Moldover's limited edition Mojo MIDI controller for serious musicians with seriously deep pockets (video)
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted January 14th 2010 11:14AM
posted January 14th 2010 11:14AM
When 21st century renaissance man Moldover couldn't find the controller with, and we quote: ""the intuitive tactile response" that he needed to supply the blips and buzzes that are his stock and trade as a performing musician, he built his own. And he'll sell you one -- for about $1,800 bucks. Mojo is a 12-inch by 18-inch (give or take) mahogany box with all the touch strips, arcade console buttons, knobs, faders, and toggle switches you need to rock the house party, club, or where ever it is that you move bodies (the morgue maybe? Sorry, that was a bad joke). This is a USB MIDI device, and as such there are no drivers to install -- but the dude does kindly supply an Ableton Live MIDI map. Oh, and the faceplate is scratch-resistant anodized aluminum. What -- you're still reading this? You'd better hurry up and order, only twenty will be made. Ships in March. Video after the break.
Damn. You're breaking this story before DJTechTools? Or I must've missed it.
Anyway, this is a highly specialized 'controllerist' unit. Most people will be happy with regular MIDI controllers.
@whiskers That's what I was thinking. As soon as I saw it on engadget, I went to the DJTT forums.
@frshurektor There are other sites out there that are way ahead of djtt. This was on the abletondj forums more than a day ago
@ezelkow1 Just to follow up, some sites I would recommend for news on this stuff are: createdigitalmusic, djforums, synthtopia, and skratchworx. Especially for NAMM news this time of year all of those will most likely be way ahead of djtt for the news. They've already covered all the new numark controllers and players as well as the prelease info from doepfer and the new akai controllers.
I'm still trying to figure out how to do a Haduken with this...
Every time I see a new midi controller, it becomes even more obvious that no one is going to make one to suit my needs.
Either I spend a fortune buy a sweet hand built one like this, or I spend close to a fortune and 3 months of my time to design and build one by hand.
Screw it; I'm just going to get a bunch of little cheap controllers and use them together.
@Cuervo So build one. You can buy prebuilt digital and analog to USB MIDI boards: http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=9108 . Find some pushbuttons, potentiometer knobs/sliders/touch strips and put them on a panel: http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/categories.php?c=145 . Wire the whole thing up and build an enclosure and you're set.
@dingus
You can also get the MIDI boards and other bits to build your own from Hale: http://www.halemicro.com/Products/Products.html
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@Cuervo All retail midi controllers are grossly overpriced, you can build your own for about a third of the price.
@SirNoDroin Actually, I would argue the opposite. The economies of scale allow retail manufacturers to build controllers at a cost far below small-run controllers.
@SunDre Looks like Sparkfun is reselling the Hale board. The Hale breakout boards are worth it for anyone who doesn't want to crimp or solder the ribbon cables.
WANT!
...but can never have :(
I can see why you why engadget recommends deep pockets. This unit wouldn't fit in your pants otherwise.
Old School Beautiful
1,800 dollar bucks?
@Zhuzhu Dollar bucks are the best kind of bucks!
other then the wood, all the other componets of this box would be >200 if purchased retail from a electronics supplier.
I guess the wood box would retail for around another 200-300
so what the 1,300 dollar markup going to?
@SirNoDroin
@SirNoDroin Are you counting the cost to design and machine a small run of custom faceplates? How about the cost of the PCB and/or the interconnects between the electronics and the controls?
Those touch sensor strips aren't cheapo pots. That twist-lock USB connector alone costs more than $10 at retail. I think you're vastly underestimating the price premium from the manufacture of premium small-run products.
@SirNoDroin touch sensor strips that I have bought in the past are like 10-15 bucks a pop for a 24 inch one, I'd imagine that the shorter ones are cheaper. I do admit i left them out of the equation, but, even with 10 of them our grand total has hit around 300-400 bucks.
less than 200 not more
If you're buying from Moldover, you can count on waiting a really long time to receive what you ordered. And you'll probably not get exactly what you paid for. -from personal experience
@crapNstuff
Bought a TheraminCD from Moldover. Came in 3 weeks, worked great.
What's your gripe and taking forever and not working as described?
@littlebeastsf I'm just bitter because I ordered 2 of the large theremin albums. A month and a half had passed when I got them and what I received was one large one and one small one. Out of empathy I didn't contact him for a return but I still am a bit irked by it.
@crapNstuff A friend of mine was concerned about your post so he sent me a link. Sorry to hear about the mix up. It was crazy dealing with the flood of orders from all the Engadget attention back in August. If you send me your mailing address I can ship you another Awesome Edition.
Cheers,
( ! )
@moldover white faced.... WOW Thank you, sir. I'll do that.
Can I hook that up to my xbox and play Street Fighter?