To Maschine Or Not To Maschine

[sondericker]

I picked up a Maschine yesterday and while it is still early I think I have most of it figured out. I don't think it does much that my APC40 + MPD18 can't do ( other than automating any parameter at any time on the fly with knobs, which is huge imho) but, that being said, having everything right there on buttons, knobs and sweet juicy glowy drum pads is too much fun to be believed. Maschine is tremendous fun. While difficult to articulate, Maschine is somehow a more "immersive experience."

My immediate guess is that I'll use Maschine to lay out the basic structure of a tune and to write the beats along with some loop based melodic motifs. Then I see myself popping over to Ableton to add more parts and to do the real EQing and sound design. From there I'll bang it over to the Arrangement View, add more automation and finishing touches.

Big thing is the fun factor!

[Syncretia]

I still say don't get it, it's rubbish, you don't need maschine, you got drum racks man and on top of that you got a whole line of mpdzzzzz to get you goin, and I know about some mpdzzzzz I started with the first one and have had every single drum controller, minus the nanos. Just do yourself a favor and forget all about this machine business, how do we even know it really exist I mean have you ever really seen one.... uh huhhh see all of these people talking about maschine has even one of them actually showed you a maschine yet.......? that's what I thought, who even knows if this much flaunted and squawked about workflow fairy dust even really exist. If I was you the first thing I would do in the morning is go down to the local gc and find this so called mythological beast called maschine and walk right up to the sales rep standing next to it and say loud and clear with a thunderous voice.......'here here good sir what ever you do do not show me that maschine'..................end of story, and if he doesn't listen and trys to demo it for you anyway I'd scream 'unhand me good sir lest I chastise you with my whipping cane, this maschine business is for the common folk and I'll certainly have none of that. then I'd scream 'you, boy over there, bring me my brisk tea and lets have out of this hellish place' bring the carriage around and back, back I say to our mincemeat pie and drum racks now and forever more very well there there, the second there is most important in this type of situation, anyway.... look at it like this, with the drum racks you could have racks with in racks within racks within racks within racks, now somebody tell me can maschine do that, heeeeeell no!!!!! I could put a rack in a crack of a crack in iraq dammit and I'd like to see maschine pull that off why don't yee

Single most enlightening quote about Maschine ever.

I hate that I'm going to buy this thing. It goes against every fibre of my being, but the software/hardware integration just doesn't exist with other stuff yet. Not because it can't; but because nobody has written it yet. Sigh.

[501dubz]

if you produce hiphop then fair play maschine may be the way for u but in terms of most EDM production with lots of switches I'd say dont waste your time thinking that the workflow will help you in any way. Its been collecting dust since day 1 here.

[humnumb]

if you produce hiphop then fair play maschine may be the way for u but in terms of most EDM production with lots of switches I'd say dont waste your time thinking that the workflow will help you in any way. Its been collecting dust since day 1 here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xmn8TvFqEGY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VIL6RidXdQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egPncQ36G-w

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZxcWIe3lO0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_iH5hGF210

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXI8cEhYNMM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liGUW7QF6cQ

[23kon]

if you produce hiphop then fair play maschine may be the way for u but in terms of most EDM production with lots of switches I'd say dont waste your time thinking that the workflow will help you in any way. Its been collecting dust since day 1 here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xmn8TvFqEGY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VIL6RidXdQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egPncQ36G-w

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZxcWIe3lO0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_iH5hGF210

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXI8cEhYNMM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liGUW7QF6cQ

It is true that Maschine is more of a hiphop tool than a dance music tool - certainly for trancey progressive stuff I think. You only have to look at all the early Maschine videos where it's all hip hop producers and artists giving it big-ups and saying how it's replaced their MPCs.

You have to remember that the NI videos above are ADVERTS! The artists wouldve been paid to give the product big-ups and will have been given the product as well as all the other NI suite.

The best for and against reasons for buying maschine personally have come from other users on this forum who have contributed sensibly to the arguement. Especially the more genuine ones that arent completely PRO maschine but think its a good tool - e.g "It's good ... but ..." and list its faults too.

Buying a product based on ADVERTS is just falling for marketing hype.
Just like if you think you buy some shampoo and think you are going to get gorgeous hair like Jennifer Anniston or whoever lol

[lethal_pizzle]

It is true that Maschine is more of a hiphop tool than a dance music tool - certainly for trancey progressive stuff I think.

