SequencePad 1.0: MIDI for Android

Posted: September 17th, 2009 | Author: TimConneally | Filed under: Apps | Tags: 4, 4-track, Android, app, arrange, beat, beatmaker, composition, general, maker, MIDI, music, note, rhythm, SequencePad, sequencer, sequences, skyarts, song, step, tone, tool, track, tune | No Comments »

We still have a long way to go until Android has a significant number of music creation apps for creative types to choose from. It’s only a matter of time, sure…but things right now are a bit scant, so when a new music app comes along, I don’t hesitate to pick it up and give it a run through.

SequencePad (Skyarts), a 4-track general MIDI sequencer is available for ¥250 in the Android Market right now. If you work with MIDI, it makes a decent song sketchpad and supposedly exports sequences as .mid files which, as you know, can be edited in any number of desktop music suite, I personally use Logic Studio and FruityLoops.

However, I cannot guarantee that this app actually does export .mid files, because the simple fact is:

IT’S THE CRASHIEST APP I’VE EVER USED, and I never got far enough to find out if I could save as .mid.

Now I don’t think I’m unjustified in calling this app “crashy as fuck”, but SequencePad doesn’t just force close a lot (I can understand it to a point, it happens…that is something I’m used to), but this app would just turn my screen black and go completely unresponsive for 3-5 minutes. I had to fully reboot my phone three times in the course of reviewing it, and the worst part about it is that this fatal crash occurs when you want to exit the app. You’re not provided with a quit or close button, so you can either try to hit “back” or “home” and the result is the same: total unresponsiveness.

That’s not to say the app isn’t worth picking up, though. I mean, you really don’t have much of a choice if you’re an Android-using musician. You get every app at this point, support the developers, submit useful bug reports, and hope for updates.

On to what SequencePad can actually do.

There are a couple of very dumb things about the sequencing screen.  Each vertical line is a note in the scale and each horizontal line is one beat.  The red dots are notes that I’ve placed.   Down the right hand side, you see the numbers 1-4, and in the lower right hand corner, an arrow pointing down?  That’s SequencePad’s way of fitting in 8 beats.  On the first screen, you’ve got your first half, and then you click the down arrow to switch to the second half of the phrase on the second screen.

That’s not the dumb part.

The dumb part is that you can’t put a note on the ONE beat at the very top!!!  you have to start either on the upbeat or on the TWO.  See how the screen actually has space for five beats?  yeah…it doesn’t make any fucking sense.  You actually have to start playing the track to figure out where the downbeat is.  And there’s no metronome function to simply and clearly show you where to start.

If you like general MIDI and its familiar palette of 128 sounds and sixteen assignable drumkit slots, you’re fully covered.

There are four tracks of general MIDI instruments which can be either “tones” or “rhythm.”  The red number one in the picture above means i’m on track 1, and the purple button with the tools to the right of it lets me switch between sounds.  To switch tracks, you just push the number button in the middle and choose your track.

The compositional aspect of this app is intuitive and should feel familiar to experienced musicians. You can listen to a track individually, or with the rest of them at the same time, and you can alter the tempo with the metronome button.  The only thing I haven’t figured out (besides how to export .mid files) is how to sustain a note.  As far as I can tell, this app only allows one note at a time per four tracks.  That is, you can’t plonk down four tracks worth of sustained piano notes complete with overlaps.  If you can, I still haven’t figured out how.

This might be because the instructions are in pure Zero Wing Engrish.

“Edit Phrase Screen:  When it touches the measure eye part, the demiquaver can be added.  When it touches an existing note, it is possible to erase it.  However, harmony cannot be used.”

Okay, I sort of get what it’s saying, and let me respond by posing this question:

How perpetual notes? User cannot creation tone which have timbre and echoing over formerly stricken sound, and resulting phrase have redolence of Sierra On-Line vintage King’s Quest MIDI beeps.  Please to instruct.

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