Sitting on the Fence - Push or Maschine

[SuburbanThug]

This is the version w/o cheat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6A-JYbu1Os

I was already familiar with the compostition but this is a very nice version you posted, amazing skill. As far as cheating do you mean using samples? The guy on the Push is not using scale mode. I don't mean to insinuate that the Push version compares to the version you posted in the least.

This thread is somewhat addictive, even though I know it's a waste of time (as by now, the actual value of the comments is zero), I keep reading....and posting

to firstly position me in this "war": I did buy Maschine two years ago, but never really got into it which is more testament to me not spending enough time rather than weaknesses of the product. The fact of having a "sequencer within a sequencer" did bug me though, so with Push offering tighter integration with Live (i.e track creation, device creation, browser, Live devices) AND M4L, I jumped ship and bought Push (arriving today !!). Now, where I kind of blanked out was the fact that I had (stupidly) bought an academic version of Maschine before. Now realising that there is no way I can sell the controller (other than as a replacement controller or for scrap parts).

I know, stupid but also kind of clever in terms of inner family budget discussions because guess what ? I will have both . And I am happy about it because they do complement each other (even though not to a level that I would knowingly buy both). plan right now is to use Push as the Master controller at the Live level, managing tracks, devices, clips,automation and accessing Live content. All the patterns, clips and scenes will be inside Live rather than using the respective features of Maschine.

Maschine, on the other hand, will primarily act as a vst sound source (Komplete Elements, Expansion packs) and sound manipulation tool. So I will feed MIDI from Live into it, and I will route the audio per track out of it. Might also feed external inputs and other internal sound sources into Maschine for sampling.

So the direction is quite clear. In case there is overlaps (drum sequencing, playing chords), I will go down the Push route, for everything else, I use the tool that is superior/unique for the respective feature.

But that wasn't my point.

Regarding the (pretty useless) "instrument" debate, why don't you check out the wikipedia definition ? As both don't produce sound by itself (unless finger tapping on a disconnected device is your thing), they are both not considered instruments. If at all, the computer (or better the DAW) + the user interface (Maschine, Push, Keyboard) is the instrument. So let's abandon the instrument debate and focus on the controller debate.

What is the better controller/user interface ? Obviously, hard to judge as someone would have to come up with metrics first. And this is actually quite hard because functional richness, musical range etc. are not necessarily appropriate. At the end of the day, it is all about creating music, and if a device with less choices get you there quicker, then this device is better (for you).


So why don't you guys exchange all your sound cloud pages and decide based on your MUSIC who has the longest, and who is more having a hypothetical fanboy debate (probably merely scratching the surface) ?

Last comment: I don't think anyone here on the forum regardless which side of the fence has a vested interest in creating more sales for either company (call me naive ), but we seem to use the "Maschine vs Push" proxy debate to make ourselves, our choices/preferences and ultimately our approach to music seem superior. NI and Ableton can be proud of you (for all the free "grassroots" marketing)

So rather than discussing the means (=tools), discuss the final product (if you are really determined to appoint a winner).

I obviously think, there is no winner, most of the music I am enjoying has been produced using neither of those (I guess). Take Squarepusher, Autechre, Aphex Twin. I doubt, I will "overtake" any of them even by having BOTH.

I'm not totally familiar with Autechres setup these days but yeah I doubt they'll be rocking a Push, haha. Don't they use Max pretty regularly now though? Somehow I don't think they use it with Live though.

I did consider suggesting we could post videos of us improving all using the same patch, some on Maschine, some on Push to have a more comprehensive debate on which one was more of an "instrument" but I agree that it does seem silly since each one has its own strengths. I'll say it one more time: I don't think one is inherently better than the other. I think they are DIFFERENT, and one does not replace every strength of the other. I brought up the instrument argument because IMHO a controller with more key range is better suited for playing chords and melodies in the context of traditional instrumentation and playability.

[beats me]

I’d like to file a complaint/question about Maschine.

I recently bought some expansion packs, mostly for the samples and styles they represent, but also for the patterns that I sometimes find as a good starting point. Each pack supposedly comes with like 100 patterns each as advertised by NI’s spec (sales) page. Well, when you hit the patterns window in Maschine’s browser it’s completely empty, no patterns from the stock software or expansion packs I got.

