Akai MPC
More info
- Creator
- Roger Linn, Akai
- Released
- 1988
- Type
- Sampler and sequencer
The line of samplers with sixteen rubber pads and a built-in sequencer that defined how hip-hop got made for decades.
The MPC60 of 1988 was designed by Roger Linn, of LinnDrum fame, and sampled at 12 bits and 40 kHz. What made it indispensable was the timing: Linn's swing quantisation nudges every other sixteenth note slightly late, and the result felt more human than the rigid grids of its rivals. Producers sampled records, chopped them across the pads and played new patterns straight in.
The MPC3000 of 1994 went to 16 bits and became J Dilla's instrument; his deliberately unquantised grooves are still imitated in DAW templates. Linn moved on after that model and the brand changed hands in the 2000s, but the name survives: the 2017 MPC Live is standalone again, now with a touchscreen. The cramped memory of the early units left a sound that is now emulated on purpose.