Everything from beer to beef comes in craft varieties these days, so why not beats? So goes the thinking behind Irrupt, a new site offering "creative sound elements designed to inspire you and your productions." The three founders of the company—which began gathering sign-ups for it's beta launch last week—all carry serious bonafides in the world of electronic music. Chairman Eloy Lopez and A&R rep Brad Roulier are two of the three founders of Beatport, and Irrupt's CEO Jay Ahern is a veteran of Berlin techno institution Hard Wax.While the company is too savvy in its messaging to use words like "artisanal" or "craft" (leave that to the journalists), it's clear that the goal of Irrupt is to offer an elevated alternative to the traditional sound/sample packs that electronic music producers have been using for decades. Its first step, according to a recent interview with Resident Advisor, was to simply change the wording from "sample pack" to "sound product.""Doing something which may seem as simple as redefining a term internally has a huge impact in how we approach creative, production, marketing and even business development," said Ahern. This exercise in semantics is all fine and good, so long as you have a higher-quality product to back it up. To that end, Irrupt promises "'real deal' sounds rather than 'approximations'" in their offerings and insists that the "granular sounds" on offer will be made by top creators in each genre. However, they won't be trading on the names of these sound designers, nor will they feature Top Sales charts, which are found on pretty much every other online music retailer. The company hopes the absence of these typical sales tools will discourage customers from gravitating to the same sounds as everybody else, and encourage users to dig deeper and discover their own style.Sign-up for Irrupt beta at the website.
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