MPC or SOFTWARE

mwalker wrote: plus, tell me any hardware piece that sound as good as trilogy (bass), atmosphere (pads) and stylus (loops).

Ya micing real instruments....and creating your own shit, pads depend on style and taste, and stylus loops.... they are good don't get me wrong but they arent in a league of their own not to mention, some people actually program their own shit, as far as a hardware piece that sounds as good
......look at some of the newer shit, not to mention the endless supply of samples, but thats besides the point your obviously a software nut so whatever works for you (Trilogy is def a must have but its collecting dust to my self made collection of basses due to personal perference)
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As far as the software/hardware thing, my setup is a Triton ST88, mpc4k, motif 6, and fantom x6, ran into a digi 002mx (other shit but this is just basically all my main hardware pieces)

My work process always starts on the mpc4k, I've drifted away from it, used other programs, comtemplated selling it a few times, but I always return to it everytime, happier than before, it makes me happy, I know it pretty much inside out, easy to work with, works with anything else, it inspires me to be creative, some people are stats and feature freaks, they think shit is cooler because its newer and blah blah, all that means shit, I used to think the same shit, hopping on the bandwangon and shit, the more these software cats put down the hardware pieces, the happier I am that they don't have the same shit I have

I think the initial period of your fleshing out your tracks into what they are going to be is crucial, but it also should be fun, nothing on the market atm has been able to replace that feeling I get, when I'm in front of that machine its like my right arm

with that said though I bounce all my audio tracks down to PT or Cubase and mix them down, but midi wise regardless of me missing the Notation which I love, the mpc handles everything I need to be handled, certainly between the two programs theres nothing Reason can do, that cannot be done in some shape and fashion on the 4k

I have logged a couple of weeks time (not weeks as in I played with it a few times during 2-3 weeks, but weeks time in actual hours), and was really enjoying the program, spent time to learn it quite well, a while later I went back to my 4k a even better man, because I just incorporated the knowledge I gained from Reason into my usage of the 4k

Regardless of some of the nice features of Reason, it just doesn't give me that same buzz

But with both things, your still going to need something to mix it down with outside, PT with a waves bundle pretty much all you need sides sounds, and linking up PT/Ableton Live/MPC4k was a good experience for me as well, I love the realtime timescretching of live, but I still don't use it as much as just the 4k(with samples and sound modules) and PT combo, that just does it for me

mwalker wrote:plus, tell me any hardware piece that sound as good as trilogy (bass), atmosphere (pads) and stylus (loops).

It's all subjective, but i don't like romplers at all. And that's what trilogy, atmosphere and stylus are, though implemented as software.

Tell me one piece of software that'll howl like a god damned banshee when you crank up the filter resonance, like a korg ms-10 does.

But as I said, it's subjective and depends on what kind of music you want to do.

iceberg-slim, glad you join the convo. i am a drummer by trade. i use stylus as a back drop of the drum part. usually, my stylus parts are very low in the mix and i use battery/redrum (i have trillions of samples) for my main drumming groove. iceberg, you are more seasoned than most individuals on this board and the thing about reason is that it is a great learning tool for mixing, eq, insert, send etc for people who do not have a clue. i think the subtractor and malstrom s*cks. also, the factory soundbank s*cks. i just use redrum and nn-xt sampler in reason. i usually start out on my drumset and just play for 2 to3 hours and then sit down to create. the drumming gets my blood flowing, i guess the same way mpc4000 gets you going.

personal i am tried of reading post about individuals have brought $2000 worth of sh*t and do not know how to use it. just spend $299 on reason and just learn some basic before going out buying all that sh*t. period.

how could you have a mpc and do not know how to midi it up to other equiment? how can you want to be a producer and do not want to read the manual for mpc.

I am sad and unhappy.

believe it or not guys,

technology is what gave music its character or rather not enough of it. why i say this.
when the s950 came ot you only had 768k of memory, believe tht sh***.
cats had to load piano, bass drum trumpet, programs from a single floppy to the sampler, this all gave the genre of music a character signature. down sampling 1k piano note
reggae. from jamaica laid hands on an 808 in the eighties and produced the "computer riddim" the actual name. tht gave dancehall a sound, deep ass bass from a tuned 808 and crusty hats, same for hip hop
i look on this as remarkable.

i am sure if you use tht same same 950 and produced a classical musical piece in todays standard, then you may have a problem or you may become very rich.

fine romplers like trilogy, i have had a play with it, and the expression and fret noises, string sctratches, make it so believable, tht is some serious stuff there. but for eg. hip hop, "original hip hop" you dont need all tht sh**, some 12bit samples and a couple of drum loops are fine,

from the 60s right up to the mid eighties, reggae music started on 4 track. everything was bounced all three times. bob marley recorded on 8 track, by enginner morrison. he bounced like hell on the limited desks. this all increased the noise floor of each track, making them "hissy" and leakage from channel mutes on cheap overloaded, bass driven desks, nevr helped much. so this was one character of reggae music.

the point i am making, is that you need to know when to use what program and how. me personally as i said, i was a software junkie, trying to break the habit( this is no joke, i got so carried away) i was addicted, isoftware manufanufactureres see this in people like me, and capitalise on it, cubase is prime example sx1 sx 1.02 sx1.03 etc etc sx2 sx2.01 sx 2.02 etc. sl 1 etc. nuendo1..... etc i can go on but i wont, once upon a time, updates just fixed problems, but now it is a stepping stone to release a newer "version " tht does so much more.... tht you have to have it.
cakewalk has jumped on the band wagon as well.
every month a new software, this is ajoke.

just know how to strike a balance on them both, i have! but iwill only tell yall when i upload my first track.

ya I agree with you mwalker, I'd have to say Reason is the best learning tool on the market, especially if you cop the tutorial, it will take you through making your first beat

mwalker wrote:iceberg-slim, glad you join the convo. i am a drummer by trade. i use stylus as a back drop of the drum part. usually, my stylus parts are very low in the mix and i use battery/redrum (i have trillions of samples) for my main drumming groove. iceberg, you are more seasoned than most individuals on this board and the thing about reason is that it is a great learning tool for mixing, eq, insert, send etc for people who do not have a clue. i think the subtractor and malstrom s*cks. also, the factory soundbank s*cks. i just use redrum and nn-xt sampler in reason. i usually start out on my drumset and just play for 2 to3 hours and then sit down to create. the drumming gets my blood flowing, i guess the same way mpc4000 gets you going.

personal i am tried of reading post about individuals have brought $2000 worth of sh*t and do not know how to use it. just spend $299 on reason and just learn some basic before going out buying all that sh*t. period.

how could you have a mpc and do not know how to midi it up to other equiment? how can you want to be a producer and do not want to read the manual for mpc.

Word on the manual thing, it reads like a kindergarden book, why do people have so much trouble with it........

reading level