energyXT

Good god you have to play it to believe it. Apps like eXT, Reaktor and Live are forging a new road of music (as music is always tied to the technology of a culture, but I'll save the rest for my thesis).

Many people have commented, "When or where do I get the best usage from eXT?". I ran into this conundrum myself. I needed a "higher" level view than the excellent "how-to" documentation has provided.

To get the most from eXT I have found it best to think of it as separate programs;
1) a 'sequencer', 2) a host 'chainer' 3) an 'eXperimental Toolkit', 4) a 'sample creator'

In standalone mode use it as a Sequencer. Open a sequencer, do all your composing work inside the sequencer (import or create MIDI tracks + load wav samples), then route these tracks to your VSTs then to a mixer module and save your mixdown to .wav and it's perfectly great for this. It's mighty powerful workflow, and can give you envelopes and automation for your MIDI and audio tracks. Don't feel like you are mising out on any power features by going this route. In fact the option the eXT VST wrapper gives you of morphing 2 presets from you VST is reason enough alone to use this as your sequencer. And remember, don't touch that arp module!

In chainer mode you will want to load into another host, say Fruityloops or Live. From here you will use the MIDI part, Audio parts, Arpeggiator, Chords and MIDI routing components. The main purpose here is to have your host trigger, via MIDI keys, complex patterns you have set up within eXT, say a MIDI Part which contain just 3 notes which then trigger 3 independant arp patterns (each differentiated by keyrange and velocity). Or you can have in s MIDI part a single note which will then be passed to one of the other modules to then trigger the arp, chord or audio pattern programmed within.
Sound complex enough for ya?? Leave that sequencer module alone, it will only add extra unneeded complexity to this application. Remember, this is why you are using a host sequencer.

In Standalone mode we mad scientist types can use it as a 'Toolkit' for sound mangling. While not meant to replace such higher-level tools such as Max/MSP, CPS, PD or Csound, eXT is, with VST plugin kits such as mda's Effect and Utilities Pack's an easy replacement for apps such as Audio Mulch. This where you might want to load up loop manglers, test tone systems or live performance functions.
Users in this mode will also find 'SynthEdit' to be a must for creating quick (in under 30 minutes) VST synths, fx and utilities.

As a sample creator you can link up an a MIDI comp -> to your drum-synth of choice and create mad beat and groove samples for use in you main sequencer (even if it's eXT). Hook an Arp (with drum-synth following) and/or Audio (with samples sliced for X-Phrase style triggering) comp after the MIDI part and get ready for massive mind-scrambling polyrythms!!

Agile, responsive, useful, fun = eXT.Read Review