm considering a setup built around a Roland S-1, Elektron Model:Samples, and a Behringer Edge. It feels like a rig that could be great for improvised live jams, and maybe some of those jams could eventually become finished releases.

The thing holding me back is that I don't want to jump straight into something like a Tonverk or a Syntakt plus an expensive sampler. I'm honestly not even sure whether I'd end up using that kind of setup enough to justify it.

I guess it's partly psychological. I'm already very comfortable working in Ableton, I even teach other people, but there's always that thought in the back of my mind: what if hardware opens up a completely different creative process?

So I'm curious—has anyone here made the jump from a fully in-the-box workflow to either a completely hardware setup or a hybrid one?

I also notice that a lot of artists I really like, such as Polygonia, still perform with a laptop or tablet alongside a bunch of controllers.

At this point I'm honestly not sure which direction makes the most sense for me.

I'd really appreciate hearing about your experiences. Thanks!

Hey everyone! I'm an Italian living in Russia, and I've completely fallen in love with the paintings of Arkhip Kuindzhi. He also had Italian roots and lived in Russia a long time ago. Most of his work is about the Russian wilderness, and there's one painting in particular called Weeds (Buryan) that I can't stop thinking about.

The idea for my next album is to translate that painting into sound.

I've spent most of my life making classic techno and electro, usually working with synths like the Roland SH-101. Lately though I've become really interested in granular synthesis, and I'm trying to figure out how to use it to recreate natural environments.

Do you have any sound design techniques for turning field recordings into something expressive with granular synths or samplers? Or even ways of synthesizing specific nature sounds from scratch—grass rustling, wind moving through weeds, that kind of thing, maybe using filtered white noise or other approaches.

I remember Polygonia made a great tutorial on wooden textures, but I'm especially interested in grass, wind, dry vegetation, and similar organic sounds.

If anyone has experience with this kind of sound design, I'd really appreciate hearing your ideas or seeing any tutorials, artists, or techniques you can recommend.

I was wandering is there any sample packs, racks, M4l devices or vst plugins inspired by this kind of hardware machines?

Excluding the Erica's Virtual Delay and Lyra free emulation.

Thx in advance.

Hi everyone!

I've been producing music for a long time, and most of what I make is old-school techno and electro. My setup is usually based around an Ableton Push 2 and VST emulations of vintage synths like the SH-101, TB-303, Juno, etc.

Recently I've become really interested in modern experimental techno and started diving into granular synthesis. I've been working with Granulator III and Push, but I often feel somewhat limited by the workflow. Because of that, I've been considering buying a Torso S-4.

The thing is, this would be my first serious hardware purchase in an area that I don't fully understand yet. In my country it's very difficult to find, and the price markup is quite high. Before making such an expensive decision, I'd like to ask if there are any VST plugins with a similar workflow, philosophy, or creative approach that I could try first together with Push 2. If I discover that this way of working really clicks with me, I'd feel much more confident investing in the hardware later.

I realize this might be a somewhat unusual question, but hopefully you understand what I'm looking for.

In short: I'm searching for a granular "playable instrument" or sound-design workstation that I can explore with Push 2 and that offers a workflow somewhat comparable to the Torso S-4 before committing to the actual hardware.

Thanks in advance, and sorry for ai translation my English isn't perfect.

Kind of a weird request maybe, but I’m looking for game recommendations and I’m honestly almost completely new to gaming.

I never really grew up playing games. As a kid I remember watching my dad play on an old Pentium 1 PC, and sometimes trying stuff like Stronghold or one of the Total War games. Later I’d occasionally play Flight Simulator 2004, and I think that’s when I realized I’m way more into slow, immersive games than anything competitive or fast-paced.

Right now I’m trying to find something for Android, preferably offline.

I’d love something with fantasy or medieval vibes, maybe strategy or turn-based combat, good atmosphere, interesting lore, pixel art or older-looking graphics. I don’t really like super modern-looking games or anything that requires fast reactions.

I also loved playing D&D with friends years ago, and I used to be really into Magic: The Gathering at school. So I guess I’m looking for something with that kind of energy — taverns, ruins, strange worlds, quiet exploration, tactical thinking.

More than action, I think I just want a world I can disappear into at night.

Would really appreciate any recommendations.

Sorry for translation

Hello Everyone!

I just wanted to show you my new album.

This album is my biographical transition from Italy to Russia articulated through a polylingual body of voice samples.

The album consists of six tracks structured as a binary cycle: three focus on the voice as an autonomous sonic object, while three explore its interaction with rhythm, alternating and shaping a pulsating perceptual flow. The title Locked Ground functions as a metaphor for fixed identity and a potential sonic territory awaiting excavation.

Created over six months using 12-bit samplers, the album marks a shift from synthesis to lo-fi discretization, where digital erosion becomes a method of reconstructing an industrial imaginary oriented simultaneously toward the dancefloor and the archive.

Would be grateful for any feedback!

Hey everyone — looking for recommendations on modern wonky techno mixes / compilations / sets.

I’ve been into underground techno for years and I’m a huge fan of the Birmingham sound, both the original pioneers and newer artists carrying that spirit forward. For example, Polygonia absolutely blew my mind after her STOOR performance.

Usually when I dive into a genre, I go full nerd mode: RateYourMusic, digging through essential releases, classic LPs, tracing influences etc. I did the same here — spent time with early Neil Landstrumm, Cari Lekebusch and a lot of the artists connected to the roots of this sound.

What I’ve realized though is that there’s not really one clear common denominator to “wonky techno” besides maybe moving away from strict 4/4 structures — broken rhythms, off-grid percussion, weird groove science, that sort of thing.

Now I’m trying to understand where this sound has gone over the last 5–7 years: how it evolved, what the current tendencies are, how diverse the scene has become sonically.

I also realized that approaching this only through LPs and digging release-by-release will take forever, so I thought I’d ask here instead:

What mixes, compilations, podcasts or sets do you personally consider essential for understanding the modern face of wonky techno / Birmingham-influenced techno?

Could be newer artists, legendary mixes, niche stuff, whatever comes to mind. I’d genuinely love to hear your recommendations.

Hey everyone! Wanted to have a chat about granular synthesis. Let's put together something like a master thread on the topic within the context of techno production.

I've figured most of it out through trial and error and haven't really studied the theory or explored many plugins beyond Granulator 2. Share your favourite techniques, tutorials, tools, and plugins on the subject. Let's try to put together a complete guide on this topic lol.

Is there maybe some long course — not just a short video — that demonstrates the possibilities and practical applications of granular synthesis in production?