essential equipment for starters

just the other day i was thinking of how cool it would be to make my own music. when i hear some of the tracks you guys post here i get really envious sometimes. so basically, my question is: where do you start?

before you start with the tech talk you should note that i'm a total n00b. i'm talking about me being a baby fetus in the world of gerontophylic electronic music superstars.

i have no extraordinary knowledge in the field of electronics, let alone computer programming.

i own a laptop without any additional software or hardware. i use my laptop mainly for the internets and word documents.

i hope you get the idea. i would be very thankful if you would be so kind to give me some valuable information.

:undecided:

go here www.flstudio.com/

well. get some software demo's and see what one you feel like you can use. to start out you need only a 'sequencer' which.... sequences the different parts of you're track.

there are allot of sequencers out there - here are the main ones -

fruity loops - good, easy to work with workstation. it doesn't take long to get to grips with it, and it's a good way to get started imo.

cubase/logic/sonar etc. these are all slightly more high end than fruity (though that does'nt necasarily mean better!). they have a slightly higher learning curve, but are perhaps a little more flexible once you get used to them. they also have the bonus of being able to record audio so you can play guitar etc. in you're tracks.

renoise/fast tracker etc. - these are 'trackers', and work in a different way to standard sequencers, things scroll down instead of accross and you trigger sounds by putting in command lines into a matrix style thing. allot of people fear them, but you can learn to use one in a evening and many people find they can work allot quicker and more effeciently in this way.

reason - is an all in one package a LITTLE like fruity loops in the way it works... but not really. It comes set up with everything you need to make pretty high quality tracks, and doesn't take long to learn. but the downside is you can't use third party instruments and effects, you're stuck with what reason comes with, and some people complain about the quality of sound it creates. but it's undoubtedly a good program.

there are five main types of audio software (that i can think of right now)...

sequencers - allow you to arrange you're tracks, add effects, draw in 'parts' for midi instruments to play, often record audio and generally piece you're track together.

synthesisers - normally need a host sequencer to work in - these make sounds from scratch , you would normally load it up in then write what you wan't it to play in a sequencer.

sampler - these work in much the same way as synthesiser, except they don't make sounds themselves, you load a pre recorded audio file (or lots) into it and it allows you to trigger the sounds in a sequencer as well as manipulate them.

then theres audio editors, like acid, cool edit, soundforge etc. these are best used to work on individual sounds before importing them into a sampler or sequencer.

lastly theres things like reaktor and max/msp. you don't need to worry about them yet i would guess. they can be effects or synthesisers or samplers or lots of other things, and they give you ULTIMATE controll over the sounds you make - but, they take a bit of time to get fluent with.

hope that helps!

o

thx, machine! in a very accessible and transparent fashion you wrote exactly the things i wanted to know.

cheers!

  welcome to the machine said:

fruity loops - good, easy to work with workstation. it doesn't take long to get to grips with it, and it's a good way to get started imo.

cubase/logic/sonar etc. these are all slightly more high end than fruity (though that does'nt necasarily mean better!). they have a slightly higher learning curve, but are perhaps a little more flexible once you get used to them. they also have the bonus of being able to record audio so you can play guitar etc. in you're tracks.

Actually FL can record audio these days too. As I discovered when "my" copy of ableton stopped working :laughing:

When you've used Cubase for literally 13 years like I have then I find something such as Fruityloops a real pain in the arse!! It all boils down as to how determined you are to make some tunes. For what its worth I find Fruity irritating as hell to use but I know loads of people use it bizarrely. For laying down drum tracks and getting shit going at speed nothing beats Cubase IMO. Then again I am using an old version and have never managed to go beyond that. Each time I try and use a more recent version I just start to rant and rave 'cause they're like totally different!!

thanks for the feedback.

*jots it down*

  Promo said:

When you've used Cubase for literally 13 years like I have then I find something such as Fruityloops a real pain in the arse!! It all boils down as to how determined you are to make some tunes. For what its worth I find Fruity irritating as hell to use but I know loads of people use it bizarrely. For laying down drum tracks and getting shit going at speed nothing beats Cubase IMO. Then again I am using an old version and have never managed to go beyond that. Each time I try and use a more recent version I just start to rant and rave 'cause they're like totally different!!

haha im exactly the same but flipped. ive been using fruityloops 3.0 (cant be bothered to upgrade either) for years now and cant get used to many of the other programs i try. fl is just so fast for me now that when i try something else i just get pissed off because i have to learn everything again and i cant do anything as fast as i can in fl.

