Magic Russ

If you've been around long enough you will have picked up a few bundles at killer deals. You probably will have more compressors, eqs, and delays than you know what to do with. The same holds for distortion effects and modulation effects. Unless you are a discriminating keyboard player, you will have more than enough pianos for your needs. If you have both Komplete and the Arturia suite, there aren't a lot of synth sounds you can't get. You've probably picked up your fair share of samples. For me, there's not a lot that is going to trigger GAS. If IK were to release new components, I would probably pick it up. If ToonTrack puts an EZKeys library on sale, I will likely pick it up.

Both things can be true. One person could hypothetically have an issue where when you go through a bunch of projects in the spirit of "Is this any good? Do I want to work more on it?" and you open up the one file with a plugin you have used in a project here and there, like maybe RMV, and that plugin crashes. And the next time you open the file it is fine. If you are the type who is more focused or who comes to your DAW with mostly complete songs, this will not happen to you. You won't get the bug either if you don't have that plugin. You won't have it if you have audio you can preview. DAWs are complex and have a lot of bugs. Some people will hit them and some won't, depending on any number of factors. That's how both things can be true.

I always wondered about that. It should be straightforward enough to say that a certain size shoe should fit feet of certain sizes. Even worse, some brands can't even be consistent. My wife had shoes and slippers from Uggs on her wishlist. One pair of one style was too tight at size 8 and another pair in a different style was loose at size 7. Getting back on topic, Bandlab has put in a few nice features and fixed a lot of bugs and avoided any of the blunders of the Roland or Gibson years.

It still is. I have a few patches I created from way back that stand up to a lot of newer synths.

I also thought I saw the "Blackout" version of the DL-4 ver2 for $199.

I thought I saw a 4th gen Scarlett 2x2 on sale for $169. Also matched by Sweetwater.

OK, that's a little confusing, but in the end it worked.

Hmm, it's says free but won't actually take me to the cart. Instead I get a list of other products to add to my order.

As someone who does not like subscriptions I can tell you that there were a lot of people who felt the need to signal their dislike of subscriptions at every turn even when it wasn't relevant, sort of like the proverbial obnoxious relative who could find a way to inject partisan politics into your third grade daughter's dance recital. You couldn't have a conversation about what direction the software was going without dozens of people repeatedly saying how much they hated subscriptions, multiple times in a thread. Someone might post "Hey can we have tagged browsing of templates" or "Hey can we have staff view" or whatever they wanted in the next Sonar and every such thread was spammed with "I hate subscriptions!" I do think it's funny though that people are talking about the Reaper model or the Bitwig model when as far as I know Cakewalk was the first to offer such a plan. I think they were also the first with a rent-to-own plan. That's a lot of innovation to be throwing away.

Michigan audio labs. The IRs are cabinets for amp sims , not reverb.

One other thing about AAS. Do not listen to any of the demos or jams featuring Thiago Pinheiro when you are figuring out which sound packs to order. That man is dangerous and a menace to your wallet. He could make Computer Music's CM-101 synth from the early days of VST sound like a boutique synth.

I like and use Lounge Lizard a lot. I really respect what Chromophone is capable of but it doesn't find itself onto many of my tracks. I have similar feelings for String Studio. Objeq Delay is brilliant. It does things virtually none other can. Ultra Analog is not one of my go-to synths. Strum is a great idea and a wonderful tool for composition. However, it's sound is painfully unrealistic. The acoustic sounds can be passable with heavy processing but the electric sounds are only slightly better than 90s GM sounds. The only time I have actually tracked anything with it was on a song where I ran one of Strum's acoustic sounds into Vinyl, so it gave a fair imitation of something from an old record. Their modular unit seems ok for what it is. I'm not super into the whole modular thing, but it is not currently one of the most respected offerings in that space. It would be better with some polyphonic abilities. It was a severely limited when it came out but they have been making good progress with some of the added components. Tassman was really great, especially considering when it came out.

While in Analog Lab V, I saw two freebies I hadn't seen before: Past to Future and Amapiano Essentials

https://www.native-instruments.com/en/pricing/guitar-rig-standalone-effects/?sscid=61k8_n27lj&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_source=shareasale&utm_campaign=shareasale-NI home text link&utm_content=shareasale_314743__1145559 Kolor, Psyche Delay, and Tape Wobble, previously only available as effects within Guitar Rig, now are available as individual VSTs for $9.50 each.

Even their Heartland Rock pack is good.

more than likely most of the libraries will see this update.

Also seeing Retro Machines

I saw that Irish Harp was updated to 1.02. No release notes.

I have the 64 bit MAGIX Acid. I can understand people not wanting to upgrade.

Also the move to 64 bit (and the resulting loss of synthedit based plugins) got rid of all the "hey, I can make plugins too" crowd.

Was audition ever in a great position in the DAW market pre-subscriptions?

I thought I read something about Reaper reading Sonar files and exporting to that common format that Presonus and Bitwig developed.

It probably doesn't help that Gen Z is a smaller generation which means that fewer new users will take up the cause.

The thing I am curious, that a lot of people seem to have overlooked, is that Bandlab still doesn't have a pricing plan in place. I mean, they bought the product 7 years ago, have been developing it for all that time, but still haven't figured out how they are going to monetize it? Am I the only one that finds that odd?

It's not like anyone is going to add anything new to the conversation regarding lifetime updates and there isn't anything to be gained. I'd rather talk about where Sonar is going. Knowing the industry, it is likely that they are just behind where they want the product to be. I mean, I work with people who sometimes take weeks to even tell you what the file name is that we need to be processing. I'd also much rather believe that Sonar "not coming soon" is due to the real world's constant mockery of deadlines and business metrics. Otherwise what's the explanation?