Akai Force: Is the Automation Snapshot the Most Powerful Performance Feature? .. SnowMetal 2023

[@robdechamber3973]

Thank you ! Good job !

[@danieklerr]

I appreciate that; thank you for watching!

[@InkyDaCaT]

End of video shows what this awesome box does! 💗🌟🙌🙌🙌

[@danieklerr]

Thank you, I appreciate you watching!

[@Lordxfx]

Trust me, it's not the box making the music you're hearing. It's the chef in the kitchen!

[@ToyKeeper]

I love my Force so much... it's like a combination of the best features of other devices, all in one. I doubt I'll ever run out of new things to try on it.

[@danieklerr]

I really dig it also, but I find myself neglecting it for other gear. When I return to it, it's always very refreshing. Thank you for watching!

[@InkyDaCaT]

Awesome jam💗💗💗💗

[@calixtetayoro5719]

The way you use Automation Snapshot with your Akai Force is the equivalent of «Control All» in the Elektron world: it’s a performance feature that allows to mangle & manipulate a sequence (sometime to the extreme), then come back to the initial state just by pressing on a button. Very powerful stuff! I didn’t know i could do it on the Force, thank you! Time to spend some quality time with the Force this weekend :)

[@danieklerr]

You are absolutely right. I started doing things this way with the Korg ESX almost two decades ago (press Shift + Pattern to instantly revert back to saved state), then took it even further with the Octatrack. This feature has always been present on the Force, but until update 3.2.1 it was unusable. Thanks for watching. :)

[@calixtetayoro5719]

@@danieklerr My pleasure really! I'll check that out on my old red ESX. You've been dropping knowledge left & right for a long time now: I started following your channel when I got my ES2 right after it was released (that I still have - my poor man's Octatrack). I wonder whether it has the same "Shift + Pattern" functionality. That was before I moved on to the real OG Octatrack, then the Digitakt, Digitone & Syntakt. PS: All the best to your son (I remember your mantra back then: "My son is a genius").

[@danieklerr]

@@calixtetayoro5719 .. Aww, that's amazing! Yes, my son is **still** a genius, and just turned 13. :) The functionality on the ESX is even more amazing, actually, as you can toggle back and forth between the mangled version and the original save version. In fact, you can mangle, snap back to normal, mangle the normal one, snap back to the first mangled one, then snap back to normal again, all at the push of a button. I demo this in a video called "Korg ESX (2019) .. Shift+Pattern Performance Hack". Unfortunately, this is not possible on the ES2, although the ES2 has some weird features (unknown to the designers probably, lol) that other machines don't have. ;)

[@L0K3E]

Very cool!

[@danieklerr]

Thank you! 🙏

[@palentier1]

So much value in one video 😮❤

[@danieklerr]

That's amazing to hear! Thank you so much for watching. :)

[@teckno_senpai]

HUGE feature i didnt know about... thank you!

[@danieklerr]

Awesome, I hope you use this! Thank you for watching. :)

[@marcopulsar910]

Good jam man! 🤟And..... I love snapshots! 😁

[@danieklerr]

Thank you so much! And thank you for watching. :)

[@josuearesav]

This is really helpful! =D

[@danieklerr]

I'm really happy to hear that. Thank you for watching. :)

[@TK-hz4ss]

Totally forgot about the automation snapshot feature, and the granulator plugin!!!Now my adhd brain is gonna forget what Im currently learning on the Force now to soak up and apply snapshot automation and using the granulator! Awesome video, keep em coming!!

[@danieklerr]

Perfect! I'd love to hear what you come up with. Thank you for watching!

