“Fruity Loops” has long proven that not all music making apps have to look the same way. FL is quirky and different. Its editing interface is built as much around step sequencers and pattern sequencing as the conventional, mixer and audio-tape-derived views. But perhaps some of its real draw is that it packs, in its mid-level-and-higher packages, it’s packed with fascinating and unusual sonic toys. FL 9 looks to continue that tradition.

And because it’s FL, if you’ve ever bought FL, you get a free lifetime upgrade to this version. (Seriously, if you’re pirating FL, stop. You have absolutely no excuse.)

New toys in this version:

• Autogun Derived from the excellent sounds of the Ogun synth, this instrument has “more than four billion presets.” (Wait… what?) I do agree with Image-Line’s description of “rich metallic and shimmering timbres” in Ogun; that’s exactly what it sounds like.
• Vocodex vocoder, the “last word in Vocoders.” (I thought the last word was, “No one needs a vocoder,” but I could be wrong.) Automatic speech enhancement plus up to 100 “variable-width, multi-parameter” bands does give this some interesting twists.
• Stereo Shaper.

I think that improved performance and editing may be bigger news, however:

• Multi-core CPU support, multithreaded generator, and multithreaded effects processing. This is the one that I expect most excites you crazy, synth-and-effects-routing mad scientists who have been pegging your CPU.
• Improved effects: sidechaining in the limiter, mid-side processing in the reverb, export and noise reduction in the awesome Edison and Slicex audio-editing instruments.
• Improved Playlists with “Clip Track” features
• A “Riff Machine” for automatically generating sequences in the Piano Roll
• Multiple controller support for defining different instrument channels. (Okay, FL experts – did I miss something? That wasn’t present before?)

What comes in the box has been expanded, too. In all the editions, you get the new stereo shaper and Autogun. In “Fruity Edition” and higher, you get SimSynth Live, DrumSynth Live, the DX-10 FM synth, and cool-sounding WASP and WASP-XT. In Producer Edition, you get the Vocodex vocoder.

Unfortunately, Image-Line still continues some confusing a la carte options, and actually eliminates its XXL edition that gave you everything. So, there’s a new Gross Beat that manipulates pitch, position, and volume in real-time, but you only get the demo with FL 9. I can’t really complain about this because FL has so much in it, but it can all get a little hard to follow sometimes.

On the other hand, if you’re an FL fan, I think you could do some serious damage with the vocoder and new sequence generating features.

I’ve always wanted to do a better job of covering FL on this site, so FL users, get in touch!

FL Studio product page
Download the demo

Welcome to the alt-DAW scene. Last week, not only did Renoise continue its rebirth of the forgotten “tracker” genre of music making software with ReWire support, but we saw a big new version of REAPER, the beloved lightweight audio production tool from the original creator of Winamp.

What makes an “alt DAW”, or “indie” production software? To me, it’s:

• small development teams of a few people
• tightly-integrated communities directly involved in feature requests
• trusting users instead of adding significant DRM, returning to the traditional “shareware” business model of old
• affordable pricing

That’s not to take away from some of the bigger players – I was struck this week with the (unsurprising) ubiquity of Ableton Live at MUTEK; it’s a real testament to what they have accomplished. But choice is essential, and looking at the history of music technology, it’s in the periods of real choice that the most interesting things have happened. It makes everything better when developers really have to compete.

Cockos REAPER has spread almost virally as an underground DAW, partly because you can download the thing and get started with without any restrictions, then buy it for as little as US$60 for personal use.

http://www.reaper.fm/index.php

It’s not just for Windows people any more, either – the Mac version is now officially supported. You can run on Windows 7 or Windows 2000 or even 98 (with limited support). You can run on 10.4 Macs, or even PowerPC (though Intel is recommended). You can even run on Linux with official WINE support, though I’d still like to see a native Linux version, especially as Linux on netbooks is getting so lovely.

Version 3.0 came out this week. There are a huge number of improvements:

• MIDI editing with inline editing, event filtering, Sysex, controller automation – finally, REAPER is getting as good with MIDI as it is with audio
• Automation lanes
• Unlimited folder nesting
• Multichannel audio support
• User-created track and mixer control panels and macros
• Game controller support, including joysticks and even Guitar Hero controllers, which you can integrate with existing MIDI and macro facilities
• New graphics engine, new theming

And that’s just a few examples; see the full changelog:

http://www.reaper.fm/whatsnew-300.txt

You can script your own audio and MIDI plug-ins using JS, and use 64-bit plug-ins included with the package. And all of this is a 4MB download. And there’s no DRM.

While some software increases memory and resource consumption with new versions, REAPER reverses the trend: it’s getting more lightweight and faster as it develops. That’s something we need more of; it’s absolutely possible with the right development approach, and is a welcome change from the “get fatter as computers get faster” approach that infected decades of software development.

Upgrades are $149 if you bought Reaper after September 1, $199 otherwise, or EUR249 for Europe, or $99 if your favorite color is blue, or $123.5 * PI / 2 if you had LE, or $999 for REAPER Suite, or $699 for a Grande REAPERccino Latte, unless you don’t want all the plug-ins, in which case you can get Tall as an upgrade for $119.3587 plus a $150 fuel surcharge, unless you bought your license on a full moon…

Oh, okay, actually, upgrades are free for two major upgrades – meaning if you buy now, you’re covered through 4.99. And there’s one version, called REAPER, which includes… REAPER.

