The Fraktor sequencer was inspired by a bunch of other great sequencers made with Max For Live, as well as previous LDM midi toys such as PreRoll, Oblek and Xenbeat, but with an urge to go deeper into individual controls at the subdivision level.

At its heart is a step sequencer with up to 16 steps, variable speed and each step able to be subdivided up to 16 divisions. Any step can also be set as Random subdivision, which means that every time the sequence plays through, a random number of subdivisions will be set for that step. Right away we can also get hands on with the velocity levels of each division, and in the case of Random mode, we get a function which will set the relative velocity level from the first to last subdivision. It’s also possible to set velocity variation amounts for each subdivision.

Going through the display tab, we can then get into more deep controls for each sequencer, parameters for step pitch, subdivision pitch offset, subdivision octave offset, step probability and subdivision probability. Even using only a single sequencer, we can get a lot of work out of Fraktor, triggering many different hits or notes, and getting a lot of randomization of playback and velocity levels.

Instead of including different playback modes such as reverse and palindrome, Fraktor sticks with a left-to-right playback through the steps, but next to each sequence, we have a slider to add some amount of randomisation of the playback. Crank it up for complete chaos, or keep it low for just the odd glitch in playing the ‘wrong’ step sometimes.

All in all, Fraktor gives you a lot of control, from the sequence level down to the subdivision, with a bunch of ways to add variation and probability to make creative and evolving patterns.