Thoughtful Things launches Engram, a hardware sampler that celebrates AI's beautiful mistakes

Thoughtful Things, a music-focused startup, has debuted Engram on Kickstarter—a hardware sampler and groovebox that embraces imperfection. Rather than aiming to generate polished, radio-ready tracks, Engram is designed to explore the strange and uncanny territories of AI-generated sound, deliberately pushing the boundaries of what its models can do.

How Engram Works#

The device operates entirely offline, running small, custom-trained AI models on local hardware rather than relying on cloud connections. Founder Evan King describes it as a "field recorder for latent space"—essentially a tool for capturing and manipulating the computational space where AI hallucinations occur. In demonstrations, the device transforms voice prompts into oddly-formed audio: asking for "piano" yields something recognizable but distinctly warped and experimental.

Design Philosophy & Ethics#

Thoughtful Things has been deliberate about its training data, stating that the audio models were trained exclusively on commercially licensed material (such as CC-BY licensed datasets) and will never rely on pirated or unlicensed content. The company plans to release Engram's firmware as open-source, enabling musicians and developers to modify the models or introduce their own.

The instrument takes cues from circuit bending—the hobbyist practice of deliberately breaking electronics to create novel sounds. Here, that principle is applied to AI: users can twist the models' behavior to yield increasingly unpredictable and textural results.

Availability & Pricing#

Engram is available through Kickstarter starting at $675 as an early-bird price, representing a roughly 30 percent discount. The company has not yet announced an official retail price, though it is expected to range between $850 and $900.