You’re seeing what this hype is about, right? And, if you’re like me, you’re wondering why, you know, other things can’t be a little more like this?

Updated: Sorry, I lost my mind and wrote “JavaScript” instead of the unrelated scripting language JS. Here’s a good explanation from the JS Programming Reference to what this is.

JS is a scripting language which is compiled on the fly and allows you to modify and/or generate audio and MIDI, as well as draw custom vector based UI and analysis displays.
JS effects are simple text files, which when loaded in REAPER become full featured plug-ins. You can try loading existing JS effects and since they are distributed in source form, you can also edit existing effects to suit your needs (we recommend if editing an existing effect you save it as something with a new name–if you do not you may lose your changes when upgrading REAPER).

JS Programming Guide

There’s also an extensions SDK in C++ and an LGPL-licensed SDK for control surfaces. You can contrast this with Ableton, which will charge extra for its Max for Live runtime and has no officially supported or documented API for control surfaces, which means that support for more exotic devices routinely breaks, and trying it yourself is harder.

This is going to get confusing, isn’t it, with a product name like “Record”? (A “Record Tutorial”? A “Record Video”? Maybe it’s just me…)

Anyway, if you’re hooked up with the Record beta and looking to get started, Propellerhead have posted a video tutorial to get you going, with more planned. There’s also a new Record blog:

Record Blog

There’s an update on the state of beta testing, and you’ll find some notes from Props CEO/founder Ernst on why they’re creating Record:

When we designed Record we went back to our original roots, the drive that made us create Reason a long time ago. In 1998, when the Reason design came to life, there were already incredible synthesizers. You could already make music with your computer. There was immense power in the solutions that existed.

Now, I’m sure that won’t calm down any of you who won’t use Record because it has a dongle, or because it lacks MIDI output for talking to your hardware synths. But, then, that’s why we have more than one tool from which to choose in music technology, both commercial and open source.

For instance, since I know there’s a rabid Reaper community out there, I’m happy to see these two apps face off in an audio software slam.

Just to be contrary, I’m going to tag this post “DAWs,” because even if Record isn’t a DAW, I think it clearly can be an alternative to DAWs as a “piece of software that allows you to record and make music.” Really, while there’s no convenient acronym for that, that’s the whole point of all this software, right? (Then again, that’s all the more reason not to call anything a “DAW,” because “workstation” is a meaningless word that has little to do with actually using computers to make music.)

And, sure, if I had it to do over again, I might simply call this blog “Create Music.” Or “Music.” Or just “ate.”

If you could have an ideal drum machine and sample-slicing workstation, taking the physical control of hardware but the flexibility of software, what would it look like? We talk a lot about hardware control of software, but hardware usually comes second – software gets designed first, and then either you have to figure out how to map hardware to it, or someone else comes along and designs gear. That means there’s usually a disconnect in the design and workflow of the two, and most of the time, you have to reach for the mouse to make up the difference.

Maschine (pronounced as the German, mah-SCHEE-neh) was developed at Native Instruments with the goal to design the hardware and software simultaneously, not separately. That’s not an easy goal, and I don’t expect Maschine to be perfect or please everyone. But I got to visit the prototype at NI while I was in Berlin in October and see it in action, and I can say at the very least, the folks who created feel the way many of us do – they love software, they love hardware drum machines like the Elektron, and this is an attempt to be a real hybrid.

So, while contrary to rumors, NI does not have a box that does any audio generation in the hardware, this is a real attempt to fuse the controller and software in terms of design and workflow. The idea is to use the screen for visual feedback (you do have this big, pretty monitor on your desk or notebook), but to be able to work without a mouse.

Maschine can also work as a plug-in as well as a standalone app, depending on how you like to work (or how you want to play live). That means if you’re already in love with something like Ableton Live, you ought to theoretically be able to put the two together. Unfortunately, you can’t yet use it as a sequencer to drive other software, which would be an ideal next step; sequencing is as big a part of what Maschine does as sampling and sample manipulation. (No official statement on MIDI output has been made yet.)

Maschine’s hardware also works as a controller. So, for those keeping score, you could put Maschine next to the just-announced Akai APC40 and use them both to control Live – or Maschine could compete with the APC for your Live-controlling dollar – even before you touch the Maschine drum machine software.

Here’s NI’s intro video, which gives you a sense of how this stuff ties together (and we are officially the first to post it).