My research has come up with nothing and it appears the patterns browser is only for patterns you create on your own and save as a pattern. Am I wrong here? If you have to save your own patterns or manually save individual patterns from demo songs NI sells after the fact then why advertise it coming with a certain amount of patterns?

seriously, dude ?!.......RTFM !

page 31 (maschine manual 1.5)

Pattern is a sequence that plays Sounds from the current Group. A Pattern is therefore usually linked to a Group since it is a part of the Group; however you can also save it independently from the Group. This is useful if you want to try out different drum kits with the same Pattern or different Sounds with a given melody. More information on Patterns can be found in chapter 6, “Working with Patterns (Software)” and chapter 7, “Working with Patterns (Software)”

Load a kit and press the pattern button, each pad now represents a pattern.

I browsed the manual, Google searched, and even checked tutorials. None of which, including what you quoted, said anything like "Included patterns in Maschine and expansion packs aren't saved in or available in Maschine's pattern browser".

I've bought a stupid amount of drum plug-ins over the years, most of which have some kind of built-in sequencer and they all come with patterns to build from, as well as their expansion packs. It's kind of ridiculous given Maschine's price and capabilities that it doesn't have this as well other than manually saving patterns from full songs, most of which you aren't going to want because they are melodic parts or one shots that only fit that song. That's a construction kit.

And although it wasn't asked, why not just bang out my own beats from scratch? Because most developers that release patterns use actual drummers or pro producers that are going to come up with something far more intricate or interesting than what I am going to come up with when I try to wedge in music time between work, responsibilities, and life affirming depression. Not to mention, drums are just one aspect of what we work on as a solo home producer. Drum programming isn't my strong point and nor do I feel it should be if music isn't something that is paying my bills. I'm fine letting the pros do the heavy lifting in that department and I'll edit their quality work.

PS. I don't compose House music. So I'm not whining because I can't come up with a 4 to the floor beat.




And thanks 3dot... for your response as well as including "unfortunately". I don't know if it's laziness or an oversight that they wouldn't include patterns in their pattern browser.

[yur2die4]

Well, I think by 'cheat', he mostly means how the left handed chords are already pre-recorded on that Push version. Which is why he is playing to the metronome

Had it been on a piano, it possibly could have been done with only two hands. But Push only lets him get away with the right handed patterns.

[monohusche]

I’d like to file a complaint/question about Maschine.

I recently bought some expansion packs, mostly for the samples and styles they represent, but also for the patterns that I sometimes find as a good starting point. Each pack supposedly comes with like 100 patterns each as advertised by NI’s spec (sales) page. Well, when you hit the patterns window in Maschine’s browser it’s completely empty, no patterns from the stock software or expansion packs I got.

My research has come up with nothing and it appears the patterns browser is only for patterns you create on your own and save as a pattern. Am I wrong here? If you have to save your own patterns or manually save individual patterns from demo songs NI sells after the fact then why advertise it coming with a certain amount of patterns?

seriously, dude ?!.......RTFM !

page 31 (maschine manual 1.5)

Pattern is a sequence that plays Sounds from the current Group. A Pattern is therefore usually linked to a Group since it is a part of the Group; however you can also save it independently from the Group. This is useful if you want to try out different drum kits with the same Pattern or different Sounds with a given melody. More information on Patterns can be found in chapter 6, “Working with Patterns (Software)” and chapter 7, “Working with Patterns (Software)”

Load a kit and press the pattern button, each pad now represents a pattern.

I browsed the manual, Google searched, and even checked tutorials. None of which, including what you quoted, said anything like "Included patterns in Maschine and expansion packs aren't saved in or available in Maschine's pattern browser".

I've bought a stupid amount of drum plug-ins over the years, most of which have some kind of built-in sequencer and they all come with patterns to build from, as well as their expansion packs. It's kind of ridiculous given Maschine's price and capabilities that it doesn't have this as well other than manually saving patterns from full songs, most of which you aren't going to want because they are melodic parts or one shots that only fit that song. That's a construction kit.

