Starship Krupa

RIP Mr. Brown and thank you for the great music. When I read the topic title, I was afraid that it was Pete Brown, the Microsoft engineer, champion of DAW's in the Windows environment and longtime Cakewalk ally.

A few of those sound like oblique strategies. A four bar loop by itself is not a song, but if you do something over that four bar loop, like play saxophone or rap, it can turn into one. I've started multiple songs (even finished a couple) that started as beats and/or bass lines. I don't think I've ever started a song with an outline. Taking piano lessons with a teacher who is sympathetic to your goals and teaches theory along with it is definitely something I'd recommend to anyone wanting to learn more about how music works. By "sympathetic to your goals" I mean someone who is willing to teach you popular idioms rather than preparing you to become a concert pianist (assuming you're interested in popular music rather than becoming a concert pianist). And speaking of learning how to play, setting the DAW part aside, I would tell my teenage self that in order to play bass in a rock band, you can get by just playing the root note of whatever chord the rhythm guitar player is playing. Then go from there. That would have been very valuable information. Also as a guitarist, if you want to play power chords, just play the top 3 strings and go through a distortion box. The other 3 strings will just clutter up the sound and the distortion will fill in the harmonics. Also: when playing barre chords, you don't need to barre across the strings where your other 3 fingers are playing notes. I mean, duh, but it takes beginners a long time to figure that one out. Your index finger doesn't need to be a friggin' capo.

I can see that. And I GET that even though you said "you" that you're talking about your own process, not making a statement about how anyone else should work. Obviously, there are many, many very talented and successful composers who work entirely in the box. When I read what you wrote it reminds me of how some fiction writers still prefer to use typewriters. You have to have the idea in your head and be confident with it before you commit it to paper, whereas with computer tools, your mind can wander and you can always cut, copy, and paste stuff around. There are just too damn many possibilities when creating with a computer, which is one reason there are so many YouTube videos about how to actually COMPLETE songs. It seems like you fell into a rabbit hole and found a way out. And the visual language of real music notation vs. colored blocks on a grid, there's no contest. Visually, the piano roll is just sideways Tetris. If you can read, you can look at sheet music and hum the tune, and that's not going to happen with the piano roll (you'd just insert "Hum-a-nizer.vst3" on the track and hit Play anyway). For me, I don't even know what "voice leading" is (I'm sure that as with music theory in general, I already use it but don't know what it's called), and I think the DAW is great for motifs because I can copy phrases and just sprinkle 'em around. ? Also, my notation reading and writing skills are....underdeveloped to put it kindly. Forget sight reading, I usually need to write some note letters down next to the notes in the 1st couple of bars before I can work my way through sheet music. I suppose I'm coming at scoring from the opposite direction: although I've wanted for decades to be able to compose orchestral music (and I have done it several times in my head while lucid dreaming, so the data must be up there somewhere ?), it would be impossible for me without using a DAW. I didn't even start trying until I got the (don't laugh) Orchestral Companions from Sonivox to use as backgrounds and then started to think I could compose something with just orchestral sounds. You mention timbre, and that's another area where I think composing with a DAW can actually give an advantage, and it's sort of the other side of the coin that you mention. Timbres do greatly influence the musical choices I make, be they synthetic or orchestral samples. I'm coming at it from a naive direction. Never formally studied orchestral composition, just took a couple of years of piano (with some good basic theory mixed in). Timbre is as much of an element that I "write" with as melody, rhythm, harmony, and the rest. Most of my favorite ideas (including "Sensation") have come from browsing presets in my synths until I find a sound that triggers me emotionally. Then letting my mind come up with a way to use that sound. Sometimes the sound happens in my head first, then I figure out how to make that sound, but very often, it is the instrument that is the starting point. I understand that I'm talking about a different thing, electronic music vs. orchestral, but the same thing can go for orchestral music: I find a good cello sound or harpsichord or whatever and it sparks something. This is especially true for arpeggio patches. I struggled with the idea that building a song around an arp patch is "cheating" or "unoriginal," but some of my favorite songs are built around arpeggiated synths ("Blue Monday," "Little Fluffy Clouds") and ostinatos were around for a looooonnnnnng time before the first sequencer came along ("Linus and Lucy" is the one that always comes to mind). So the hell with it. I'll leave it to someone else to diss my music, I don't need to do it myself. I've written songs that started with lyrics, chord progressions (piano or guitar), bass lines, melodies (usually suggested by a lyric), and definitely timbres. I'll take anything, basically. If it's a good idea, other ideas will flow from it and fill out the song. Thanks for replying, it's cool to hear about these things are from the perspective of a trained composer.

Interesting. There are a lot of people who consider their digital audio workstations to be composition tools. I'm one of them. Were you using yours as a compositional tool and had bad things happen as a result? I'm curious as to what you consider the pitfall(s) to be.

