Soft To Hard?

[Tarekith]

Blog post time! This one talks a bit about working with hardware to write your music, as opposed to strictly a software workflow.

http://tarekith.com/soft-to-hard/

[Tagor]

there are people around using laptops only for recording

[Ub373NNN]

i going have to honestly say this blog no help on me either. sorry.

[Matt_Quinn]

That's what she said?

Sorry, had to. Great post as always.

[Tarekith]

i going have to honestly say this blog no help on me either. sorry.

Stop reading it then, or sign me up for more pizza newsletters like last time.

[Tarekith]

Thanks for not wasting time, that's one pizza newsletter I hadn't see yet.

[starving student]

hey is that an sp-808 I spy, don't have mine anymore but still have about 20zips, did you know you can install the emix studio os on it as well as the edirol version…..I love that thing.

[Tarekith]

Yeah, that pic is about 15 years old though, I haven't had an sp808 in well over a decade.

[trevox]

I come from pretty much the same background in that I used solely hardware for many years - various synths/effects and an emu sampler. Well pretty much all my PC could do was transmit midi anyway - a 386 with a whopping 16Mb's of RAM running Cubase. And that was close to top of the range at the time! The part about menu diving is very true. The crazy repetitive button combinations to record in, normalize and place sample on a key is almost hypnotic, though I must say I do not miss it too much! In fact, the only thing I really prefer software versions of are samplers and Logic's EXS24 MkII is by far my favourite in terms of ease of use and functionality.

I started using some software then and ended up doing what many people do - try every single vst under the sun to a point where you have far too many to choose from. This is not a good thing at all - well not for me anyway. After a few years of using plugins, I have totally reverted back to hardware apart from some EQ/Dynamics plugins for mixing and the odd delay or reverb. The reasons are quite different than what you described. It is not as much about workflow as it is about sound. I know people will bang on about how great this, that and the other plugin is, but in my opinion, few to none come close to a decent hardware synth. You really begin to realise this when mixing more than anything else. More often than not, I find I don't have to do nearly as much EQ/dynamic work on the raw recordings compared to soft synths to get them sitting nicely in the mix. Don't get me wrong, you can make really nice sounding music with softsynths - I just personally prefer the additional rawness I believe you get out of hardware synths.

It's funny too, because I have 2 Nord modulars (a G1 and a G2 engine) at the heart of my studio, so you kinda have to use editing software. Same with my Matrix1000 and to a lesser degree my Tetra - all are in effect like programming a softsynth. What I tend to do is try to make clever assignments of controller knobs for each sound that I can play live and record the midi cc data. That way, I am still relying on my playing, but in the event that I make a mess of a small part, I can edit the midi before recording the actual audio. It takes discipline not to go in and start bastardizing your cc data though - I really try to make sure I only do this when something sounds really terrible so the live playing element is retained! I ordered a Quneo which will hopefully arrive pretty soon which I am hoping will add a whole new element to the way I approach playing synths too - if it ever gets completed that is!

Anyway, I enjoyed the blog - pity some of the responses are not pertinent to the discussion as it's an interesting topic!

[Machinesworking]

Funny I started out using an Ensonique Mirage and a Mac +. I never could get into hardware sequencers, and samplers for the most part are better on the computer.
Programming synths wise though there's no competition to the Memorymooog and Xpander. The moog is as straighforward as it gets and the Xpander has the best layout of controls for hundreds of parameters of any device I've used. In fact I wish Novation etc. would have copied their layout instead of generic and confusing etc.

I'm a firm believer in using what you most feel comfortable using. I use about 4 software wavetable/FM synths plus samplers and my hardware synths and it works for me.

[noisetonepause]

Most of my non-drum sounds now are coming from hardware. I prefer the interface on the hardware I have to soft synths. I don't mix on a mixer because a) I don't have a good one and b) I like total recall.

But I also just discovered the sequencer on my Ensoniq VFX-SD. It's fun and incredibly easy to use... Could churn out endless techno with that and very little else. Hm. Maybe after I get some monitors I'll look for a cheap Mackie..