PavlovsCat

I actually did a demo for Orange Tree Samples for their newly released Evolution Vintage Violin Bass (a sampled Hofner 500/1 bass) that should be available next week. I'll share it here when it's officially out. My struggle is that, having tendonitis that stopped me from playing professionally -- or even play as a hobbyist -- 23 years ago and only starting to play again last year makes it tough to accept that I can't play like I once could. Consequently, when I listened back to this cover, it sounds terrible and I'm grateful for everyone for the kind comments, but listening back, I wish I didn't even share it. I put a lot more time into the demo I did for Orange Tree Samples. It's a medley that starts out with me playing a chord progression from McCartney's "Dear Boy" with a guitar solo over it and then goes into a very McCartney-esque song I wrote when I was around 13 years old. Back when I wrote it, I thought the song sounded too much like McCartney's style, so I shelved it, but after creating 4 demos, one that was green-lighted and almost finished, I started getting bored with what that demo song I was about to complete and started jamming on the McCartney chords before going into my old song and it just seemed a lot better than my other demo songs and much better than the job I did on "Hey Joe." All of that said, I greatly appreciate how encouraging people here have been and try to do the same for others. It's just that trying to play again can be part joy, part frustration. But I am at least getting better as I go along.

There is an economics lessons here that I won't bore you with. Okay, just kidding, I will! Just as economic studies show that a union business moving into a region impacts the labor and benefit rates of business in the surrounding geographical region (that is, it results in higher wages and benefits for labor in surrounding businesses that are not unionized), the impact of Waves $29 USD pricing has profoundly impacted its competitive environment, resulting in a good deal of high quality plugin developers putting effects doing deep discounts on their plugins, like this deal. And the sales prices are often at that $29USD or $19 USD price point that Waves sales prices perpetually stay in (that's actually, technically, an FTC violation, but whatever, it also greatly impacts market behavior; Waves is not likely to be able to sell their plugins long on perpetual sales for $29 USD to as low as $16 USD for $199 USD or more again, as they've trained the market not to pay that much for its plugins). So, that's a long way of saying, while a lot of us (me included), are not crazy about Waves' marketing practices particularly their infamous WUP, they've had a undeniable impact on the world of effects pricing that has enabled many of us to afford plugins that we may not have otherwise been able to afford. So thanks Waves!

Well, I need to read that, especially after buying this new compressor! Thanks.

I didn't have time to install it, but I bought Softube's FET compressor last night, based on the recommendations of folks in this thread. So thanks for the advice to everyone who shared their opinion. Also, I wanted to give a shout out to thank and publicly recommend @antler's articles. Ant's been super helpful to me and does a great job of explaining how to mix. I'm not saying that I've figured out mixing yet, but Ant's coaching helped me make progress , teaching me some things I didn't previously understand. Plus, he's a cool guy. A great part of the community.

Wow, I love that guitar tone and playing! Yeah, the mix is pretty trippy, but the guitar playing and tone sounds awesome! I really love it. Yeah, that puts my little version to shame. I want to come over to your house to jam! Haha. Except with my tendonitis, I could only play for one tune and I'd need to stop for an hour before doing another! Also, "I'm just a guitar player"? Well, as you can tell, I'm a guitarist wannabe! An old drummer that plays the keys also that attempts to pretend he's a guitarist, but very poorly.

I PMed a musician friend who is pretty knowledgeable on mixing after I made the post and he recommended I pick this up. But your post, especially with the humor, gave me a laugh and was enough to persuade me. I've really liked the Softube plugins I own and they have great sales and no WUP!

I don't have much experience with compressors, but this sounds really good in the video examples and I've found Softube makes excellent plug-ins. I'd love to get the thoughts of those more experienced at mixing.

This is likely an unwise overshare, but it's not my first. Many years ago Greg Schlaepfer, Orange Tree Samples' CEO, and I were chatting and I said, "Someday you've got to do a bass guitar sale or bundle and call it 'Big Bottom' in honor of rock legends Spinal Tap." So yeah, I really want to make sure I get credit for that in case anyone didn't get the reference to the name! I mean it should be on my resume, right? It's just pure fun in naming. I mean, we're all a bunch of musicians and there should be joy and even humor in what we do, IMO. Music is all about emotion and passion.

Every Foundation library they've put out has been really nice. They definitely put out quality and, of course, you can't beat the price.