And although it wasn't asked, why not just bang out my own beats from scratch? Because most developers that release patterns use actual drummers or pro producers that are going to come up with something far more intricate or interesting than what I am going to come up with when I try to wedge in music time between work, responsibilities, and life affirming depression. Not to mention, drums are just one aspect of what we work on as a solo home producer. Drum programming isn't my strong point and nor do I feel it should be if music isn't something that is paying my bills. I'm fine letting the pros do the heavy lifting in that department and I'll edit their quality work.

PS. I don't compose House music. So I'm not whining because I can't come up with a 4 to the floor beat.




And thanks 3dot... for your response as well as including "unfortunately". I don't know if it's laziness or an oversight that they wouldn't include patterns in their pattern browser.

Sounds like there is a little bit of a misunderstanding here. I thought, you were complaining that you can only access patterns either by "extracting" them from whole demo songs or create your own, hence arguing that NI marketing is misleading.

And I tried to explain that this is not the case. What benefit is a pattern (nothing else than a midi file) to you if not loaded in conjunction with an instrument (ableton drum rack, maschine group/kit) or adding to an existing instrument. The third option is to keep a pattern and replace the instrument. Out of the three approaches, you can do two with Maschine "out of the box" (load pattern + instrument/group/kit, load/replace instrument/group/kit while keeping the pattern). The third approach can be done using 3dot's link (i.e. keeping an existing kit/group and just replace the pattern).

So import the patterns and you should be all set, but NI isn't really wrong as the expansion packs DO contain patterns. And you don't have to load whole songs (containing the melodic parts and one shots that you don't want) to get to the patterns. Take an 808 kit. It will come with predefined patterns, and I would argue that the kit as a whole can be considered "homogeneous" and should be loaded as a whole.

Hope that makes it clearer. And I agree, NI should provide the patterns individually as part of their "out of the box" product although I am assuming that the patterns have been designed for specific kits (which is why they are bundled with the kits).

[delicioso]

I’d like to file a complaint/question about Maschine.

I recently bought some expansion packs, mostly for the samples and styles they represent, but also for the patterns that I sometimes find as a good starting point. Each pack supposedly comes with like 100 patterns each as advertised by NI’s spec (sales) page. Well, when you hit the patterns window in Maschine’s browser it’s completely empty, no patterns from the stock software or expansion packs I got.

My research has come up with nothing and it appears the patterns browser is only for patterns you create on your own and save as a pattern. Am I wrong here? If you have to save your own patterns or manually save individual patterns from demo songs NI sells after the fact then why advertise it coming with a certain amount of patterns?

Um, you haven't spent much time with Maschine, have you?

Patterns that are included with Maschine's library or expansion packs come together with groups (kits). When you load a group (kit), you can choose whether any associated patterns load with them or not (button above the right LCD that says "PATT").

[beats me]

Sounds like there is a little bit of a misunderstanding here. I thought, you were complaining that you can only access patterns either by "extracting" them from whole demo songs or create your own, hence arguing that NI marketing is misleading.

And I tried to explain that this is not the case. What benefit is a pattern (nothing else than a midi file) to you if not loaded in conjunction with an instrument (ableton drum rack, maschine group/kit) or adding to an existing instrument. The third option is to keep a pattern and replace the instrument. Out of the three approaches, you can do two with Maschine "out of the box" (load pattern + instrument/group/kit, load/replace instrument/group/kit while keeping the pattern). The third approach can be done using 3dot's link (i.e. keeping an existing kit/group and just replace the pattern).

So import the patterns and you should be all set, but NI isn't really wrong as the expansion packs DO contain patterns. And you don't have to load whole songs (containing the melodic parts and one shots that you don't want) to get to the patterns. Take an 808 kit. It will come with predefined patterns, and I would argue that the kit as a whole can be considered "homogeneous" and should be loaded as a whole.

Hope that makes it clearer. And I agree, NI should provide the patterns individually as part of their "out of the box" product although I am assuming that the patterns have been designed for specific kits (which is why they are bundled with the kits).