It's suited to any repetitively structured music based in blocks. Less so for linear recordings/vocals etc. There's plenty of ways to skin a cat, but for me Maschine is the best bit of kit I've got, in terms of hands on fun.

[nowtime]

I only read the first page of this thread, but based upon your original first post, you do not need Maschine, it would only be a luxury and not necessary.

[Damon_Chambers]

I just hate giving my money over to those sloppy @#$#s at NI.

to be perfectly honest i feel the same way. i hate the fact that NI has made a great product like this. they have, in the past, been one of the crappiest companies regarding customer satisfaction and how they treat their customers. its irritates me to no end that another company didnt come up with it, but they did so ill just deal.

i freaking love my maschine. i cant say enough good about it. ive never been good at drums and procussions and maschine has made this part of music making fun. i laid out a nice afro-tom sound today and have never done that before, and never thought i would because im not a drummer.

[JuanSOLO]

Kruddler, it seems to me you have already written it off, and based on your OP, you already have a working flow. Why even entertain it?

I dont have much positive to add about Maschine that isn't consistently repeated,,,,,, workflow.

However, this is still relative per user. I think for some the workflow will appear seemless, and for others it will just be another layer between you an Live.

I have only been at it for about 3 weeks. I will say, it's definitely filled in some gaps. The ability to quickly bang out beats, AND edit them all on the fly, scroll folders of drum hits (as opposed to the ones I load in sampler/DrumRack), 50% quantize button, soloing drums not the entire live set, delete notes when pad is pressed etc etc....ALL these minor things have made Maschine just what I wanted out of my beat creations the small details make the "fairy dust workflow" fast and fun. That said, it does add another layer to Live. So far, my single most frustrating part of Maschine is wanting to send Maschines sequencer/pattern data individually to a Live midi track. For example, lets say I have some kick pattern laid out in Maschines sequencer, I want to hear the kick, plus send the kick midi data to a track track in Live triggering something else (i.e. my midi triggered pump compressor) So far this does not seem possible. Many have claimed Maschine's sequencer sends midi out, but so far I have not seen any evidence of that UNLESS, the Pad in question has a MIDI OUT on it, which means you cant use a Sampler, equaling no sound, just midi. So if I like preparing my beats in Maschines sequencer, eventually they will need to go into Live, creating the extra layer between me and Live. BUT, this has proven to be just a minor inconvenience considering I get some cool feature Live does not provide.

As for comparing the APC40 to Maschine, it's pretty much apples and oranges. If you got some Native Kontrol stuff on your APC40, you have browser control, and a lot of other tricks that are not normally a part of the APC40/Live default, making it have some Maschine like features. BUT, that creates layers of Modes on an APC40 which can be equally confusing, especially on a matrix of unlabled buttons. I have pretty much configured my APC40 in all kinds of ways with scripts, M4L, Native Kontrol and such. Yet I still feel more fluid on Maschine due to the dedicated buttons knobs and how they relate to eachother in the Maschine software. For me I have freed my APC40 from so many modes layers, and moved some of that mess to the dedicated Maschine. However I wanted to do that, I wanted another controller to take the heat, and Maschine is close to perfect minus a few annoying things.

So back to the OP, it seems you are already happy with what you got, and on that alone I would not really bother.

Lastly, Maschine is not completely mouse free, but it does cut down the mouse activity SO MUCH, that people say "you'll never touch the mouse," but the truth is you will still need too for a few minor things. For example, if I pull up a Reaktor ensamble and Maschine defaults the knobs to whatever it does, AND I want to change them, I cannot do that directly from the hardware. But Maschine does take most all of the top level control and browsing and make it hardware palatable.

[delicioso]

So far, my single most frustrating part of Maschine is wanting to send Maschines sequencer/pattern data individually to a Live midi track. For example, lets say I have some kick pattern laid out in Maschines sequencer, I want to hear the kick, plus send the kick midi data to a track track in Live triggering something else (i.e. my midi triggered pump compressor) So far this does not seem possible. Many have claimed Maschine's sequencer sends midi out, but so far I have not seen any evidence of that UNLESS, the Pad in question has a MIDI OUT on it, which means you cant use a Sampler, equaling no sound, just midi. So if I like preparing my beats in Maschines sequencer, eventually they will need to go into Live, creating the extra layer between me and Live.

