Rainy Day Hailstorm, a touchy groovebox with samples and synthesis

Rainy Day Hailstorm is a new fascinating touchy portable groovebox with a hybrid sound engine from the designer Otem Rellik.

Otem Rellik. This name is familiar to some readers. In recent years, the developer has regularly released fascinating electronic instrument projects but with a downer. All these were done in extremely small quantities as it was previously just a hobby for Otem. Projects like the Arcus or Cirrus 2 were sold out in just a few hours…

But things have changed. Rainy Day Electronic Instruments is a new company that is turning its hobby into a profession. The first product under this brand is a groovy affair: Hailstorm.

Rainy Day Hailstorm

Hailstorm is a new unique groovebox, featuring both samples and synthesis. The operation concept is striking. In addition to classic elements such as knobs and buttons, there are touch strips with which you can operate the groovebox. 

For example, it handles the recording of the sounds into the sequencer. There is no classic XoX-style sequencing onboard. Instead, you can use the touch strips with the trigger feature. With more intensity, you get more sounds into your pattern.

The four tracks, the core of the Rainy Day Hailstorm, each control an internal drum Synthesizer and a sample simultaneously. With the mix control, you can smoothly crossfade between the synthesis and the samples. That sounds interesting. 

Rain Day, aka Otem, doesn’t tell us how deep the synthesis goes or whether there are different drum models to explore. On the unit itself, you can control the level, pitch, decay, shuffle, and effects for each track/sound using the touch strips.

On the sample side, you can load your sample using a SD card. Once you start the unit, these, then, are loaded into the RAM, which offers a maximum of 8 MB of sample capacity for 12 kits. It is not a unit for long samples but more for drums or short samples.

Effects

Additionally, the Rainy Day Hailstorm features global decay and reverb controls on the front panel. According to the developer, you can choose between five global effects types: reverb, beat repeat, global pitch, cutoff filter, and granular delay. Like the synth/sample parameters, they also offer parameter automation

Right under the touch strips, you can also find four buttons that serve as track mutes. This way, you can quickly add variety to patterns or to your performance.

On the connection side, it has a stereo output, a MIDI in/out on TRS-A, a USB port for power, and MIDI and analog sync in/out. Thus, you can also connect it to your other gear with a sync option.

First Impression

A refreshingly different approach to a groove box. Instead of step sequencing, recording touch movements is something is different. Looks very fun. It’s certainly not a super deep groove box like an MPC. But probably a great addition to a mini pocket synth setup.

Rainy Day Hailstorm is available now for $495 and is hand-made. 

More information here: Rainy Day

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