Numero uno is that I would have warned myself about the audible effect of jitter and staying away from interfaces from before the JetPLL era. And I would have only purchased a single 8-input interface rather than springing for a pair of them that I could chain together. I think there was one single occasion where I used 10 of my 16 inputs, and very few where I used more than 4 (I track drums using a 4-mic setup). I'd probably warn myself away from mixing plug-ins that combine multiple functions (compression, expansion, EQ, saturation whatever) under the hood with only 2 or 3 controls (Trackspacer is the NOTABLE exception). The tracks in my earliest mixes have too many of those pulling each one in different directions. Really, though, I don't look back and see big missteps or long detours, only a learning process that continues to this day. It takes time to learn mix engineering, and part of that time is discovering things that don't work. I sought out good advice, both from friends and from what was around on the web. Still do. I will say, though, that there is some cliche "wisdom" that I was subjected to that I would never throw at a n00b. And more than one "rule" that I consistently break.

It depends on what one considers "best," I'd say. If someone watched a product introduced a year or two ago, wanted it, but couldn't justify the purchase, then saw it go on sale at a deep discount, then yes. That's a common scenario. Glitchmachines' Tactic and iZotope Neoverb were like that for me. But if someone has been waiting for their favorite company to release a new product and said product is released at a deep intro discount, that could be a "best" deal as well. Also not an uncommon scenario. MeldaProduction MTurboAmp was like that for me.

Unfairly dismissed. ?

I've been a fan of both the visuals and music for the French cinema company Studio Canal's intro logo. They own a lot of catalog films, so their logo comes up a lot when watching streaming services. The prismatic effect reminds me of the kaleidoscopic slit scan effects used toward the end of the 60's in 2001: A Space Odyssey and ABC's Movie of the Week intro. Tonight I decided to see if I could find out more about the theme. Turns out it was written by Alexandre Desplat, who among other accomplishments, bagged a Best Original Score Oscar for The Shape of Water. Turns out there's a video of him conducting the orchestra at the recording: I've been messing around with writing music that could be played by a small orchestra and I'm in awe of the beauty and feeling that this guy manages to evoke in 20 seconds.

We could ask Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich....

As far as virtual instruments, Break Tweaker definitely changed my game. Xpand!2 put a ton of great sounds at my fingertips. Hybrid 3 with its crazy dual arpeggiators has patches that I've built songs around. MSoundFactory's Meldway Grand is so good that I don't feel bad about having to get rid of my baby grand.

I would like to see this video. Is it on YouTube?

This is an appropriate question for the Feedback forum. My guess is that The Coffee House is the least read forum for anyone with the ability to make that change. I would like a "Love" reaction. As for a shrug, I think "Meh" already takes care of "I'm so indifferent to what you said that I must let you and the world know." A thing I like about this forum is how little I feel like using any reaction but "Like," "Thanks, and "Good Idea," so I'd prefer adding more positive reactions than negative ones.

Indeed. I probably got each of them for $10 or less. There is one scenario where it actually is a deal. If someone were interested in 5 or 6 out of the bundle, it's not bad. I haven't seen any of the ones I like on those deep discounts in quite some time, like maybe a year (anyone else?). If someone's getting Hybrid 3, those half dozen preset packs are nice to have, I picked them up one at a time as $5 eligibility for PB freebies. So there's another $30 I've spent on products from this bundle. I'm into 90's ambient sounds, so Hybrid 3 is a source of delight. The oscillators and filters sound very silky and the dual sequencers just put it over the top (for me). So it ain't that bad depending on how many of the instruments you want in the bundle. But I agree that if someone looks at it and thinks "oh boy, 10 instruments to play with, plus all those FX!" they're going to find out that less than half of the package is worthy of attention. Everything in it is a MacOS update away from being discontinued. If someone is on OSX they shouldn't touch anything in it with a 10' pole. I really hope that they do a Hybrid/Hype on Xpand!2. It has such a useful soundset. The best strategy is probably to buy unregistered licenses from sellers on KVR.

I am. My last single was based largely on a Hybrid 3 patch that makes great use of Hybrid 3's arpeggiator. I've yet to meet an arpeggiator I like better. It's still pretty much my favorite synth, despite having acquired Massive, MPowerSynth, MSoundFactory, and Chromaphone 2. XPand!2 remains a great way to sketch out musical ideas, and often enough, it's sounds are quite usable in a finished production (the basses and pads are especially good). Vacuum Pro is really good for basses. Yeah, they're relatively old, but then plenty of other musical instruments that I love were originally designed in the 1950's or earlier. What soft synths are currently chic? Omnisphere? Diva? Is Serum still a thing? Well, that's it. I would agree as far as the ones that are trying to emulate specific vintage instruments, like DB-33, but the ones that do synthesis hold up better. Which makes sense, as the technology for creating emulations is probably moving at a faster pace. A number of instruments that AIR have released in the past 6 months are using repackaged pieces of Hybrid 3 (Hype) and Vacuum Pro (Tube Synth, Bassline).