We’ll naturally be looking more closely at Maschine soon (I’m going to buy a new espresso maker and not sleep for the next few months). Here’s a quick overview:

• 16 pressure-sensitive pads, which light up for visual feedback
• Step sequencing
• Polyphonic recording (so it is a real sequencer, too)
• All software features are available quickly “on the surface,” so not only do you not need the mouse, but unlike a lot of hardware and even controllers, you don’t have a bunch of submenus and buttons to press to do stuff. That includes tasks like automation editing and even sound editing
• Automatic sample mapping, beat slicing, note repeat
• Real-time audio recording and resampling – so you can not only record, but resample what you’re working on, MPC style
• Effects sends “from conventional to experimental” (basically, you can enjoy the kind of sound mangling goodness we’ve had on Kore and Reaktor lately)
• Kore-style sound browsing, with a multi-gig library to get you started

Availability: April 1

Pricing: US$669 list (EUR 599)

The hardware has a top-notch feel and metal casing; at least from what I could judge from the prototype, this should look and feel absolutely fantastic. My only real disappointment was that there’s no synth engine, but that’s just because I love drum synths. Then again, I love the simplicity of Maschine, so perhaps the best fix would be to add the ability to either host plug-ins, as Kore does, or to provide MIDI output capability to other software, so that you could drive synths and other creations. (Heck, you could even sequence visuals in that case.)

What’s unique to me about Maschine is that it isn’t simply an emulation of an MPC; it still takes a software approach to sequencing, it still supports plug-ins and the things you like about software, and it still has NI-style effects. By virtue of being software, in fact, you can really change how you use it relative to hardware. You can drop it in Live or even in a tracker like Renoise. You can use it not as a drum machine but a pattern-based effects unit and insert it after your voice or an instrument. Then you can switch to a VJ set, ignore the Maschine software, and use it as an intelligent plug-in for running live visuals for your friend’s band. None of this is nearly as practical with a conventional hardware drum machine – and this is a whole lot cheaper.

Also, unlike some attempts to unify hardware and software in the past, the visual relationship isn’t slavish. You see something that looks like it makes sense on a screen when you’re editing; it looks like software, but you can easily control it with hardware and not the mouse. (Nothing against the mouse – it’s fantastic for many jobs; sample slicing and music editing just happens not to be one of them.) When you’re ready to perform, the displays on the device mean you don’t have to look at the screen at all.

It’s also worth noting that this is very different from today’s Akai APC announcement. The Akai is clearly better suited to mixing and clip triggering, but the Maschine has velocity-sensitive pads the Akai lacks, and is better suited to hardware control of beat slicing and editing operations. (That said, someone may decide to use Max for Live to turn Maschine into a hybrid machine that also controls and edits Live itself, so everything is suddenly wide open.) And the APC is all about a host (Live), whereas Maschine is all about adding a drum machine / workstation to a host (which could be Live, or Renoise, or Pro Tools, or something else altogether).

In fact, to me, the real competition is Ableton Live’s Drum Racks, groove extract, and slice to rack features. It’s mouse-based, but it also integrates with a host and can host plug-ins itself. I’m personally excited about using both, so it’ll be interested to see which I wind up preferring for which tasks. And you can meanwhile bend your brain around the idea of Maschine instances running inside Ableton Live Drum Racks and other odd combinations.

If there’s any criticism of Maschine, my guess it that it’s likely to be criticized for over-simplicity: as opposed to the first release of Kore, the approach here is really minimalism; NI did less in the hopes that you’d get more out of hardware integration, and the rest you can make up by working with your favorite existing tools and plug-ins. That’s not to say it’s dumbed-down, from what I can see, though I just have to use it.

Whether NI has nailed this one is another question, of course, and one I’ll want to test vigorously. But I love the idea. Mainly, I just want to get my hands on one so we can try this out. You’ll definitely want to stay tuned.

http://www.native-instruments.com/maschine.info

Corrections: In the first draft of this story, I suggested that Maschine could output MIDI to other software instruments or host plug-ins; at least as of version 1.0, the software can’t. You can use it as a controller, though, and output MIDI to other hardware (so you could sequence hardware synths or even other drum machines). The thing I’d like to see there is MIDI output to other software; we certainly have enough hosts (NI’s Kore being one of those hosts). I also overstated the connection to Kore (which is why I was confused about plug-ins). Like Kore, Maschine is integrated hardware and software, it shares the Kore browser, and it shares some of the other design features of the current generation of NI software. But Maschine is its own creature – and honestly, that’s a good thing. Stay tuned for more details.

Ever feel music creation apps are too similar? Imagine an alternative universe in which music making software evolved along different lines. In this universe, the “tracker” isn’t some arcane novelty, but the detailed, bottom-up music editing approach that becomes the basis of music construction tools for any genre. Now imagine a breakthrough software release in that alternate universe.

Maybe it’s the Large Hadron Collider, but the release of Renoise 2 means that this is actually our universe: we have a cheap, community driven, unique app that runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux. And it’s getting a big update Thursday – almost in time for my birthday (Tuesday).

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you picked the right moment to tune in. Renoise always had potential as a unique tool for music making, and with the shipment of Renoise 2, some very key pieces are falling into place. I’ve just gotten an exclusive look at what’s coming in the final release. Dac Chartrand has shared some details that weren’t previously public.

