Panda Bear

“I do love the Octatrack. I’m not a big fan of using a laptop on stage myself. I’m not opposed to it, I just never felt like I could figure out a way of doing it where I felt like I was still performing or that there was a flexibility to it. I know Daniel from Oneohtrix and, talking to him, he’s found a way to achieve that, but I haven’t really sorted it yet.

So, the Octatracks are essentially my way of having Ableton in a box if you deal with it a specific way. I’m basically taking stems of the studio recording over seven of the tracks, using the eighth as a master channel. Typically I’ll take drums, bass, weird percussion stuff, weird sound stuff and maybe a main melodic component so I know everything’s set up with that template.

There are two Octatracks, both of which contain the exact same information on the card and I kind of mix from one song to the next. Some nights I do it better than others but it’s essentially DJing the stems of the record," says Panda Bear, in this article.

Panda's favorite sampler.

"I've been using the Boss SP-303 almost exclusively (besides drums) for three years or so now. I think it's about time to move on, at least focus-wise. But it's been my favorite thing to use without a doubt." - Panda bear (Noah Lennox) for Pitchfork, February 15, 2007.

"I got this [Korg M3-M] workstation, it's usually part of a synthesizer, but I got the version that's just a module-- just a white box, basically. I found out that you could run a line input into the thing and affect that within the box. So, pretty early on in the process, I had this idea of just sticking a guitar into that; that was essentially going to be my setup."

On the last page of the article, an OP-1 can be spotted in front of Noah's laptop

At 5:55 theres a clear shot of the Panda Bear adjusting the 'intensity' knob on the RE-20.

In this tease for the A Day With the Homies EP, you can see the Digitakt interface with the song title being writen into the pattern.

"Maybe 90% of the bass sounds on the album are from [the Moog Voyager]. They’re brilliant synths and more convenient than the old ones with their MIDI capabilities," says Panda Bear, in this article.

As you can see in the proof image, Panda Bear is using a Roland SP-555 to make sampling with his guitar.

My friend Bradford Cox of Deerhunter was the first one to mention it. We went on tour together and we’d talk about how I used to use a cassette eight-track and that was essentially how I’d learned to record music and it was my favourite thing to use. I’d been using Cubase and he said I should really try Ableton - that coming from a four-track/eight-track mindset you could use it that way, and it was easy to use. It was on his advice that I started using it.”

Avey Tare is playing a Juno 60 in Animal Collective's My Girls music video.

Sampler?wise, Weitz and Lennox favour the Roland SP404 and the more recent SP555. "The SP404 was just what we started using,” Weitz says, "'cause it was what we could afford and it was the most simple thing. And now it's become an instrument that we know really well. It's really user?friendly. You can do things in real time on it. So we've gotten used to them. We almost may be approaching a point where we know them too well and it's time to try something else.”

In page 4 of this article Noah states that he uses the Apollo sound card, and that 70% of the plugins he uses are Universal Audio

In a feature by MusicRadar, Panda Bear discusses his studio setup, mentioning that he uses Yamaha HS50M monitors, which he appreciates for their quality. He notes that instead of a second set of monitors, he often tests his mixes on laptop speakers, acknowledging the prevalence of listeners using such devices.

Here he’s using it to run his samplers through

In a video of Animal Collective performing "Winter's Love," Panda Bear can be seen playing a Höfner Senator guitar. (Source: YouTube, Spiritinakhole)

According to the liner notes of his first, self-titled album, Panda Bear is credited with playing the Roland TB-303.

According to the liner notes of his first, self-titled album, Panda Bear is credited with playing the Korg 01/W FD.

According to the liner notes of his first, self-titled album, Panda Bear partially recorded "Panda Bear" using a Tascam Portastudio 488. This information is verified by the album's release details on Discogs.

The credits to his album "Reset" credit panda bear with playing the microfreak on the album

The credits to Panda Bear's album "Reset" specifically list him as playing the Vox Starstream guitar.

Panda Bear has been observed using the Fender Telecaster Thinline Black throughout his recent "Sinister Grift" tour, as documented in the YouTube video titled "Panda Bear - New album live at The Lexington, London, 10/12/2024" recorded by roustghoti.

Panda Bear is confirmed to have used the Korg Poly-800 during the recording sessions for "Merriweather Post Pavilion." This is evidenced by a photograph from Sound on Sound, where the synthesizer is visible in the upper right corner, positioned atop a Wurlitzer Piano.