Rules and rack
Rules and Rack are the two last Track pages. Rules let one track change its steps when another track plays. Rack turns a track into a four-lane drum rack. Both are off until you turn them on.
Rules
A track has two rules, A and B. Each rule watches a source track and, when a condition holds on that track’s last step, changes this track’s step.
Open Rules with RIGHT from Evolution, or hold EDIT and tap pad 46 in the picker.
| Setting | Rule A pad | Rule B pad | Values |
|---|---|---|---|
| Source | 82 | 75 or 76 | 41 Off; 42 to 48 are tracks 1 to 7; 31 is track 8. A track can use itself as its source |
| Condition | 84 or 85 | 78 or 61 | 41 Played, 42 Not played, 43 Accented |
| Action | 87 or 88 | 63 or 64 | 41 Mute step, 42 Accent, 43 Fill, 44 Skip, 45 Transpose |
| Amount | 72 or 73 | 66 or 67 | Used by Transpose, in scale steps: 41 to 48 are -12, -9, -7, -5, -4, -3, -2, -1; 31 to 38 are +1, +2, +3, +4, +5, +7, +9, +12 |
- The actions: Mute step silences the step. Accent raises its velocity. Fill turns a rest into a hit. Skip silences the step and leaves it out of the cycle count, so the pass takes longer. Transpose shifts the notes at play time without changing the stored steps.
- Muted tracks are left alone, and a locked step only takes Accent.
- The condition is read from the source track’s last step that was processed.
- Each tick reads every track’s state from the tick before, so the order of the tracks does not change the result.
- Rules are off by default and are saved with the project. The companion window shows them on one line, such as RULES A: T3 played > skip.
Rack
The rack gives a track four lanes, one drum per row of the step area. Lane 1 is the track’s own steps. Lanes 2 to 4 are extra drum lanes. Each lane has its own MIDI note.
Open Rack with RIGHT from Rules, or hold EDIT and tap pad 47 in the picker.
| Setting | Step pads | Values |
|---|---|---|
| Rack on | 82 | 42 on, 41 off |
| Channel | 85 or 86 | 41 is the device drum channel (channel 10 on the Circuit Tracks); 42 to 48 and 31 to 38 are channels 1 to 15 |
| Note, lane 1 | 71 or 72 | 41 follows the device’s default drum note. Pad 31 is that same note, 42 to 48 are 7 to 1 semitones below it and 32 to 38 are 1 to 7 above it |
| Note, lane 2 | 75 or 76 | As lane 1 |
| Note, lane 3 | 61 or 62 | As lane 1 |
| Note, lane 4 | 65 or 66 | As lane 1 |
Not yet verified on hardware
The rack is described from the app code. It has not been tried with a Launchpad and a drum machine.
With the Circuit Tracks preset the four lanes start on notes 60, 62, 64 and 65.
Once the rack is on, Beats > Steps shows the four lanes:
- Tap a step in a lane to turn it on or off.
- Options 21 to 24 pick the page: steps 1 to 8, 9 to 16, 17 to 24 or 25 to 32. A page past the end of the length is dark.
- Press and hold a lit step to select it. The value row then sets its chance (41 to 48: 1/8, 1/4, 1/3, 1/2, 2/3, 3/4, 7/8, 19/20; tap the lit pad again to turn the chance off) and its velocity (31 to 38: 16 to 127).
- LOCK and a tap locks a step; CLEAR and a tap resets it.
Gotchas
- Generators (Euclid, accents, rotation, evolution and randomize) act on lane 1 only.
- A copy of a track made with DUP copies lane 1 only.
- Lane rotation is not built yet.
- Lanes are part of the pattern, so they switch with it. Projects saved before the rack existed have no lanes and load with the rack off.
- Track mute silences all four lanes.