I’ve been working on my thesis app this whole time in the serene knowledge that there’s very little precedent for what I’m trying to do. However, I just learned that I’m wrong, that there’s an app out there with a lot of broad similarities to mine: Loopseque, made by Casual Underground. At first glance, I was alarmed; had I been scooped? Has all my work been in vain? The superficial similarities are hard to miss:
Right off the bat, you’ve got the same concept that I’m working with: concentric rings divided into sixteen steps, wrapping a time-unit box system into a loop. Loopseque also has some cool features that I hadn’t thought of. You can have four loops running simultaneously, two for drums and two for synths. There are some nice effects, filters and delays and such, and while the interface for applying them is a little confusing, it’s quite graphically appealing.
The coolest feature in Loopseque is the sequencer for which it was named. My idea for a sequencer was to show miniature graphics of your loops lined up along the bottom of the screen, and that they’d just play sequentially. Loopseque uses a similar paradigm, but it’s better. Instead of progressing through the sequence in a linear fashion, your loops are arranged into columns, and you can jump freely around them the way you would with clips in Ableton Live Session View. The current loop cycles around until you switch to another one, giving the whole app an appealing DJ feel.
Loopesque also has a kids’ version with very Katamari-esque graphics.
I thought I could differentiate myself with my app’s education component, but no, Loopesque has “Master Class” mode, which teaches you how to make beats. Fortunately, while the lessons are fun, they don’t go very deep into the musical content. You’re given blank patterns with blinking boxes that you tap to activate. Little text boxes pop up to explain what you’re doing. However, the text isn’t very illuminating. You’re given unhelpfully vague advice like “pay attention to the interaction of the bass and drums.” There’s no real mention of musical terminology like strong beats and weak beats. There is some discussion of syncopation, but the text uses the words “symmetric” and “asymmetric” incorrectly in trying to explain it. Reading this, I’m feeling more optimistic about my app’s prospects.
Loopseque walks you through some generic patterns: downtempo, house, etc. However, it doesn’t really explain what makes one pattern different from another. By working with actual patterns from actual music, I think I’ll be offering a richer experience. I’m going to be more careful to talk about subdivisions of the beat and how they go from stronger to weaker, how syncopation is a form of surprise, how the different rhythm styles center heavily on the placement of the kick drum.
I also like my idea about beat tutorials better. Loopesque uses a paint-by-numbers approach; you’re told which beats to activate. My tutorials will give you an existing pattern that you’ll then manipulate. For example, you’ll be presented with the break from “Take Me To The Mardi Gras,” and all of the sounds will be locked except for the bells. You can experiment with your own bell patterns while the underlying groove remains solid. As you get more advanced, the sample patterns will have more parts unlocked, so for example, you can take the Funky Drummer and move the hi-hats and snares around. Or you’ll be given Impeach The President with the kick drums removed, and it will be up to you to place them where you see fit.
In spite of their superficial similarities and beginner focus, then, the major difference between Loopesque and my app is going to come down to audience. Loopesque is going for the casual market, would-be DJs, “non-musicians,” people seeking entertainment. To that end, perhaps to appease investors, Loopesque is trying to gamify. From the web site copy:
Despite its apparent simplicity, Loopseque is a challenge to the musician. How fast you can change the patterns, which patterns you create, what effects you use – that’s what makes the difference and determines the quality of music material.
Loopseque is a game in which “achievements” are measured by the richness of sound created by the musician on the fly, and “high score” is the number of listeners who enjoy the music of the artist.
It makes sense for an app like this to have a community aspect; you want people to keep coming back, not just fiddle with it for a few minutes and forget it. It makes good business sense to want to have a competitive game aspect to that community. People love games. But does it make sense for a music tool like this? I’ll freely admit to having competitive emotions when I monitor my Soundcloud stats. But I wouldn’t say I’m engaged in a “game” — I like seeing people listening to and downloading my tracks, but there’s no win condition that I’m trying to attain. Aside from a straight popularity contest, how do you even determine if a piece of music “wins” or “loses”? The web site copy above evades the question. Can’t a music app just exist to make music with? Why does everything have to be a game?
The more I work with Alex Ruthmann, the more clear it becomes that I’m aiming at the education market. Maybe my app is going to appeal more to nontraditional education than K-12 classrooms, but it’s nevertheless going to act as a music teacher, not a game. I want my app to take you from ground floor beginner-level to a place where you understand drum patterns to the point where you can program them in any software environment, or even play them live. You’ll walk away with a sense of why some grooves work better than others, what their history is, what the pop cultural reference points are. Loopesque wants to be a destination; I want my app to be a gateway.