Planning on grabbing a Volca Bass
Ok, I think I’m about to bite and get a Volca Bass. I want to run the thing into Ableton and play out melodies, etc. Anyone have one of these and route it into Live? Is it easy to do? Looking for some feedback before I spend the cash and find out I need to buy more crap.
Also, I run a 2i4 interface I assume I would run the midi out from the Volca to the midi in on the 2i4?
It’s easy to do I have a volca keys and volca beats and volca bass it’s fairly straight forward routing I spend most my time trying to figure out how I want to dump the audio… It’s a bit different then running them in flp which is more accustomed to… I did see some mappings/plugins that can be added to modify parameters and send the automation data to the volcas so that way your not manually doing it everytime you bounce the audio to wav… I haven’t picked one up since in fruity loops there’s a dashboard plugin and a fair amount of templates for the volcas to do this…
How do they sound?
Honestly I’ve been fairly impressed the volca keys is very particle
Can get some nice sounds out of it I think have some vids here let me try attachinghttps://vimeo.com/120384362https://vimeo.com/120384434
I route trough my monotrons sometimes I don’t have any clips of the bass just the keys and beats
I’ll have a look through the videos when I get home. Thanks for posting them buddy. If the bass model is legit I will look into the beats/keys.
Is this something I’d be able to run with my 2i4?
Yes you will be able to… I can run directly through my internal sound card and it sounds fine… I have midi being ran just by a usb to midi roland dongle… The midi implementation is fairly straight forward… One thing I wish is that it’s have midi out to record automation from the unit itself… There is a already midi out kits on the shelf for the unit so depending on how plan on using it that’s an option
I would love to just turn a know and have it automate on its own lol. I mean, I can work around that of course. What are you talking about when you say there is a midi out kit?
the lack of MIDI out seems like a pain in the arse if you don’t know how to solder. So you’d essentially have to use a controller to record your MIDI notes and any automations, (or mouse clicks) then record the audio straight into your DAW?
I think if I were you, I’d wait and save up for something with better MIDI in/out - maybe look at the Microbrute?
Yeah I see what you’re saying. At this point, I’m looking to get familiar with the designing of sounds on hardware, not so much be able to play them into Ableton and have midi sync on point. But that may get old fast, I have been eyeing the mini/micro brute for the past few days as well. That probably will be the best bet.
Hardware Question => Hardware thread.
You can map a controller to the volca and map the knobs to control it then when you run automation record it will play it back… For what I feel midi out isn’t that big of an issue and a work around by mapping the knobs to the midi cc is the quickest way around it… Since you can map every control it makes it more versatile
I don’t know live well enough but would assume there would be a similar way of creating a dashboard/container for the hardware controls below is the dashboard setup I use for my volcas in fruity loops
You can feed midi clock data to the volcas so they are synced… I too am likely going to add a minibrute at a later date
Be warned…foraying into hardware is a slippery slope. Once you get a synth, then you need hardware effects, then another synth, a drum machine, then you have to expand your interface. 
I find doing the hardware sound design to a playing MIDI clip helps me dial in the sound best as well as gives me ideas for “playing” the controls of the synth for sound design movement throughout the piece. Hence why I like the MIDI capabilities, both in and out.
If your budget will take you up to the Minibrute, check out a BS II as well. Great synth with tons of functionality for the price, plus you get two oscillators along w/ sub - it’s got a much cleaner, less experimental sound than mini/microbrute, but the different filters make it pretty diverse for a cheaper mono. Great arp too along with preset management.
All agree on its a very slippery slope rgas can happen real quickly and before you know it. The bassline 2 looks great and if I didn’t already have money invested into other things I’d likely grab one especially since can find them for around 400 from time to time… The korg volcas are very nice and play well with the midi implementation… I have found midi out not to be too much of a bother… Changing work flow to accommodate hardware is likely the biggest learning curve as essentially you are composing midi and then arranging samples… This is where it can get messy and real quick… Normally what I do is have my mpk mini routed to midi in on my hardware and I will play sequences on it as I hone in the desired sound once that is done I’ll record the midi controls via the dashboard template and then sequence the midi playback record in Edison touch it up load the sample into a slot on the mixer and then start adding effects… If I want a filter or tape delay I run a send return to my monotron delay or my monotron duo for filters… You can get lots real quick depending on how in depth you dive to your sound… When I was producing regularly 10+ years ago the only hardware I had and now really regret dumping is a virus b and a jp8080 I spend my days now looking for one or the other to come up on eBay for a nice price although the jp8080 has some really good soft synth version there’s just something about hardware that sounds different and has a different feel for it
For what it’s worth analog sounds normally are more experimental because getting that real refined sound is more complex then getting really weird experimental sounds…
Example the volca keys took me over a month to be able to get a real refined clean sound… Now I can fire it up and within minutes have a nice warm lead or pad sound that would fit with regular tracks gine
I just ordered a Microbrute from Zzounds lol
Haha nice hope to hear some nice analog warmth there is something about just hooking up powering on and jamming…
You’ll have fun with that puppy!
Very excited lol. Been waiting for this day for a long time.