You heard it here first:

• Renoise 2.0 FINAL launches January 15, 2009, “8 years in the making, 4 months of beta testing.”
• Launch details on January 15 will be at http://www.renoise.com/launch/
• It’ll work with netbooks. Dac tells us: “Renoise can now be resized to fit on small Netbook screens. Here’s an interesting thread where a user reviews Renoise on his new MSI Wind U100:” http://www.renoise.com/board/index.php?showtopic=19175"
• Additional tweaks and bug fixes made it in, including Universal Audio UAD2 DSP support and latency compensation.
• Renoise 2 will support fraction BPMs, like 127.56.
• It’ll have new demo songs. “Two of the songs were selected from submissions by the Renoise community in a competition called "Beta Battle, Round 1 & Round 2". The developers chose their favorites and have included them in the final release of Renoise 2.0. More info here:” http://www.renoise.com/indepth/category/competitions/
• New native DSP effects: RingMod, Scream Filter

Read on for more details, plus tips on making this work with the tools you already use…

Renoise 2.0 New Features

Here’s the rest of what’s new in Renoise:

• Automatic plug-in delay compensation for everything – effects and instruments
• Latency compensation and fixing when recording
• Improved audio performance, lower-latencies on multiple CPUs on Mac and Linux
• Channel and polyphonic aftertouch
• Note quantize options, real-time quantize on record, nudge, and keyboard shortcuts

Plug-in improvements, including one big one:

• Mac AU support, removing the big obstacle for Mac users
• Multi-output VSTi/AU (that’s good news for Kore users, among others)
• Send notes to VST/AU effects (instead of just instruments
• Plug-in management improvements, including info, custom sorts, sort by manufacturer, hide, move, rename (and that was listed under “minor features”)

A lot of the best features are related to timing improvements. You will need to update old songs, but for new songs, there’s a lot of power. And this really gets into the significance of Renoise as a tracker, something I hope we’ll cover this year:

• Custom track delays for audio and MIDI to offset an entire track
• You can now set time via “Lines Per Beat” – how many lines in the pattern make up a musical beat. (That’ll make sense to tracker users and not to anyone else, but until we whip up a demo, just trust me that that’s a good thing.)
• There’s a delay column for fine-tuning specific grooves at up to 4096 parts per quarter (PPQ).
• You can set pitch and volume glides, independent of the “tick” of the sampler.
• In the future, Renoise will support “zoomable patterns,” piano roll for those who want it, greater timing accuracy, and other new improvements.

There are also tons of other improvements, performance tweaks, shortcuts, and other little features:

New in 2.0: Complete Feature List

Integration and Tips

Of course, the hype that usually accompanies software launches at NAMM and elsewhere usually has to do with convincing you the tool is the One True Tool you need, replacing everything else. That’s nonsense, of course. Just as in the pre-computer days, what made a studio productive was the right combination of gear and easy ways of connecting it, software lovers find combining software to be what makes them happiest and most expressive.

Dac passed along a few ideas for integrating Renoise. These immediately make me think of other possibilities, but here are a few gems to get you started:

Guide To Connecting Reason To Renoise: http://www.renoise.com/board/index.php?showtopic=15683

A workaround for sending SYSEX to your synth: http://www.renoise.com/board/index.php?showtopic=11777

GarageBand in conjunction with Renoise: http://www.renoise.com/board/index.php?showtopic=12590

Convert Renoise files to MIDI files using PHP: http://xrns-php.sourceforge.net/xrns2midi.html

How to use Windows VST on Linux: http://www.renoise.com/board/index.php?showtopic=15347

If you can’t wait until next week, there’s a release candidate available for download in demo mode right now:

See also:

Renoise + FM8 Drum Kit, Free Download: FM Meets Tracker [our own kore.noisepages.com]

Renoise 2.0 Public Beta Amps Up Popular Tracker for Windows, Mac, Linux

Wallace clued us in back in summer 207 that this would be big

And for pure, absurd fun:

Renoise Tracker Made Into Animation

What do you say when it’s all been said? We felt it was time for a fresh perspective on the MPC phenomenon — one a normal review couldn’t provide. So we got the opinion of our friend, samplist/producer and Segue member Dave Dri. And the verdict: there’s still something about an MPC — even if it suggests why there’s also something about software, too. But it involves dust. Here’s his op-ed:

Recently I had the task of reviewing an MPC5000 for a local street press magazine. The MPC part of it was fine — the word limit was trickier. Over the last decade I have reviewed the MPC2000XL and the MPC1000, with a lot of time and gigs passing between them. From early days in a live breaks act to my current progressive house act, an MPC has been right under hand. In the week that I reluctantly handed the 5000 back to Musiclab, the drummer that guested in my band at the Big Day Out festival asked me to play keys and samples in his band at a local festival. [Ed.: Our own Jaymis filmed the Big Day Out gig if you want to check it out.] I found myself in a chance conversation with a friend from the live breaks act Bitrok and the very next day, somehow, I’m on stage with his MPC2500 — a unit which I have since bought. So why did reviewing an MPC5000 lead to me buying an MPC2500 after years of happy service from an invincible MPC2000XL?

If you’re reading this, you probably know what an MPC is, and you can readily review any number of link-bait Google results for the product mentioned in the title of this post. [Ed. Hmmmm, link-baiting MPC's, huh? "10 Ways an MPC is Like a Cupcake"? "15 of the Best MPC YouTube Videos Featuring Hot Women MPCers?" perhaps? -PK]

What you probably want to know is what it’s really like. So I will tell you.