That's definitely a thing. Metering plug-ins are supposed to be looked at, by definition, and if the sonible way of displaying things is your preferred one, then these will be the best spectrum and loudness meters for you. Many companies make loudness meters and spectrum analyzers, but the best ones are the ones that the person looking at them can most easily understand. IMO. My favorite spectrum analyzer is MeldaProduction's but not my favorite loudness analyzer. I use Mastering the Mix' LEVELS on every project, on my mixdown bus. That's like sonible's true:level (with a couple of fancier metering options), which in the MeldaProduction line would be MLoudnessAnalyzer and in the Plugin Alliance lineup, bx_meter. Another fave is TBProAudio's dpMeter. For spectrum analysis, I use the aforementioned MAnalyzer. The sonible equivalent is true:balance, which is similar to SPAN and Plugin Alliance's SPL Hawkeye. All of these can be demo'd (or even owned) for free, so take advantage of that. Maybe you'll discover a must-have feature in one or more of them. bx_meter and SPL Hawkeye may be had for $49 for the pair. LEVELS is the spendiest, but I got it as a PB freebie, one of the best ever.

What @Bruno de Souza Lino said about Insight 2. You have iZotope Music Production Suite 5, IIRC? If so, it includes Insight 2, Neutron Unmask and Ozone Master Rebalance. MPS 5 includes tools that go beyond what the sonible ones do, so if my memory is correct and you do have it, check those out first. I have MPS 5 and it's so vast that I haven't scratched the surface of what it can do.

If you like the way Sonible does things and you think you are in need of fancy metering/analysis software, try their demo. What issues do you have that you want those plug-ins' help with?

My favorite free spectrum analyzer is (surprise!) MAnalyzer. "MAnalyzer is an advanced spectral analyzer and sonogram containing unique features such as smoothing, normalization, super-resolution, prefiltering and deharmonization. The included meters provide a peak meter and EBU R128 and ITU-R BS 1770-3 compliant loudness meter." My favorite feature is that it comes with a bunch of presets that show analysis for various genres of music. These curves can then be compared with the live input to see how your song's overall balance looks.

It's a podcaster tool, for sure. But since the OP has opened 3 different topics about whether this or that piece of cheap crap will help him make better recordings, I figured I'd check to see what the first rung out of the cheap crap pit costs these days. Pleasant surprise. I don't buy any gear new if I can avoid it, so my recommendation would be a used Scarlett or Audiobox. I prefer Presonus because they haven't abandoned 5-pin MIDI. Behringer kind of screw themselves with the lower end of the line having similar units that do or do not have decent drivers, so I stay away from those in recommendations.

Where did you get that information from, John? I found a couple of reviews that specifically praise the M-Track Solo for having an ASIO driver: https://higherhz.com/m-audio-m-track-solo-review/ and https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/m-audio-m-track-solo-duo I was surprised to find it, because like so many of us, my "price of admission" level was stuck around $100 for reputable interfaces. But they somehow managed to get the cost down a rung, and if the reviews are to be believed, the main sacrifice was in using a plastic case rather than a metal one.

Glad to see that you're still championing Matrix upgrades. Persistence is the way.

Compress the guitar to get a good, consistent level before the signal goes into whatever you're using for an amp sim. Faster release times (under 75ms) will emphasize more of the sustained tail of guitar notes. For that heavy fuzz sound, Voxengo Boogex is a good freeware amp sim plug-in to check out. Also, there are sounds in the previously mentioned freeware A|A|S Swatches that will nail that guitar tone without further processing. If it's a virtual instrument, just replace it. Try the Love Lost/Steamroller Filth (key) or Steamroller Scream (key) patches in Swatches. Nice mournful sounds with long fades, and a better distortion tone than that square wave fuzz you're getting now. Since this is a virtual guitar part, there are some things to examine in your MIDI track. Velocity and note length to start with. You may have just programmed your notes to be too short for the effect you're trying to get. I assume from the description of the emotional picture you're trying to paint that a long, mournful wailing sound is your goal? It's not easy to get a credible guitar sound from virtual instruments, but it can be done.

Add the price of a second trip to Burger King and get something from a reputable company. Providing that this is a hobby you're willing to invest $50 in: https://www.amazon.com/M-Audio-M-Track-Solo-Interface-Podcasting/dp/B08Q1NJSBQ

Fix'd! ?

Believe me, if someone told me I had to choose between little audition/mute buttons in clip headers vs. an integrated sampler, I'd go with the sampler. ? I'll probably dig retro/idle/background MIDI record once I experience it, too. Fortunately, it's not a zero sum game and we loves all features great and small. The devs are the ones who decide cost:benefit ratio. Is adding a UI button for an existing command a lot of work? Or not? I dunno. Shift+<spacebar> and K work great for me, a 5-year veteran, and probably for most other veterans who know the commands exist. But how long did it take to find them and memorize them? How important is smoothing the learning curve?