In many respects, Teenage Engineering is the tech company that can do no wrong. Throughout its relatively short history (its first product, the OP-1 synthesiser, was released in 2011), the Swedish company has created a raft of meticulously designed and extremely expensive pro audio gear (not least the OP-1 Field), along with a host of playful, far more affordable sound toys (see the PO-80 Record Factory). Its instruments are covetable, collectable, and hugely influential in terms of design, often using esoteric interfaces as a way to short-cut the path from idea to sound to song.
Teenage Engineering EP-1320: a portal into a world of imagined medieval grooves
Humour is an essential ingredient in the TE recipe (even if detractors claim that the company’s prices are the punchline). This is the new EP-1320, a complete overhaul of last year’s compact EP-133 K.O.II groove machine. The joke, if you can call it that, is that the EP-1320 presents itself as a portal into a world of imagined medieval grooves, thanks to a completely redesigned interface and UI that takes inspiration from the realm of scrolls and manuscripts.
Lutes, chants and hurdy-gurdys have a 14th-century timbre
The onboard sounds also have a distinctive 14th-century timbre, with sample sets that include lutes and chants, hurdy-gurdys and acoustic drums and other quirky sound sets, all of which can be played on the device’s pads or via an external midi keyboard. This is idiosyncrasy taken to its logical extreme – ‘instrumentalis electronicum is the ultimate, and only, medieval beat machine’, reads the blurb – but musicians of all stripes will lap up the chance to break out of the rigid grid of established 21st-century techno sounds.
Whether this box of tricks will usher in a new age of medieval-inspired electronic music remains to be seen. Nevertheless, the onboard sounds and sequencer (which can be augmented by importing and slicing up your own samples) give off a vibe that’s part Monty Python, part Midsommar, potentially birthing a form of weird folk that looks to even further into the past.
Teenage Engineering is certainly leaning in hard to an off-beat aesthetic of magick, myth and strange symbolism. A leather keychain, ‘medieval quilt bag’ carrying case, and a 10in record ‘full of medieval sounds recorded by real medieval musicians on real medieval instruments’ to be enjoyed and sampled, are all being made available.
The EP series looks set to become TE’s next playground, following on from the ultra-simple Pocket Operator line of tiny synths and drum machines. We’ll keep you posted on the next stop on this intriguing audio journey.
Teenage Engineering EP-1320 Medieval, £299, teenage.engineering/store