Changes, Rants, and Internet Haters

It’s big. Really big. In fact, it’s so large that it couldn’t fit on the Jerker desk that forms the core of my studio rig, and spent its review loan period on a keyboard stand. In a particularly amusing moment I happened to glance at a nearby MacBook with an Akai MPD-16 controller plugged in to it and formed an unfounded suspicion that the sheer size was simply a ploy by Akai to appeal to some demographic that might use the MPC5000 as the core, if not entirety, of their studio. Would Akai deliberately oversize their hardware to appeal to bling-savvy producers?

It’s got a new screen. Getting past the size, the next comment is usually on the screen. Long-time MPC users with older models are delighted with the display being adjustable in both position and contrast. As one might imagine, navigation and editing benefits immediately, and the old Shift+Number menu system is replaced with context-sensitive Mode and Window buttons. By this point things are getting off to a great start. All the basics work as they should, and getting around the unit is old hat to anyone who has touched an MPC.

It’s a synth – but will it replace other synths? Then we find ourselves exploring the onboard synthesizer emulation that Akai claim “eliminates need for external analog synth modules or buggy software based synthesizers.” We will touch on the concept of buggy software in a minute, but I think we can safely ground the private fantasy jet that Akai seem to be flying around in with the notion that their VA emulation is somehow a replacement for external analog synth modules. As you would expect, the preset patches have a liberal use of the word “Moog” and sound nothing like one. Even worse, it soon becomes clear that you need to load a patch into memory to even preview it. As Just Blaze says on his MPC5000 rant, this is 2008. Having to spend studio time loading a synth patch just to preview to it is ridiculous, and was something that Yamaha seemed to avoid with their RM1X back in the mid to late 1990’s.

As to the marketing claims of “avoiding buggy software”, this is, of course, a point of instant ridicule for anyone who has owned first-generation Akai hardware. If there is any company deserving of an award for consistently disappointing software programming it would be Akai. Optimists like to say that 1.0 OS implementations are likely to have a few issues that soon get fixed, but that kind of logic in the automotive industry would cost lives. In the same sense, broken functionality or crashing operating systems can limit creative output. For a device that costs as staggering an amount as the MPC5000 (MSRP US$3500), it is inexcusable to release such a flagship product without appropriate testing and debugging. It’s not like the world was clamouring for a massive, heavy, expensive hardware sequencer with onboard virtual analog synth emulation. Again I will point to hip-hop producer Just Blaze and his rant at Akai for the state they released the MPC5000. [Ed.: This is not an official CDM comment or my comment on Akai's reliability, because, frankly, I haven't used one. So if anyone wants to add to the rants here or question them -- and perhaps comment on how firmware updates have settled -- I'm all ears; please do so in comments! -PK]

In Australia right now, for the same price as the MPC5000, one is able to purchase a rig such as an Asus laptop, Motu Ultralite audio interface (site | on CDM), Ableton 7 and an MPD drum pad MIDI controller interface. Then again, you couldn’t simply turn it on and start making music out of the box. Despite the need for hardware that simply works, Akai simply cannot afford to rely on Roger Linn’s (on CDM) clever idea from the 1980’s any longer without actually following through on their product promises. Akai commentary aside, this isn’t an outright attack on the MPC5000. Not by any means. The parent company may attract comments on internet forums like “they be smoking crack mangz”, but their products do have a place in the market. This is where anyone left reading can take a deep breath and bask in some hints of genius.

MPC5000’s Brilliant Bits

The MPC5000 does indeed have enough promise to warrant its place on the shelves of your favourite music store or in the database of your choice of online retailer. For a start, the filters and Q-link faders are stunning. Noticing the in-built pre-amp (that Akai have finally copied from their competitors) included in the MPC, I hooked my trusty Vestax turntable and randomly grabbed a record – in this case, one of those James Last records you can’t but trip over in Australian record stores. With it spinning, I pushed record, grabbed a good 20 seconds, mapped the sample to a pad and the pad to a program. Going into sample edit mode, I enjoyed the large screen and multiple faders for adjusting start and end points without the 2000XL style scrolling or shift fader. On a whim, I bumped the resonance on the filter. It took about 5 seconds for me to fall in love with the potential of these filters. Sweeping low, I turned Tijuana trumpets into a resonant sub bass that swept up with my fader movements into the kind of pitched build-up that is still all over progressive house. Sample transformed.

Grabbing other samples from sources less dubious, I began to simply enjoy the hands-on creativity that sampling so effectively enables. Whether you’re a fan of the Sonalksis TBK filter or run your samples through an old Korg MS-20, there is something to be said for the creative aesthetic that comes with a simple sampler, some records and some decent filters. Do I see some heads nodding in agreement over in the French House corner?

Conclusion: Dusty Fingers

So, after a lengthy rant, I managed to say some nice things about the filters and the aesthetic of the MPC. Unfortunately, all specifications and feature sheets aside, the legacy of the MPC series is and always will be the elusive concept of feel, aesthetic, and groove. Once upon a time, this might have been currency to spend on lengthy, impassioned essays to enraptured audiences. These days, the proponents of the tradition of MPC groove tend to get short thrift amongst their contemporaries, who program the same boom bap beats in Fruity Loops, on Roland Grooveboxes and — lest we forget — Madlib’s infamous Roland SP303. There’s a certain element of buying an MPC that’s just down to being down with the MPC format. Plenty of internet forum arguments are waged over hardware versus software, Akai versus Roland, this versus that, purple versus magenta.