As an example Addictive Drums comes with "thousands" of built-in patters/MIDI files. To be fair in those thousands there are slight variations and fills. It's not thousands of completely unique patterns. They are organized in genre by name (rock, funk, blues, etc.) Play any pattern and while it's playing just change through the drum kits. Find a drum kit you like and just as easily change the drum pattern on the fly. Repeat until you find something that works or you want to tweak further.

That's what Macshine should have by default. "Thousands" of patterns already in the pattern browser filterable by it's tagging system, not "25 patterns" that are actually 25 different elements of a complete demo song....which also aren't in the pattern browser by default.

It's not a deal breaker. I'm just surprised and disappointed they didn't do that.

[beats me]

I’d like to file a complaint/question about Maschine.

I recently bought some expansion packs, mostly for the samples and styles they represent, but also for the patterns that I sometimes find as a good starting point. Each pack supposedly comes with like 100 patterns each as advertised by NI’s spec (sales) page. Well, when you hit the patterns window in Maschine’s browser it’s completely empty, no patterns from the stock software or expansion packs I got.

My research has come up with nothing and it appears the patterns browser is only for patterns you create on your own and save as a pattern. Am I wrong here? If you have to save your own patterns or manually save individual patterns from demo songs NI sells after the fact then why advertise it coming with a certain amount of patterns?

Um, you haven't spent much time with Maschine, have you?

Patterns that are included with Maschine's library or expansion packs come together with groups (kits). When you load a group (kit), you can choose whether any associated patterns load with them or not (button above the right LCD that says "PATT").

And when/how do these patterns appear in the pattern browser without me having to do anything? I've loaded all kinds of things and have never had anything appear in the pattern browser.

[monohusche]

Sounds like there is a little bit of a misunderstanding here. I thought, you were complaining that you can only access patterns either by "extracting" them from whole demo songs or create your own, hence arguing that NI marketing is misleading.

And I tried to explain that this is not the case. What benefit is a pattern (nothing else than a midi file) to you if not loaded in conjunction with an instrument (ableton drum rack, maschine group/kit) or adding to an existing instrument. The third option is to keep a pattern and replace the instrument. Out of the three approaches, you can do two with Maschine "out of the box" (load pattern + instrument/group/kit, load/replace instrument/group/kit while keeping the pattern). The third approach can be done using 3dot's link (i.e. keeping an existing kit/group and just replace the pattern).

So import the patterns and you should be all set, but NI isn't really wrong as the expansion packs DO contain patterns. And you don't have to load whole songs (containing the melodic parts and one shots that you don't want) to get to the patterns. Take an 808 kit. It will come with predefined patterns, and I would argue that the kit as a whole can be considered "homogeneous" and should be loaded as a whole.

Hope that makes it clearer. And I agree, NI should provide the patterns individually as part of their "out of the box" product although I am assuming that the patterns have been designed for specific kits (which is why they are bundled with the kits).

As an example Addictive Drums comes with "thousands" of built-in patters/MIDI files. To be fair in those thousands there are slight variations and fills. It's not thousands of completely unique patterns. They are organized in genre by name (rock, funk, blues, etc.) Play any pattern and while it's playing just change through the drum kits. Find a drum kit you like and just as easily change the drum pattern on the fly. Repeat until you find something that works or you want to tweak further.

That's what Macshine should have by default. "Thousands" of patterns already in the pattern browser filterable by it's tagging system, not "25 patterns" that are actually 25 different elements of a complete demo song....which also aren't in the pattern browser by default.

It's not a deal breaker. I'm just surprised and disappointed they didn't do that.

I hear you, and I think, this is quite easy to fix for the next Maschine revision.

But do play around with different kits and groups, and you will realise that it is not "25 different elements" of a song. And as I said, changing drumsounds and whole kits while keeping a pattern you like is there, no problem.

[onestep]

As an example Addictive Drums comes with "thousands" of built-in patters/MIDI files. To be fair in those thousands there are slight variations and fills. It's not thousands of completely unique patterns. They are organized in genre by name (rock, funk, blues, etc.) Play any pattern and while it's playing just change through the drum kits. Find a drum kit you like and just as easily change the drum pattern on the fly. Repeat until you find something that works or you want to tweak further.

