Novation Launchpad 1.11

Not everyone is fascinated by music, and even less people are able to actually make a solid composition, but technology is making it easy for anyone to come up with a solid track and instantly gain recognition for it.

And it doesn’t get much better than Novation Launchpad, a live-performance, loop-based recorder that almost anyone can use to create catchy tunes with the ability to instantly share them or save them for offline listening.

Anyone can use it

Novation Launchpad is cleverly designed to communicate its purpose without too much explanation. You just start tapping away at the samples and the music begins to flow.

There’s a big record button at the top that you simply can’t miss, and the effects panels are touch-centric and very intuitive as well.

Some visual effects will provide feedback letting you know the effect you’ve had on your tune (such as the high-pass filter), and the color palette is very distinguishable and well suited for music making. It actually looks like a full-fledged live-performance rig.

Everything is explained swiftly in the welcome screen so you can get working in seconds, and you receive tips along the way as you use some things for the first time. Novation couldn’t have achieved a more user-friendly UI.

The app has gone through several redesigns over time and the latest one brought it up to date with the overall look and feel of iOS 8, which makes for great blending between the app and the operating system. The result is a tool that looks sleeker and feels a lot more responsive, which in the end is beneficial to those who want to concentrate on making music rather than worrying about what button to press on the app.

Use existing loops, import your own, mix and record

Launchpad features eight sessions that span different musical genres, including breaks, drum & bass, dubstep, hip hop, and various forms of house (classic, tech, trance).

Regular new content is offered via in-app purchase, but the built-in samples are more than ok to get a few tracks out.

You get, time stretching and synchronization, the ability to record and share your performances via Soundcloud, Dropbox, AudioCopy and email, and options to route your sounds to a compatible app. On iPad, you can control Launchpad with Novation hardware. Also worth noting is that the iPad interface is very different from that of the iPhone.

The tablet version is actually very suitable for live gigs, and it also includes a powerful edit mode.

Dynamic performance FX will make your track sound really pro-level. On iPad you also have the repeater and synced filter effects, while iPhone users get filter, stutter, gater and delay effects, all easily accessible during playback.

The features and the samples offered by Launchpad are normally paid commodities, but Novation somehow found the winning formula by throwing in all this for free, leaving people to decide for themselves if the trip to the Store tab is necessary (and most importantly, when). Sharing is fast and painless.

Add to watchlist:

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