Ignoring the actual conflict, it’s obvious that there is something passionate about the range. For me, the MPC5000 reignited a passion that had fallen behind with the 2000XL’s user experience, compared to my workflow in Ableton and Battery. Despite relying on the old grey box for live shows, I had forgotten the unique outcomes of dusty fingers, hands on vinyl, samples on sampler. And it managed to do that in spite of its size, cost, weight and bugs. Once Akai iron out the last of the issues, there is no doubt that this will be a success amongst those producers who are set on hardware sequencing in the box with all the trimmings. For me, the MPC range has been an extension of DAW workflow more than an alternative. In that light, I am content in the MPC2500 bringing crate digging and sampling enjoyment back into my studio and replacing my trusty 2000XL in the flight case at gigs. If the idea of the MPC5000 appeals to you, then I would urge you to test it out for yourself. If you already have then let us know how you found it in the comments below!

Dave Dri is an MPC-wielding Samplist and Producer from Brisbane, Australia. He has been involved with a variety electronic acts running the gamut from Breaks to Jungle. His current project is Segue.

Pro Tools 8 is up on Digidesign’s website. Rather than copy and paste their features, I’ll let you read. This may not shake you from your music making tool of choice, but it looks like it could be, at long last, the substantial refresh for Pro Tools users of that platform have been waiting for. I can quickly sum up the strategy (“strategies” and “tactics” being on the American political mind lately):

• Get all the instruments and effects in the box: Apple’s Logic Studio set the bar for this by first bundling lots of soundmakers,then cutting the price. Digidesign has been busy with their talented AIR group designing some very nice stuff, so this is a no-brainer. Updated: as readers note, you still don’t get a sampler as with EXS24 in Logic and now Dimension Pro in SONAR. Then again, you could add on your on own; is that really a deal breaker for folks?
• Fix the UI (conservatively): Without rocking the boat, obviously Pro Tools was long overdue for a fresh coat of paint and some enhancement.
• Beef up MIDI: This was long Pro Tools’ weak spot, perhaps because of its lineage as an originally audio-only product (the opposite of most of its rivals); MIDI seems to be better integrated with existing paradigms for editing
• Edit pitch more fluidly: AutoTune and the magical note-editing Melodyne are probably safe, but more fluid editing of audio pitches is making its way into audio software in general
• Integrate scoring: The fruits of Digi’s Sibelius acquisition, real, modern music notation is finally in a major DAW (not the dated, clunky implementations elsewhere). My only concern: I hope Sibelius continues to make progress as a dedicated notation tool, because having myself spent long hours over scores, a lot of composition happens outside software like Pro Tools for other reasons.

The notation feature, to me, is probably the biggest story. As a long-time Sibelius user and with some interesting composer contacts, I expect to look at how this works in some depth. Congratulations to Sibelius and Digidesign for pulling this off; I’ll be in touch.

Actually, let’s do better. I’m through really reviewing DAWs. You know why? If I used every DAW, I’d never get any music made. And, oddly, the process of even trying to review something as broad as a tool like Pro Tools just about short circuits any music logic anyway. So I’d rather build a network of gurus in each, and talk about actual music production rather than feature lists – the latter is the developer’s job, anyway. If you’re game and consider yourself an advanced user, get in touch. I’ll have more on organizing this soon.

In the meantime, Digi has posted some videos; free registration on their site required.

Pro Tools 8 Announcement + Demo Videos

Update: keep the comments coming. To me, the challenge all these tools face is that people are (naturally) entrenched in what they’re using. So, yes, it’s possible to say Pro Tools is playing “catch up,” but to play devil’s advocate, you could easily say the same about its competition. My preference remains for “native” hosts with their more flexible hardware and software support, and because personally I’m more creative in an Ableton Live or SONAR (or tracker!); that’s me. Digidesign sent out an open letter about promising interoperability. I’ll be interested to see what they mean, as I don’t immediately see that addressed in any way here. But certainly, I respect the utility of each of these tools to someone. The loyalty of those user bases is part of why progress tends to be incremental, not revolutionary. You have to serve their needs first.

FruityLoop’s approach is so unique that it negates the value pricing. If you want to use FruityLoops, you basically have to commit to another DAW. So while you will save money by getting everything you get with FruityLoops, you will still find it necessary to purchase another DAW to streamline your recording … so the final price you pay will end up being about as much as if you had just bought another product in the first place. …

His principle complaints: the lack of a dedicated timeline view (interestingly, something Ableton added out of the gate with Live’s Arrange view), and limitations to the number of inserts on a channel. It’s not all rants — Evan also raves about some of FL8’s new features. But the timeline view issue is, of course, the big one, and I think it’s a big reason readers seem to be split — even among those who love FL — between using FL alongside other apps and producing start-to-finish in FL. (The opposite reason: despite FL’s Playlist features, many FL users prefer Ableton’s more non-linear approach to performance, dumping FL tracks into Live for playing out and improvising.)

Some of you do use FL to complete entire songs, however. The February Thaw mentioned some of his work, including the all-FL8 track Alcion.