That's what Macshine should have by default. "Thousands" of patterns already in the pattern browser filterable by it's tagging system, not "25 patterns" that are actually 25 different elements of a complete demo song....which also aren't in the pattern browser by default.

It's not a deal breaker. I'm just surprised and disappointed they didn't do that.

You can do what you're talking about. As pointed out above, every kit in the factory library and any expansion pack kit comes with associated patterns. You would initially load a pattern when you load a kit (because unless you have a kit loaded, a pattern by itself will not make any sound). Once you do have a pattern loaded that way, you can keep changing kits by only loading kits while the same pattern is loaded. You can also save your own patterns and browse and load them from the browser as well. The pattern browser is primarily for saved user patterns.

Now, since it sounds like you're wanting to browse and load factory/expansion patterns from the pattern browser to start off with, independently from kits, here's what you do:

For factory patterns, someone has uploaded all of them for you in that link 3dot provided earlier. Drag em to your pattern folder (on osx documents > native instruments > maschine > patterns)

Do the same for expansion packs by finding the pattern files in the expansions pack's library folder.

[delicioso]

And when/how do these patterns appear in the pattern browser without me having to do anything? I've loaded all kinds of things and have never had anything appear in the pattern browser.

Looks like onestep already helped you. Like he said, the pattern browser is primarily for saved user patterns but for what you want, just put all the patterns into Maschine's Patterns folder and they will all appear in the Pattern browser for you to browse.

[SuburbanThug]

Well, I think by 'cheat', he mostly means how the left handed chords are already pre-recorded on that Push version. Which is why he is playing to the metronome

Had it been on a piano, it possibly could have been done with only two hands. But Push only lets him get away with the right handed patterns.

Oh, duh.

[beats me]

I do appreciate the work around info for the patterns and I don’t think anybody is really disagreeing with my point. If I dump them in manually are they already named and tagged in a way that makes sense or is that more manual BS I have to do?

Some of the patterns in the songs are literally 1 or 2 one shots in the entire pattern. Is NI including those as part of the total included pattern count?

[skatr2]

I do appreciate the work around info for the patterns and I don’t think anybody is really disagreeing with my point. If I dump them in manually are they already named and tagged in a way that makes sense or is that more manual BS I have to do?

Some of the patterns in the songs are literally 1 or 2 one shots in the entire pattern. Is NI including those as part of the total included pattern count?

so much for completely mousless

[delicioso]

If I dump them in manually are they already named and tagged in a way that makes sense or is that more manual BS I have to do?

The pattern browser is primarily for saved user patterns but you can still do what you want like I explained. It's quick and easy to custom tag multiple selected items at once. NI clearly wants you to load factory/expansion patterns with the kits they're associated with or just make your own patterns which it is great for, instead of looking at it as something to browse and load pre-made patterns by themselves.

Aside from the obvious things like drag & dropping and prepping/organizing stuff like importing samples, tagging, naming new projects, the actual music making process in Maschine can be all done entirely from the hardware without the mouse or qwerty keyboard.

[beats me]

All I’m saying is don’t advertise something has 100 patterns and then there’s nothing in the pattern browser.

It’s like saying something has 3,000 samples but none of them appear in the sample browser until you manually add them one by one.

And I realize Komplete is a little more complex but I don’t get patterns having to be tied to kits. It’s not like you have a pattern for kick, snare, and hats but as soon as you load a different kit those notes are going to trigger all crashes, cowbells, and blocks. A snare note should be a snare note no matter what drum kit you load.

I’ll get over this, but it’s generally one of the first features I test drive when I get a drum plug-in with a sequencer and I thought the lack of patterns in the pattern browser meant something didn’t install properly or I needed to configure something.

And really which is a user more likely to use, snippets from an entire demo song or quality patterns that aren’t tied to any included song? A lot of the patterns included in the songs are laughable as a preset pattern. It’s really not that difficult to program a 4 count hat or kick. So one argument is you only save the patterns you think you’d use. My argument is 100 patterns should be quality, not 20 interesting usable patterns and 80 patterns of fluff or something a monkey could tap in with quantization turned on.

This thread inspires long winded bitching. I can't wait until a graduate to personal attacks.