I think their target audience are well-heeled Apple customers who like to imagine that they are musicians. Hacker culture doesn't have a "collector of expensive African originals" role, so "amateur who collects equipment far out of proportion to the time they invest in using any of it" has formed to collect the same psychological energy. It's about the combination of the creator fantasy on the surface backed up by the collector's motives beneath.
It is a very common way to present as a consumer in hobby markets, but it has elaborated itself to a great degree in this case because hobbyist musicians aren't surrounded by retired session artists the way, for example, woodworkers are surrounded by retired tradesmen.
You’re not totally wrong, just mostly. I use Apple stuff. I bought an EP-133 at launch. That part was true.
I also spent thousands of hours with a MIDI setup on my Amiga when I was in high school, teaching myself how to program the little FM synth my parents bought me for Christmas, and learning the theory of what makes a drum pattern sound good.
I don’t have thousands of hours available anymore. I still want to dabble sometimes though. Those are skills I worked very hard to learn, I enjoy exercising them, and I don’t want them to atrophy. That specific Teenage Engineering device has all the things I want to play with in a single portable box that also manages to be dirt cheap for what all it does.
Some people drive BMWs because they want to be seen driving them. Others drive them because — get this — turns out they’re nice cars to drive. At $300, my EP-133 isn’t exactly the BMW of musical instruments. It still does a hell of a job of scratching my musical itch. I couldn’t care less if anyone else ever sees me playing with it. I hope they never do. I got it for me, to enjoy, to make (bad) music with so I can get songs out of my head and into my ears. Sorry-not-sorry if that’s not “real musician” enough for some. I don’t care. I’m still having fun.
Yes, fun is the key value. It is fun to play with a music toy, with a near-useless interface, and still get 'something' out of it. That is a key factor in their design principles - make some expensive whimsical toy that GAS-afflicted punters will invest in.
Meanwhile, you can spend the money on even more powerful devices and avoid the frustrating UI experience for which Teenage Engineering are infamous.
Sure, you can make music with a toy - thats the beauty of music, not the toy.
Your comparison of TE to BMW is apt. As is OP’s comparison to Apple.
For those of us who have raced cars on a track, we see the BMW E36 M3 (90s) as the last proper race worthy vehicle. People who drive BMWs now just want a “nice car to drive” and spirited drivers don’t want anything to do with them.
Likewise, people who use TE instruments want to feel like they are making music, even though they are not using the hardware or software conducive to do so.
I agree with you that BMW and TE aren’t the gear that hardcore professionals would reach for, but enthusiasts who enjoy those respective activities can get a lot of enjoyment out of.
Both make stuff for people who enjoy nice things, no pretention required.
I glossed over the "Apple" dimension of elevating plastic stuff to luxury goods by being amazingly careful about injection molding marks etc, but I don't know a lot about it. I think the daring fireball guy is the recognized expert on the consumer experience side of it.
I don’t know, I got an OP-1 to play with many years ago and I seldomly recognise presets or effects when listening to music from talented and successful musicians. Which makes me realise that I have some skills issues when I compare with the noise I make.
Blasphemy! Thou shalt not present such claims without the proper scrolls and ledgers of sales to substantiate. Ist thou not acquainted with the more-expensive instruments of musical synthesis available?
I don’t think they make cranes tall enough to get you off that high horse. This thing is cheaper than my crappy middle school beginner trumpet was and professional musicians don’t have a monopoly on making or experimenting with music.
I am not a fan of Teenage Engineering (Disclaimer: I make audio products too).
The reason is, they set a standard for useless gimmicks which are far, far too expensive, designed to appeal to style over substance.
The OP1 is one of the most over-rated 'instruments' out there. It has a fancy, expensive OLED, a fancy, expensive casing, and useless gimmicks. The OLED never really shows you anything useful to the act of music-making. This is true of their Pocket Operators as well - its nearly all stylistic whimsy over functionality.
Save yourself the hassle and frustration of using a Teenage Engineering product and either buy the parts and make yourself an LMN3[0], or invest in devices that don't take the piss out of the user, such as the 1010Music Bluebox or Synthstrom Deluge.
The musical-instrument industry is rife with people who want to rip off the punters, who they know for a fact are easily afflicted with GAS (gear acquisition syndrome), resulting in customers across the globe who end up stashing their expensive, sexy-looking (but functionally retarded) toys in the drawer after a period of glib usage.
I am over TE. Just today I was looking at the OP-1 that's had a dead key since it was about a year old and been completely non bootable since a year or so after that. With the EP-133 I made the mistake of believing TE would do a better job of the practical design of their instruments. But it broke with interface problems reported by thousands of people. TE wasn't very supportive of my repair request and I don't have time to chase them for a replacement of something fundamentally broken. I don't want more objects that won't last.
Yes, this is a common refrain I have heard from musicians and hobbyists lured in by the aesthetics, only to be frustrated with the actual functionality after a week or two.
Fortunately, there are other manufacturers who "get it" and make instruments, not toys.
The problem of TE and self admitted by their CEO (in Figma's Config talk) is that they won't listen to users feedback. They are really good in design and terrible in compromising. They make toys, which can be used as musical instruments (like anything else that makes sound), the reason I call them toys is because they have the most glaring blind spots which prevent them to just be called "music instruments". Even their flagship OP-1 suffers from this and it has a ridiculous price tag. Till they get down from their high horse and start implementing basic functionality for musicians, these machines will never reach their potential.
The Pocket Operators are the best Price-to-ActuallyFunctional thing that TE produce. They are very immediate and fun to use. Everything else they do is extreme bait.
> The OLED never really shows you anything useful to the act of music-making.
Thou art prone to hyperbole! Said instrument of synthesis ("Operator-1") has a step sequencer, mixer, ADSR envelopes, recorder, and other useful indications for the bard. One ponders how thou hast not consulted the scrolls [1].
I owned an OP1 from the day it was released until 6 days after I discovered it rotting in a drawer, unused, in a room full of far better examples of synthesizer interface. I tried really hard to accept Teenage Engineering's priority of non-sequitur over functionality.
Sure, the OLED occasionally shows you a few things. But its completely useless compared to, say, the utility eked out of the display of the Deluge, or Bluebox. By comparison to either of these devices, the OP1 is unacceptably paltry for the price.
And then, there are the Pocket Operators. Don't get me started on just how useless that very expensive bespoke LCD print is to the musician...
Me too, which is why the whole Rabbit R1 debacle was so surprising, not just that they did the design for it, but that some of their leadership was so deeply involved in it.
I think that's a little unfair as an assessment of their design. Good design is generally considered to include functionality, and from what I've seen of their products they do generally have good functionality. Sometimes that might be a little at the cost of the visual design (the OP-1 doesn't look like the most accessible tool), but on the whole I think they make products that are good overall.
