Boom Chick: Analog Drum Machine From Cre8audio and Pittsburgh Modular
Boom Boom Chak
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Boom Chick: Analog Drum Machine From Cre8audio and Pittsburgh Modular · Source: Cre8audio
Cre8audio Boom Chick is a new drum machine developed in collaboration with Pittsburgh Modular. This analog drum machine packs a lot of cool features with a high fun factor and a thick sound into a compact format.
All About Cre8audio Boom Chick
Cre8audio Boom Chick: Analog Drum Machine With Circuits by Pittsburgh Modular
Boom Chick is designed for powerful sound and easy operation that is both fun and deep. The individual drum sounds offer a separate controller for each function, plus an easy-to-understand sequencer that also offers some clever extra functions.
Developed by the Pittsburgh Modular Synthesizers team, Boom Chick offers five individual drum voices. In addition to kick, snare and hats, this little drum machine offers two additional sounds, called Drum 1 and Drum 2.
Five drum voices with controls for each parameter Kick, Snare and Hats each have four controls to shape the sound. In addition to level and decay settings, each voice has its own parameters. The bass drum has pitch and drive controls, the snare has tone and noise controls, and the hats have pitch and filter controls.
The other two voices of the Boom Chick (here: Drum 1 and Drum 2) are a bit more complex, with controls for Pitch, FM Pitch, Sweep, Shape, FM Depth, and Decay and Level parameters. A second oscillator is also used here, with LEDs indicating whether noise, square wave, descending sawtooth or triangle is selected.
The kick drum is based on a special sine wave oscillator that uses dark overdrive, pitch manipulation and a percussive envelope to cover a wide range of sounds, from deep and booming, to clean and punchy, to aggressive and overdriven.
The snare drum is designed to deliver sounds that can imitate a real snare drum or sound modern. Hats use a dedicated oscillator noise matrix to produce clear metallic sounds that Cre8audio says are ideal for complex rhythmic patterns.
Drum 1 and 2 deliver subtle, nuanced percussion and expressive textures with two oscillators, wave shaping, frequency modulation and noise. Toms, claps, snares, kicks, cymbals, rimshots, cowbells, congas, claves and more can be created with Boom Chick’s two voices.
Sequencer With Two Modes and Nice Features
The Boom Chick sequencer has two modes. Step mode is great for programming each drum step individually, while Live mode emphasizes real-time rhythm creation and is great for performance.
Features like Step Shift allow for quick timing adjustments for complicated patterns, while Step Roll and Chance are designed to add complexity and variation. Boom Chick also offers timing functions such as Humanize, Swing and Quantize, very nice!
With up to 64 step sequences and polyrhythm functions (like a Euclidean pattern generator), this little drum machine has enough potential for intricate beats and grooves. Actually, the 6-track sequencer is inspired by the Pittsburgh Voltage Lab 2.
Connectors on the Cre8audio Boom Chick
The Cre8audio Boom Chick is very well thought out in terms of connectors, which is where its background in the modular world comes in handy. The little drum machine not only has an input and output for MIDI, but also inputs and outputs for clock and reset, as well as trigger inputs for the individual drums. That sounds interesting!
MIDI is not only suitable for synchronization via MIDI clock, the drum voices can also be triggered via MIDI and external sounds can be played via the output. In this sense, Boom Chick can also be used as a sequencer for external equipment. A DIN format MIDI adapter is included.
Each of the five drum sounds also has a dedicated output for separate recording or effects processing. The drum machine offers a mono master output and a headphone jack. Perfect!
By the way, the output levels are designed for use in Eurorack, so they are ideal for further processing in modular systems. And just like West Pest and East Beast, Boom Chick can be built directly into a Eurorack system.
Boom Chick looks like an interesting drum machine that can be quickly integrated into any setup and is sure to be a lot of fun.
Availability and Price
Cre8audio Boom Chick costs $289 / £272 / €319 and will be available in May – also here at Thomann*.
More Information
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