And Ronnie from Rekkerd.org also stepped in to defend the do-it-all-in-FL approach. He notes on his site that one description (aside from the meaningless “DAW”) of what FL is about is right in the press release:

FL Studio is a fully featured, open-architecture music creation and production environment for PC. No extra software is required to produce any style of music, as the complete set of instrument and studio tools is included in the cost of the package.

And, of course, for every critic, there’s an equally-passionate defense of FL. And I guess, warts and all, that’s why I like FL — it has a point of view, one worth criticizing or defending.

I just might not personally make it my only tool. Then again, I was the guy always plugging the modular Moog system into the modular Buchla. Paul Davis, creator of Ardour and JACK, argued these apps create what he calls a “single-app ghetto.” But I still like the possibilities of using more than one all-in-one tool. And, hey, you can do that for still a tiny fraction of the cost of a far more limited hardware “workstation.” (Sorry, Roland.) Not that I wouldn’t be even happier with native JACK support in FL and Live, of course.

‘

FL Studio 8 is here, more or less — as I write this, Release Candidate 3 is available for download, but the final version appears imminent. So, as other tools have matured, why is it that FL is one of those few programs that seems to attract real love?

The press release for the new FL Studio (known to everyone except developer Image-Line as “Fruity Loops”) keeps using the term “DAW.” I have nothing against that, even though DAW as a term has little do with music. (It is the sound English speakers make when they see a cute little lambie or puppy. You know, “dawwwww!….”) It’s a familiar situation: Ableton Live, whose developers came up with the far more descriptive “live sequencing instrument” for their product, felt (rightfully) that Live could compete with more traditional programs and so adopted an otherwise meaningless name. As in that case, FL’s combination of MIDI and audio tools, plug-in hosting and (cough, Reason!) audio recording means you can produce music end to end with it. (Too bad the acronym “DAW” does nothing to hint at what it means.)

What it means to be Fruity

  So, it’s not that FL isn’t a DAW — it’s that it is something else that other programs may not be. I think it needs its own acronym, especially with FL 8 stronger than ever after nearly a decade of ever-maturing releases, a passionate audience, and a dedication to talented developer Arguru, whom the music software community lost last year.

Some nominations:

Insane Idiosyncratically-Awesome Music Suite — IIAMS! Wait, no, that sounds like dog food. (Dawwwww!)

Toybox of Sonic Wonders — TOWS.

Beat Bonanza Tracker Sequencer Hybrid — pronounced BbbbbTHHS!, which is the sound I suggest you make at anyone who suggests FL isn’t capable of serious music or “sounds bad.” (Try to produce some spittle in the process.)

(your superior idea here)

Why am I making a fuss over this? Let me see if I can boil it down:

• FL’s approach to sequencing is like nothing else. Rich MIDI sequencing tools meet up with a unusually-focused approach to patterns and loops. It’s really a kind of hybrid between conventional sequencers and music trackers, blending some of the best of each. At first, that can make it confusing to use, but once you wrap your head around the combination, it can be very powerful.
• It’s kind of a ridiculous value. US$50-$100 buys you a perfectly usable version of the program — not a stripped-down, crippled version; you even get some extras. The most you can spend is about US$199-299, or $399 if you absolutely have to have it in a box. Opening that collection is like walking into an art museum of plug-in development, from avant-garde oddities to classics, with all the bundled noisemakers. Only it’s a museum where you can lick the paintings. For soft synth lovers, even the $500 Logic Pro bundle or new $1000 Ableton suite can’t compare in sheer value.
• It keeps getting better. Cheap and free upgrades keep you getting new features. FL has gradually matured from a nifty niche tool to one of the most mature programs out there. And download versions have lifetime free upgrades.
• It’s not for everyone. Some people find the interface maddening. Its kitchen-sink approach may frighten away people who don’t have an appetite for synths and sequencing. And it generally seems to attract a special crowd of FL lovers. But that’s why we love it. And go ahead, hate it if you don’t get it — FL lovers won’t care.
• It’s a reason to use Windows. Because of the way it was developed, FL almost certainly won’t be appearing on the Mac any time soon. But FL can make Windows look better, with rock-solid platform support, Vista support on day one when a lot of other things were broken, and rich ASIO support. It even installs ASIO4ALL by default so you can use the headphone jack on your laptop and other non-ASIO hardware. You could do that yourself. But it shows they care.

The real elephant in the room is FL’s one rival and younger challenger, Ableton Live. But a funny thing happens there. Almost everyone I know who runs Live on Windows spends some time with FL, as well. And this is why the “DAW” label is truly meaningless for people who love music software. Comparing Live and FL just doesn’t make that much sense. Ableton is an experience in minimalism, and we love it for that. FL is deliciously maximalist: arpeggiators and modulation sources seem to come out of the woodwork, and plug-ins and features are there because they’re fun, not because the program couldn’t live without them. You could live without FL itself — but that would be less fun. FL’s finely-detailed sequencing tools, better quantization features, and plug-in value also make it a perfect partner to Ableton, especially given that most of FL’s instruments and effects will run in Live as plug-ins, and FL itself will happily run inside Ableton as either a ReWire client or a plug-in itself. (It’s lightweight enough that that has some appeal.)