I'm writing this as a marketing pro, but I suspect NI could move a lot more KOMPLETE 13 users by cutting one of the newly included libraries and instead providing buyers with a voucher good for a library of the same value of their choice, the rationale being that the included libraries are very genre specific.

Great share, Abacab. That's so cool. I love learning about the developers behind the instruments I use. I didn't even know that Absynth wasn't developed by NI in-house. Cool, now Brian Clevinger is on my developers to watch list, I'm going to check out his company and take a look at his other synths. He seems very likeable and I'm a long time fan of Absynth. To quote Elton John out of context, Absynth is "weird and wonderful."

Considering the new libraries, NI is clearly more heavily pursuing younger musicians playing more current genres as opposed to the dad rock and older genre folks like many of us here (me included). I was an Absynth fan from day one, but frankly, I haven't used it in a long time.

That's the coolest post I've seen all day, @daveiv. I mean, I think it's completely fine for you to not like this synth or anything else -- we're all individuals with our own tastes and that's great (I've always been a bit of a non,-conformist, so I especially love seeing those with differing views than the rest of the group step up to voice those views). Just because some other folks like it doesn't mean you should feel you have to like it too (why does that remind me of peer pressure among kids, -- you know, like, "Come on Dave, just have one. Everyone else at school is doing it..."), . But I think it's great to see an open mind with your willing to give something a second try after seeing how other folks here like it (me included). Now maybe when you try it again you will like it and maybe you won't like it. Either way, it's great that you kept an open mind and have decided to give it a second after seeing how much others like it. I'd be interested in seeing your thoughts after giving it a second try, regardless of whether you like it or not. Please share the results with us.

I use the standard edition of KOMPLETE 13 and every project I do heavily uses KONTAKT. But there's no compelling new sample libraries or synths in KOMPLETE 14 for me. The only reason I'd do the upgrade would be if KONTAKT developers I buy from require KONTAKT 7 for their libraries.

Great job on the playing and vocals.

I've heard your playing and found you're a really talented bass player. I don't remember the name of the project you're in that does covers of 80s songs (which I like and follow on Facebook, btw), but man are all of you seriously talented. Consequently, I'm curious, when do you turn to sampled bass and do you use it in the final production or replace it with your live bass playing ? For me, I started using electronic drums and midi for live shows going back in the 80s and in later when recording demos of my original music largely because I don't have a great knowledge of recording and production techniques to be able to achieve great sounding drums with basically no effort (I've always relied on live and studio sound engineers to get the sound I was after and never got fluent on anything recording related beyond properly micing my acoustic drums).

A very similar story here. Of course, every instrument's value is subject to our personal taste, but for me, who bought this synth a couple of years ago, $10USD for a synth of this quality is a no-brainer. To David, it's completely reasonable that you have a different opinion, but to Doug's point, it would be more valuable to get your thoughts on why you have such a strong dislike of the synth. Do you dislike the patches, how it runs, etc.? I'd suggest that anyone even mildly interested should check out the videos and audio demos. If you like what you hear, it's a good quality synth and Izotope makes very good plugins and has solid support in my experience. I've been a customer many years and would recommend them.

If you listen to the demo, note the palm mutes. I forwarded an early version of my demo (it hasn't been posted yet) to Greg -- who is an excellent bassist and pianist -- and he suggested that I try palm mutes on a certain part. Wow. Once I tried that -- it made a huge difference. This is one of the most fulfilling sampled instruments to play/hear I've ever known. I've loved the sound of this bass guitar since I was a wee lad and being able to capture that sound playing a keyboard is amazing.

Pulse Audio, which makes the downloader used by a number of KONTAKT developers, has a sale going on multiple indie developers' libraries (Multone Audio, Sonora Cimematic, Rigid Audio, etc) with up to 92% off regular prices. https://pulse.audio/product-on-sale/?jsf=jet-engine&sort=orderby%3Ameta_value_num%3Border%3ADESC%3Bmeta_key%3A_discount_amount

Wow, I love the track! Great job on the songwriting, playing and vocals! I'm also am a fan of Minus The Bear. Kudos. So many folks here post music where the playing is pretty good, but also nailing the songwriting and vocals, that's rare (I was once a good musician, but never had a very good voice, so I certainly don't have the whole package like you -- I'm completely envious!). You've got it all. Nothing but respect. I'm going to follow you on SoundCloud. If you were playing a show locally, I would absolutely want to go see it with a song like this. Keep it up. Also, how am I only the first person to give that excellent track a like??? Come on guys. Mike is super talented. Give him the likes his talent deserves!!!