Whatever works for you, but don't dismiss Reason out of hand; some pretty successful records across a lot of styles (from Amen Andrews to Vector Lovers via Mylo) have been done mostly or entirely in it.

There is a definite "Reason sound", though, and I think it's in the effects - especially the reverbs. ReWire lets you hook up whatever software you're using pretty easily, though.

this really helps. thx

one more related question: how much money have you spent already on your equipment?

Additional question:

What's a delay-free way to rock a MIDI controller through a laptop and make synthi noises? Should I bother with that or just go analog?

don't talk, just do it

  Iain C said:

Actually FL can record audio these days too. As I discovered when "my" copy of ableton stopped working :laughing:

I think only the Professional edition of FL lets you record audio.

That being said, it works pretty well, compared to the zero other recording programs I've used.

tourbus.

music robot.

naked groupie.

drugs.

  MMBKG said:

Additional question:

 

What's a delay-free way to rock a MIDI controller through a laptop and make synthi noises? Should I bother with that or just go analog?

A decent low latency audio interface.

W.O.A.

Any additional input?

cubase sx 2.01 warez

reaktor 5 warez

free vsti's

...

thats it.

long time cubase user - total fucking shit now tho so i binned it

ableton live is the way forward

http://www.ableton.com

  mosca said:

long time cubase user - total fucking shit now tho so i binned it

 

ableton live is the way forward

 

http://www.ableton.com

I find this true. It's so good.

edit: probably especially suited to a beginner, as it's just so easy to use

500 quid! Think I'll stick with FL

  mosca said:

long time cubase user - total fucking shit now tho so i binned it

 

ableton live is the way forward

 

http://www.ableton.com

Yeah I've tried Cubase SX3 on someone elses PC over the weekend and its the biggest pain in the backside to use. After Cubase VST 24 V3.7 its seems like all the functionality and ease of use has dissapeared. I mean seriously I just couldn't get into SX3 at all which was a damn shame 'cause I figured there would be loads of cool features to mess around with. Any views out there because I might actually switch from Cubase too if the later versions are as unusable as they so far seem to be. :confused:

the 4 main "intruments" for electronic music are:

1: sequencer/recorder/effector/host DAW program (digital audio workstation) examples: digital performer (mac), logic (mac), cubase (mac and pc) sonar (pc) ableton live (mac and pc)

2: synthesizers (to create new tones with), can be hardware or software, though software is a lot easier to start with as it's much cheaper (or free if you get cracks) and doesn't require a burly soundcard to be recorded, everything is internal, examples: reaktor, moog modular V, absynth, fm7, there are literally billions of them out there

3: samplers (to play pre recorded sounds with, i.e. breakbeats/drums/orchestral instruments, any "real" sounding sounds, i.e. not spacey unnatural sounds, though you can also play synth samples through it essentially making it no different than a synth, as samplers typically have all the same tone warping functionality as synths, only instead of using an oscillator tone as the source material they use samples of anything you can think of, including oscillator tones or just regular synth sounds

4: effects/processing: multi effects, reverbs, compressors, delays, chorus's, filters, all the digital signal processing toys to fuck with the sounds.

like i said the easier way to get going and have a fully working "studio" is with software, you don't need anything more than a computer and software, which is cheap (compared to hardware), or free if you get cracks (but then you can't complain to the manufacturer if things don't work right) though it is usually a wise investment to also drop some money on A: a controller keyboard, get one with knobs and faders if possible, any keyboard with a midi out will do, though nowadays there are so many cheap decent "controller keyboards" designed for this exact purpose i recommend just buying one of those, and B: monitor speakers, reason being that regular computer speakers are very colored, so your mixes will sound very different on different systems, you'll be mixing levels with a subwoofer, so bass may end up sounding weak on other systems as you overcompinsated in your mix, monitor speakers are designed to be flat so that your mix will sound as decent as it can on several different systems.

this is a great thread, i liked everyones opinions of software

i use FL5 and ableton 4 and a free audio editing programme called audacity - and a usb/midi controller Emu xboard 25 - whcih i havnt really done anythign whiel due to my cd rom drive beign broken and no drivers on there site!

but im slowly becoming a hardware kinda guy

ableton is solid piece of audioware!