[@InkyDaCaT]

😁😁 awesome 💥🌟

[@danieklerr]

I was sad to hear of your passing. I'm really going to miss your powerful energy and positivity. RIP. 💔

[@vincewatson_official]

If you use the crossfader to program these mappings for this instead, you can be more subtle and have a bit more control....and its a bit more fun to drop ;)

[@danieklerr]

In my first few months with the Force, I really wanted the crossfader to work with FX in a way similar to the way I use the Octatrack. If you watch my remix of Ghost by Gunship and Powerglove, you can see how I'm using the crossfader to introduce effects in certain scenes. Unfortunately, although there are 16 separate crossfader configurations, it seems to "slip" when I have too many things being controlled in one config. As in.. It will arbitrarily stop controlling certain parameters until I go back in and re-establish the connection. I find the Automation Snapshot very easy to set up, since no parameters are actually mapped to any one controller. It's immediate, and this has allowed me to use the crossfader for other purposes. Does this make sense? :) Anyway, thank you for commenting and I appreciate you watching!

[@johndough4338]

Since the pandemic started, I purchased a korg electribe, a 1010 black box, and a Roland 404 mk2. I just recently purchased a newly used upgraded 2tb drive Akai force. Keep in mind, everything I purchased is unused, & still new in the box. My question is by me just recently getting the Akai force, Will the other units that I mentioned still be needed? Someone please let me know. Also keep in mind that I left this music making hobby alone back in 2005, and at that time,I was only working with a boss dr5 drum machine, and a boss br-8 digital 8 track recorder. But because of my son, I'm trying to get back into the mix of things, and I don't know anything about using a daw or computer based software. So I'm looking for the easiest way to get back into things, and get rid of whatever items that I don't need. I actually purchased a few cool used vintage machines to like a rarely used Yamaha rms1, Beat thang, and a Roland sp505 sampler as well, but I'm only focused on the first items that I mentioned at the beginning of this message. Thanks in advance for any help that anyone may give me. Thank you for reading this

[@danieklerr]

Hello.. Congratulations on getting back into making music! What you use really depends on what you want to do with music, to be honest. Since it has been almost 20 years, I would sit with one instrument alone until you can make songs or beats with it easily. The 404 mk2 is fun, but it's an unusual workflow, with the best users almost using it for finger-drumming. The Blackbox looks super cool, but it also seems like a lot of menu-diving to access all the features. The Akai Force is honestly not that easy to get into, although once you start to learn it it becomes a lot faster and easier, and it pretty much does everything. I think if I were you, I would sit with the Korg Electribe and make beat after beat, until it becomes second nature. This is a fantastic piece to get started again, I think. Anyway, I'm glad you got back into it. Hit me up anytime at SnowMetalUniversity @ gmail if I can help you in any way! Thank you for watching. :)

[@InkyDaCaT]

Awesome...can you telle if midi send working as Im not updated as scared as Force is master of synth set up?

[@danieklerr]

I haven't been using the Force for sequencing, since updating. I'll test this and get back to you.

[@InkyDaCaT]

@@danieklerr thank you Im so under using it. as master synth controller..,. Keep going. 🌟 Learning so much from you keep it lit💗🙌

[@jhbo84]

Are you using demos that came on the force?

[@danieklerr]

I'm not. Only my own compositions. I find writing on the Force to be very intuitive and satisfying! I'm sending out a bunch of free Force material this week. Send me an email at SnowMetalUniversity at gmail, and I'll make sure you get the downloads. Thank you for watching! :)

[@buddingsignal]

thank *YOU* very much. very cool indeed. 🙏 super good jam and possibly the best performance i've seen on the force. so fluid, you really played it like an instrument. i look forward to learning more from you. thanks in advance. 😁

[@danieklerr]

Wow, that's high praise! Thank you so much for the kind words, and thank you for watching. :)

[@HatchetHarry]

As always another great track 🤌 Have you got Jura yet? Personally i think you should get it for free to show us things we and they probably didn’t know about ❤️

[@danieklerr]

Haha, nice! Thank you for the kind words. I don't have it, but I'll probably scoop it up when it goes on sale. In 1990 my first studio had a Juno 106 in it, so the sound has a solid place in my heart. Thank you for watching. :)