Apparently, a DJ isn’t a DJ these days unless they make music. This is of course utter piffle, but that doesn’t mean that DJs should like to make music. After all, why play other people’s music when you can make your own? But the financial bar to entry is often high, and the learning curve steep. But options exist for those wishing to toe dip the music creation pool with more than just Ableton Live. Enter the minijam studio, a Kickstarter project that’s small in price and size.
The minijam studio is made up out of 5 elements — a drum machine, synthesiser, filter, mixer, and speaker, all of which are battery powered. The mixer is clever in that as a hub, it keeps everything else in sync, and records to SD card too.
This video of the drum machine element gives a good idea of what this set is capable of:
You should also check out this Soundcloud page to get a real feel for what the full minijam studio setup can do.
The really good thing…
…is the price. As a Kickstarter, you’d reasonably expect there to be an offer of some sort. But the price of these is the real draw. You’ve all missed out on the insanely cheap £99 for the set deal, and the £150 super early deal too. You can however get your hands on the full set for the paltry sum of £130 with a September 2017 delivery. You can get the individual items for £45 each, but why would you want to do that? This full setup is so compelling for the money and will hardly take up any real estate in your life, and barely make a dent in your pocket.
Summing up
While some of you will doubtlessly throw yourselves at the most incredibly expensive studio setup without every having pressed a note on a keyboard, the minijam studio is a very good place to start. It’s cheap and fun, and most notably actually capable of decent sound too. I’d jump at it, but I’m saving for an Aira setup.