Sometimes cool bits of kit sit around undiscovered for ages. The other day I was getting a bit frustrated with the Arturia Minimoog because I needed to play with the cut-off and resonance at the same time to produce the sound I was after. I was about to map the controls to some knobs on my keyboard but that means I have to turn away from the screen to operate it. I spotted the Nocturn box under a bunch of magazines, dusted it off and plugged her in. After a fair bit of faffing around downloading the software and letting Automap (whatever that is) scan and relabel all my plug-ins it was ready to go. Wow, what a revelation - loaded up the Minimoog and the Nocturn lit up like a christmas tree with the knobs mapped to exactly the controls I wanted - I didn't have to do anything! Whatever plug-in I loaded the Nocturn was intelligently mapped to the most useful knobs and controls.

I know this is not a new product and i'm not going to go into any particular depth here but after using it for five minutes I knew that this box is never going to leave my desk (unless i'm gigging with it) and I thought it was worth sharing my enthusiasm. You can get a Nocturn for under 70 quid and for that you get a pretty, sturdy, plastic box with 9 knobs, a cross fader and 16 buttons. It's nicely laid out, great little LED's and this fabulous autotouch function where the software knows which knob you're touching as soon as your fingers meet the plastic. 

The middle knob is called the "Speed Dial" knob and this has a slightly different function - it controls whatever parameter you are currently hovering the mouse over. Slap the mouse pointer over the EQ gain and Speed Dial controls it until you let go of the knob (autotouch at work). Steinberg have borrowed this idea for the big knob on their CC121 controller. If the plug-in you're controlling has more than 8 controls then the Nocturn allocates them to pages and you can flick through them with the page +- buttons.

The key to all this, as well as with all the other Novation controllers, is the amazing Automap software. Automap sort of piggy backs itself onto any plug-in and translates the incoming control data to the plug-ins parameters. It creates its own GUI, a sort of ghostly apparition that sits semi-transparent over the plug-ins GUI - you can move it or turn in off if it gets in the way but it shows you all the currently mapped controls and allows you to learn new ones or edit existing ones. When I first heard about Automap it was this GUI overlay that put me off, it sounded like something that would really get in the way - but it doesn't because you turn switch it on and off with the touch of a button.

These things aren't new, it's just that I haven't tried them before :)
This little controller and the Automap software is one of the most brilliant things I have ever used. I've used dozens of different controllers over the years and none have actually come into regular use. I have a great Korg Kontrol 49 and the controls only come into use at gigs where they control levels in Live - i rarely use the knobs and sliders when making music because it's such a fuss to setup. The Nocturn on the other hand is so simple, Automap so seamless that I don't know why you haven't got one already or why anyone would buy any controller other than a Novation one.

Go and get yourself one - It's blooming marvellous.
http://www.novationmusic.com