WingNews logo WingNews
top | item 23514755

(no title)

__max__ | 5 years ago

I too feel a little cynical, because I built basically exactly this back in 2012. Before Google, and before Ableton. AFAIK, it was the first grid sequencer online. The first version used the Mozilla audio API, before Web Audio was even a thing. I wish I was credited for the inspiration somewhere, but I guess it's very possible that this is an independent reinvention.

I called it MusicToy: http://maximecb.github.io/MusicToy/#aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...

It's almost exactly the same, with the pattern encoded in the URL, but it also has drum samples, and it has very few dependencies (no need for node or any web frameworks). I personally prefer having time go from left to right because that's how most sequencers work, and our monitors tend to be wider than they are tall.

I also made an updated, more advanced version (MusicToy 2) in 2019: https://mt2.musictools.live/

discuss

order

samizdis|5 years ago

Coldcut, a Brit electronic music duo who also dabbled in audio/video mix software, made a simple online music tool for Absolut Vodka in 1998. (Absolut was targeting the youth market and set up a site called Absolut DJ.) Coldcut's thing was a simple grid on which you placed sound effects/samples sprites. A dot moving through the grid would play each in turn as it hit them. It was really good fun, but I can't find it now. Might have been made in Flash - or perhaps it was still known as Shockwave Flash back then.

Here's an archive article about Absolut's campaign:

https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/absolut-vodka-launche...

Coldcut's Wikipedia entry:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coldcut

reitzensteinm|5 years ago

Tone Matrix predates yours by many years and was popular at the time. If you weren't aware of it, you should charitably assume OP independently built this too.

gregschlom|5 years ago

Yes, was going to say the same thing. I was playing with Tone Matrix way back in 2006 I think. It was built with Flash, and died with the rest of the flash web.

Edit: original link to tone matrix: http://lab.andre-michelle.com/ToneMatrix

__max__|5 years ago

Tone Matrix isn't a grid sequencer though, but fair enough, I should have said the first JS-based grid sequencer, not the first grid sequencer online.