The Novation Circuit: How Novation could quadruple their sales and make the Circuit the new Micro Korg

The Novation Circut could bee the best selling electronic instrument since the Micro Korg.

And I promise I will reveal give up the good shortly, but first let me set the stage on which circuit currently finds it's self-playing the role of "Black guy in a red Starfleet uniform who has just beamed down to the planet in the opening scene of an episode of Star trek"  (for non-Trekkies: That guy is usually dead within 90 seconds)

Do my claims of The Novation Circuit being a single feature away from DX7-like sales figures Sound like a bit of an Irish news report on my behalf? Well.then lend me your ear for a few and I will replace slack-jawed, drooling ignorance with a knowing wink and vaguely gay bro-down-fist-bump,

Y'see it goes like this.....

The circuit is about one-year-old and I have owned it for most of that. Novation has delivered on what they promised it would be: great sketch pad for musical ideas, not hard to learn to use, portable....blah fucking blah blah blah....

Yes "Blah" has been the albatross around this unobtrusive things  neck all along. While something like the T.E OP-1 has a very distinct sonic verve and Korg's Volca 's have a design conceit that allows them to appeal as collectibles in addition to being instruments. The Circuit has in some ways been cast as the unfortunate role of "always the bridesmaid" thought it out muscles both of those units in terms of practical usability and the flat out ability to turn the song in your head into a reality in as little time as possible.

Circuit's synths are of the "straight out of 2003 "VA variety, and now that the sheep-le have been allowed to taste the bourgeoisie boon known as "Analog"  it's a little harder to fire up the Micron and be like "Yay....sounds great" They don't sound bad mind you, they just lack sonic scrotum, and I find myself wishing they had gone the JDXI route and put two cheap analog oscillators in there instead. I think people would have been more attracted to 2 note polyphony as long as it had the unique boot-to-the-nads that analog brings to the table. Think a two voice Korg Monotribe with sample flip. Lacking any type of specific sex-appeal one tends to forget what a great tool (Grow up) the circuit actually is. And sadly, It's generic EDM sound leaves it feeling like an issue of PLAYBOY in the era of internet porn.

But this is not about what I would have done differently, it's what novation can do right now to turn this mobility scooter around and get to the Wallmart McDonald's before they start serving breakfast only.

I'm going to share two keywords with y'all you may not be familiar with, so pay attention:

ROCK N' F*CKING ROLL

For those who have no idea what I'm talking about go pick up a copy of FLASH BASTARD Rock N' Roll Must Be Destroyed or the more recent (And dance-friendly) Flash Bastard Wild 

Try Some Girls By the Rolling Stones, Raw Power By Iggy Pop Never Mind The Bollocks By the Sex Pistols, Or The NEW YORK DOLL'S self-titled debut. Here you will learn what kids did before Garageband when they wanted to get laid. There may even be a few of them left, some of you may have actually spotted one and watched your father chase it out of the back yard with a Golf Club,. But regardless of whether you have seen them, when I'm wearing my producer hat, I see them all the time...

And do you know what they ask for in their recordings? Nearly Everytime?

"We want to "electro-fy" our sound"

Yes, that's what they want, Synths drum loops, blips and bloops, so they pay ME to give it to them. Because  as guitar players and drummers these desirables seem as exotic as a Russian-speaking prostitute having a black Friday sale, They want to do business but they don't know how to say "20 dollar blow-and-go please?" in Russian.

Circuit has all the features needed to be the rosetta stone for illiterate rock musician's wanting to update their sound. And to bring that sound to the stage and practice space with zero hassle. When I do it for them i email tracks with instructions about "The click is on the left, so tell the front of house guy to feed that to your drummer and the right goes to the house" I know what I'm telling them to do is new and scary, and that most of them chicken out unless their management makes them do it.

But the circuit would be so easy, novation needs to tell rock bands that the simple pattern sequencing and recordable macros will have them sounding like Trent Reznor in 5 minutes, any member of the band (Maybe not the drummer......or bass play....definitely not the guitar players, just let your singer handle it) could operate it on stage. It would be simple to move, compared to the silly amount of gear these people set up every night, and limits them just enough so they won't get out of control with it. 2 VA synths and four sample flip spots is perfect for adding electro favor to a rock-band, to them it's instant big production in one easy box, they could even put 808 booms for the top of choruses reverse symbols leading into 1/2 time bridges. Drum loops for that super original "Indy dance kinda song" they are so proud of. I could go on and on, but where the synth community doesn't think  there is enough, Rock bands will have 20 times what they can handle. Novation just needs to ad one thing before they start trading with the Neanderthals...

.....Click track assignable to headphones.

Yep, that's all. Just so their drummer can have a click sent to him, while the main output goes to the board. Whether that drummer can actually PLAY to that click is not Novation's problem. If they market to bands as being the one stop shop backing track solution in a box, they will come by the millions.

And that is the second key element in all of this, Novation have to dump some money into advertising themselves to people who have never heard of them, but for every dollar going out, two will come back, this is a goldmine in a stream,all novation have to do is trip and fall into it. Don't waste anymore time marketing to Synth-snobs, they will never be satisfied until it out performs a Prophet 5 and gives them a hand-job while doing it (Even then they would be like "Too soft, harder HARDER! Novation! We need a firmware update!") Oh and it goes without saying get session chaining implemented imeadietly, the cavemen will need this to fling poop to their desired locations.

10 years ago, you could walk into any club in LA and you were guaranteed to see a micro Korg on stage with bands desprite to update thier sound/. That is why the Mircro Korg sold so well, not because the synth people bought it but because those who would usually NOT buy a synth bought it. Right now they aren't buying much of anything, maybe a Volca or two but they learn pretty fast that using that with their band would require more know-how and elbow grease than they are willing to invest. (Volcas are WAY better than they have any right to be, if you keep selling yours....CONGRATS! You're dumb!

There is no other product out there today who can cater to this market the way the circuit can, and after one year of reasonable but underwhelming sales and reviews I would think it's designers would be ready to, as they say in the rock n' roll world...

ROCK OUT WITH YA C$CK OUT!

P.S Novation, you take my advice? then do the right thing and cut me a nice check,