Very nice. I love the guitar tone and vibe of the track, everything sounds really, really good. Nice job!

Congratulations on a beautiful sounding drum library! I'm a former semi-pro drummer and super picky about drum libraries, and I absolutely love the tone of your library in the demos, it truly does sound fantastic.

I've been waiting for a great Hofner 500/1 bass library for what seems like forever and been begging Greg Schlaepfer/Orange Tree Samples to make a Hofner 500/1 library and this hit it out of the park, which is what I'd expect out of OTS, but still, playing this is incredible. I've had it since last month, as I made a demo for it that will go live later this week. The Hofner 500/1 is my absolute favorite tone for a rock bass guitar and in the weeks that I've been using the library, I've found that it not only completely nails the sound of the bass and plays great , but with some effects on it, it goes far beyond the signature tone that McCartney made famous and it sounds great in harder edged rock songs too. In fact, I was using it on a kind of Zeppelin-esque alt-rock song last week that doesn't sound anything like the McCartney signature bass tone it's famous for, and it sounded great. In the month I had it, this has become my go to rock bass guitar out of a total of easily 40 really fine detailed sampled and modeled bass guitars. (Disclosure: I've consulted to Orange Tree Samples. I'm a former semi-pro musician, well a drummer -- as my musician mother used to say "You're a musician because you play piano and organ; drummers aren't musicians!" -- who has a home studio where I regularly record original music and covers that extensively use sample libraries and plugins. I've long been a huge fan of OTS libraries -- that is what led to my consulting.)

Yes, to anyone prone to misinterpreting my earlier post, I definitely don't mean that I see Christian or anyone replacing Larry -- Larry was the forum's MVP, the Michael Jordan of the Cakewalk Deals Forum. But even while you're not posting every hour of the day, you're a really valuable member of the community and you know how to create compelling threads. Someone posted that they don't like the character of this forum anymore, but while I don't think that the two users in question treated Larry with the respect he and every forum member deserve, I don't think that they represent the norm here. This forum still is, by and large, a group of really nice people and that is why I keep coming back. Clearly, a lot of us -- me and included -- miss Larry's presence, not just for his prolific posting, but we like him. But Larry's a grown man. He didn't suffer bullying on the forum. He just decided he needed a temporary break or maybe he even decided to make a permanent break. That's fair. He put in a lot of effort here and I don't even know how he sustained that for so long. He knows that he's greatly appreciated here and a couple of less than polite users shouldn't be allowed to ruin the experience here.

? That is the most accurate account of what happened that I've seen (I witnessed all of that stuff go down and was sending Larry supportive and encouraging PMs, as I have a long history of doing). One of those guys was accusing Larry of shilling, having no idea that Larry never even used affiliate links. The other guy was kind of roughly correcting Larry for misinterpreting remarks from a CEO. Larry and I have had a bunch of really nice and encouraging PMs over the years and I have tried to persuade him to use affiliate links and referrals when it was an option, because he more than earned it here, but he shared those deals purely because he enjoyed contributing to the community. I agree that those posters weren't exactly in the realm of bullying, but considering all of the time and effort Larry put in here it was a level of disrespect that I think frustrated him and yes, I think it was the straw that broke the camel's back. But if you look at all the hours Larry put in here, I think he was not going to be able to sustain it. But Larry's seen a lot of gratitude here from us regulars. He knows he's been greatly appreciated. As far as the value of the deals forum since Larry left, of course, the amount of deals posted has dramatically declined, but I really haven't seen the spirit of friendliness change, and that's what has always kept me coming back. While it's not the same as seeing Larry constantly posting great deals, I find at least as much value in your (Christian's) threads where people share their insights on libraries and plugins they love as a deals thread, probably more value, actually. Those threads make this a very worthwhile forum for me and there remains a spirit of respect and friendliness towards others here that I enjoy. If a few bad apples pop up from time to time, it's really the exception to the norm here and compared to other forums, it's not bad at all. This is still primarily a bunch of friendly and helpful people I've come to like sharing knowledge I find useful even if there's not an enormous amount of deals. I hope and I've tried to encourage Larry to come back, not to work day and night posting deals, but just to be part of conversations again. He's earned lifetime HOF contributor status for this forum even if he never made another deals post.