Description

XENOTACT

Biomechanical Granular Organism for Kontakt 7

by Sick Noise Instruments

Feed It Two Sounds. Watch Them Mutate.

XENOTACT is an experimental dual-layer granular instrument that transforms ordinary audio into evolving soundscapes, cinematic textures, frozen drones, alien atmospheres, and unpredictable sonic organisms.

Drop in two sounds—a vocal, piano note, field recording, synth, percussion hit, piece of metal, or almost anything else—and XENOTACT tears them apart into thousands of microscopic grains before rebuilding them into something completely new.

No endless preset browsing. No complicated programming. Feed it sound and start exploring.

Enter the HIVE

At the center of XENOTACT is the HIVE—a large XY touch matrix that lets you explore both samples as if they were a single living organism.

Move through Specimen A and Specimen B simultaneously, scanning different regions of each recording and continuously changing the source material feeding the granular engine.

A second XY control manipulates the behavior of the grains themselves, moving effortlessly between smooth evolving textures, dense clouds, fragmented glitches, and chaotic microscopic movement.

Every gesture is smoothly interpolated, allowing slow movements to become long, evolving sonic transformations.

Bring Your Own Sounds

XENOTACT is designed to turn your recordings into playable instruments.

Simply drag and drop WAV or AIFF files directly into the interface. XENOTACT automatically detects their length and displays each specimen as a waveform.

Adjust the START and END markers to isolate exactly which section of the recording you want the granular engine to consume.

Then enter the HIVE and start mutating it.

Three Ways to Lose Control

FREEZE

Capture a single moment and lock it into a sustained granular texture. Turn tiny fragments into endless drones, pads, and atmospheric layers.

PARASITE

Let XENOTACT take control. The organism begins moving by itself, continuously drifting through sample positions, grain sizes, and scatter to create textures that evolve without manual input.

XENO

Push the engine into alien territory. Grains jump through octaves and fifths, generating strange harmonics, unexpected overtones, and otherworldly tonal structures.

And when you need instant inspiration, hit RANDOM to generate an entirely new texture within carefully controlled musical ranges.

Shape the Organism

Go deeper with 16 dedicated granular and sound-shaping controls, including:

Density · Grain Size · Window Shape · Scatter · Drift · Pitch · Warp · Stereo Width and more.

From smooth cinematic pads to unstable digital swarms, subtle movement to complete granular destruction, XENOTACT gives you direct control over how the organism behaves.

Built-In FX

Push your textures further with an integrated effects chain:

• FILTER — Resonant low-pass filtering for sculpting and darkening textures
• ECHO — Delay for rhythmic movement, depth, and spacious repeats
• VOID — Large atmospheric reverb for sending sounds into massive spaces

Fully Playable. Fully Automatable.

XENOTACT isn’t just a sound-design experiment—it’s a playable Kontakt instrument.

Play your creations across the keyboard with up to 8 voices of polyphony, transpose your specimens naturally, and use the sustain pedal to hold evolving textures.

Nearly every part of the organism can become part of your performance.

Automate knobs, switches, XY movement, sample markers, and other parameters directly from your DAW to create complex evolving sequences and cinematic transformations.

A Living Instrument

XENOTACT doesn’t behave like an ordinary sampler.

Its animated biomechanical interface houses a resident alien organism that is constantly moving, reacting, and responding to your performance.

Feed it audio.

Move through the HIVE.

Freeze it. Infect it. Mutate it.

Then see what comes back.

Perfect For

Cinematic Sound Design · Dark Ambient · Sci-Fi · Horror · Drones · Evolving Pads · Experimental Music · Game Audio · Trailers · Electronic Music · Atmospheric Scores

Key Features

• Dual-layer granular engine
• Large interactive HIVE XY matrix
• Drag & drop your own WAV and AIFF files
• Independent waveform displays for both specimens
• Adjustable START / END sample regions
• Live waveform playheads
• FREEZE granular capture
• PARASITE autonomous movement system
• XENO octave and fifth grain mutation
• Intelligent RANDOM texture generation