Design Clipboard – Gizmos

Design Clipboard is a new series of articles I plan to write here on Horizontalpitch. As you can guess from the name, these articles will focus on design-related themes. Sometimes they will come in the form of longer, more in-depth writings, with a focus on a specific topic, but more often they will just be collections of loosely-related thoughts.

The Great Gizmo

I’ve just red the article “The Great Gizmo” by Reyner Banham, originally published in 1965 and it feels like a wonderful introduction for this series. It sparks many interesting questions related to electronic music instruments and their design.

Here’s a short quote which sums up one of the central points of the article quite well:

This is what makes Ole Evinrude’s invention of the outboard motor so triumphantly American an event. To fit an inboard motor to an existing boat requires craft skills and mathematical aptitudes of a sort normally found only in places with a long tradition of boat-craft, as in the maritime cities of Europe or New England, where boatyards, ship­wrights and the encrusted wisdom of ancient mariners was freely available. […] But you can order a stock outboard from the catalogue with the right propeller for its own power and your size of boat, fix it with two clamps, add fuel and pull the starter. So ideal, and so American is this solution, that other one-shot aids to the back-porch technologist have proliferated – to cite only one, the adapters that make it possible for any hot-rod-crazy to fit any engine to almost any gearbox and transmission.

If we look at it from the “gizmo perspective”, certain apps (as in phone and tablet apps) are the perfect gizmo. User experience design seems to be all about making things quick and easy, lowering the barrier as much as possible, so everybody can take a good looking photo, manage their-work life balance or recognize any type of flower. Admittedly this is an oversimplification. Apps like Audulus or Sunvox – just to make some examples – definitely require knowledge, practice and learning.

What about electronic instruments like synthesizers and drum machines? Are they the gizmos of the music world? Simple to use devices that enable everybody – even the most musically unskilled – to make some music? Again, it’s not that simple, although, if we look at features like auto-accompaignment and the “AI-powered”, assistive tools, there is a lot of “gizmo elements” to be found.

The Gizmo-ness of Marketing Copy

“Quick and easy” are recurring keywords in the advertising copy most music tech companies use to promote and sell their products. For some reason, it seems like electronic musicians don’t enjoy making music, and just want to be done with it as quickly as possible (I’m just teasing you here!).

One thing I noticed is that all-in-one-devices like grooveboxes seem to have a more pronounced focus on it than synthesizers, but this would definitely need some closer investigation. In the meantime, here’s a couple of quotes from various companies’ advertising copy:

Generate soul-stirring song ideas in seconds, and experiment with styles and variations to coax dancing lines and rhythmic patterns from your chords.

https://www.roland.com/global/products/j-6/

Whatever you’re looking for, you’ll find your sound fast. Don’t worry if you’re lacking inspiration […]

https://novationmusic.com/en/synths/mininova

Just select the music style/sound category you want and pick a sound!

https://www.korg.com/us/products/synthesizers/microkorg

Fast, intuitive, and fun way to create and perform tracks and beats

https://www.native-instruments.com/en/products/maschine/production-systems/maschine/

Create instinctively. Perform immediately.

https://novationmusic.com/en/circuit/circuit-tracks

This gets even more pronounced once so called “AI” enters the picture. One could say that “AI” algorithms are the ultimate, perfect gizmo.

[…] whether you’re a beginner or a pro, this tool makes things quick, intuitive, and fun. 

https://www.izotope.com/en/learn/how-to-use-mix-assistant.html

The Arpeggio module is an instant easy-to-use module, providing cool arpeggios to give you instant satisfaction

https://www.orbplugins.com/orb-producer-suite/

The app then adapts to your own style and it generates personalized patterns to achieve the perfect user experience

https://audiomodern.com/shop/plugins/playbeat-3/

Of course this is likely just scratching the surface of a pretty complex topic. Also the instrument’s design and the copy used to sell it might have very different goals.

Underground Instruments

Interestingly, the more you move away from the mainstream, the less gizmo-like instruments become.

Modular synths – at least in their original incarnation – require an assortment of skills, sound theory knowledge and even mathematical aptitude to be used to their full potential. Imaginative boutique instruments, like for example Ciat-Lonbarde’s, require both practice and learning to be played. Open-canvas devices like norns or Organelle are less about giving people a ready-made solution and more about empowering them to create their own.

Quick gratification and shallow learning curves are partially sacrificed in exchange for a long-term engagement with the instrument.

It should be noted at this point that instruments being “easy” and more widely accessible isn’t a bad thing at all. A lot of gatekeeping has been done by making things artificially complex and hard to learn. As always there is a subtle balance, which is difficult to attain, but which should be actively sought. A balance between things being approachable and rewarding early on, but at the same time allowing for personal, creative expression and long term engagement. Great instrument design is all about finding this balance.