Recording MIDI into Live's sequencer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhBBhSOWCMk
http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=144164

How to trigger vsti's in Live with Maschine
http://soundsandgear.com/maschine-trigg ... eton-live/

Lastly, Maschine is not completely mouse free, but it does cut down the mouse activity SO MUCH, that people say "you'll never touch the mouse," but the truth is you will still need too for a few minor things. For example, if I pull up a Reaktor ensamble and Maschine defaults the knobs to whatever it does, AND I want to change them, I cannot do that directly from the hardware.

But you can save Reaktor ensembles with your own custom mapping as a Maschine module and from then on you'll be able to browse and load directly from the hardware. Same goes for presets for third party plugins.

[JuanSOLO]

This is a popular video response in regards to the question. This only allows you to record Maschines pads into Live's piano roll, which disables many of the cool "workflow" features that is native to Maschine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhBBhSOWCMk
http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=144164

This video only validates my point.

How to trigger vsti's in Live with Maschine
http://soundsandgear.com/maschine-trigg ... eton-live/

the point made...

Many have claimed Maschine's sequencer sends midi out, but so far I have not seen any evidence of that UNLESS, the Pad in question has a MIDI OUT on it, which means you cant use a Sampler, equaling no sound, just midi

Thanks for the effort delicioso but still NO midi out from Maschine simultaneously with a Sampler in Maschine. Which I believe is another strange oversight by NI. Seems they did SO well on SO many other things. Kind of like Ableton not recording automation to session.

[delicioso]

Thanks for the effort delicioso but still NO midi out from Maschine simultaneously with a Sampler in Maschine.

Maybe I'm missing something since Maschine does send MIDI out in native Maschine mode. But I can see how it can be confusing when people have different approaches and not necessarily talking about the same thing. I just don't use Maschine that way. It's standalone and MIDI mode all the way for me.

Here's a tip I found on the NI forums that might do what you're trying to do:
http://www.native-instruments.com/forum ... p?t=106648

"The Big MIDI Out Workaround
For those of you who would like to print the MIDI of your kits' patterns, here's one way to do it.

Create a new group, whereby each pad's base key is an individual note. You must use the Maschine controller to set the base key for each pad.
Program your patterns.
Save the project.
Create a new project with a new group, whereby each pad's SRC is set to MIDI out.
Ensure each pad's root note is set to the corresponding note as your original group, above.
Save that project.
Open your original project.
Load the second group you created, above, without the patterns into the first group.
You can now print your MIDI.

Remarks:
You can use those groups as templates to accomplish this for new projects going forward."

Also this thread seems to have it figured out (recording MIDI into host while using normal Maschine mode):
http://www.native-instruments.com/forum ... p?t=145285

[JuanSOLO]

hmmmm, I will surly investigate.

Really I just want to be able to use my M4L MIDI ducker for my kicks instead of sidechain compression. It's much more efficient because the ducking is based on midi instead of audio. No need for EQing kicks, or adjusting a bunch of different settings to get proper pumping. Just an "Amount" and "Release".

Thanks for the input delicious, I don't mean to come off as disgruntled.

[starving student]

I just don't get it really, krud the op sounds like he knows what he needs. I'm not really sure why he's even bothering, maschine on the other hand is a fantastic instrument/tool about the worse thing anyone could say about it is that 'those larky hiphop guys are using it' but surely we don't need maschine to hate on them as a matter of fact we don't need any reason to hate on them.

maschine is a box that can do somethings very well and other things it can't do at all, as long as you know what you want which it sounds like he does it shouldn't be a problem. and for anyone out there worried that they'll look like they're hiphop or something if they use maschine trust me you won't maschine can do no such thing for you.
maschine on the other hand will allow you to do some great things with samples, vsts, and step sequencing and you'll be able to give yourself a break from molesting the computer if you should want one it's really just that simple.

[501dubz]

To be honest if your tracks involve

- recording and mixing vocals synths etc audio material
- using a moderate amount of different kinds of automation
- grouping tracks creatively
- going back and forth between different song structures
- using a bunch of send and return effects

then maschine is definitely not the solution your looking for unless your shopping for headaches.

If you want a good looking midi controller with a bunch of sounds and an mpc esque standalone workflow then get it.

Maschine wouldnt be such a failure if it werent for NI's hyped marketing ("enhanced workflow" / "perfect integration"). I mean it is a tool just like any other audio software but where things got messy was when NI came guns blazing misleading many to think that this could actually enhance the production workflow or replace some aspects of a DAW. Rest assured its not the case. Its an instrument and if you can make interesting sounds or sketch ideas with it - then bang on youre right on the money. But dont expect it to make your actual mixing or production work otherwise easier.

Good luck trying to state that in the NI forum