Anyway, I digress. But as we line up coverage for the next few months, music making in a few choice programs is really high on the list. And I won’t be covering everything, not because there aren’t lots of wonderful choices, but because as a musician, you ultimately have to choose to use some things and not others. And FL is definitely on my short list. I just enjoy making music with it.

What’s New in FL8

Now having reflected on the philosophy of FL, let’s get to the good stuff — what’s new in 8.

Make your own instruments and effects: FL is bundled with FL SynthMaker, an “FL-native” version of one of the best DIY plugin makers on any platform. You can now build your own MIDI “dashboards”, effects, and instruments without coding and share what you’ve made with other FL users.

Slicex slicer/looper thing: Slicex does some ReCycle-like beat detection and slicing of audio loops so you can re-arrange and time stretch audio, and play from a controller. It’s not Edison, the audio editor-turned-instrument — in fact, Edison is built into Slicex for audio editing. The ability to just drop audio into FL and not only warp it but edit and slice it looks really terrific.

New plug-ins: The Fruity Limiter (compressor/limiter), Wave Candy (for visualizing sound spectrums, complete with an oscilloscope, or just acting as eye candy), Spectrum Analyzer, Peak Meter, and maximizer-enhanced “Soundgoodizer.”

Beefed-up Edison: Edison, an editor/recorder that’s integrated with FL, was already good stuff. Now it also does audio-to-MIDI analysis, records larger files, and lets you mark and dump sound to the Playlist. There’s also an interesting improvement that does gaps filling and drum loop stretching — more on that and the overall workflow here soon.

Envelope Sequencer: This is actually the feature I’m most excited about; stuff like Sytrus and Fruity Love Philter that uses FL’s already-powerful envelope feature now can do arpeggiated patterns more easily.

Always recording: A “background score logger” records all MIDI into a 3-minute buffer so if you’re improvising and come up with an idea, it’s not lost. That 3-minute buffer gave me a chuckle, because hardware synth/keyboards often tout much smaller buffers.

Multilink controller learn for MIDI: This apparently makes it easier to keep your MIDI learn assignments permanent when using more than one controller. It’s not the autolearn sort of feature we’ve seen in tools like Live and SONAR, but it still sounds like good stuff — more detail once I’ve played around with it.

Recording filter: Record audio and note data independently — that should be handy for working with external synths.

OGG export: Groovy. And there are a few mobile players out there that do support OGG. It’s nice to see support for this open format.

Lots of other stuff: Playlist improvements, better clip handling, and lots of little plug-in improvements round out the upgrade.

With built-in, free (with Producer/XXL) support for DIY plug-ins alone, this is a big upgrade — add in the Edison improvements, Slicex, and envelope sequencer, and I’m pretty excited.

I’ve been using FL 8 beta for about a month, but hope to get in deeper and talk more about it soon. And I know you’re interested, too — the FL 8 preview we posted was one of CDM’s most popular stories so far in 2008. Stay tuned.

What’s New in FL Studio 8 [Image-Line]

Get 10% off FL Studio and other Image-Line stuff and support CDM using code BCIIAID485 (except, of course, that the upgrade is going to be absolutely free for a lot of you — which we like!)

Thor “polysonic” synth: Continuing the industry-wide trend of combining different synth methods, Thor features six different envelopes, four filter types, wave shaping, and unique “analog-style” modulation routing. From anyone else, that description might be a non-starter, but the Props have a long history of really terrific synth design, and they promise Thor, like its predecessors, will be light on CPU usage — definitely bucking a separate industry-wide trend.

A mixer for quantization? Here’s where things get really interesting. The ReGroove mixer isn’t a mixer. It’s a groove/swing quantization tool. Quantization is real-time and adjustable, and can be applied to a full 32 groove channels independently. For anyone ready to break out of the mechanical sound of sequencing, this could be a powerful tool. I find it especially intriguing given the ridiculously simplistic quantization tools in Ableton Live; for some fine-tuned grooves, the combination of Live and Reason might again become popular. Oh, and yes, 32 independent grooves could well prove to be absurd overkill — we’ll have to figure out just how to use this. Or you could just apply one of the included groove presets, including (Props’ words, not mine) “vinyl funk gems of the 70s.” Sweet.

New sequencer: Yes, the original Reason sequencer was downright awful. This one sounds like one you might actually use:

…make global edits using “clips,” assign notes and controller events to different “lanes,” manage multiple takes, and edit events numerically—to name but a few of the hundreds of enhancements. Controller data now uses vector automaton for the smoothest of transitions. Users can manage tempo and time signature changes through a transport track. The inclusion of a floating tool window makes getting to frequently used tasks a snap.

In other words, Reason’s sequencer is a real sequencer now, at long last.

Also tasty-sounding: a new monophonic arpeggiator.

Despite its fantastic, CPU-light synths and effects, Reason had clearly fallen behind in terms of workflow. Beefing up quantization and sequencing and adding a new killer synth may be modest changes, but they sound like the right direction to me. I think the big question for a lot of users will be whether Reason fits in with another tool that handles audio, like Live, FL Studio, or a DAW. (And, for you hard-core sequencer types, maybe no audio at all but Reason inside an insane tracker.) I look forward to testing it.

The New Reason

And now, the obligatory giant rack shot: