across the board, DAWs are getting shittier...

[mholloway]

just mentally insert "IMHO" before every line below so we can avoid "you're wrong" arguments and focus on discussion of my + your response to the future of Live and other DAWs, K? thanks!

this is the ultimate 'white whine' etc. etc. but here we go: in observing the latest updates to major DAWs including Live, I'm getting a sick feeling in my stomach.

1. Live 9 (and yes I'm beta testing it) feels like it should have been live 8.5. The biggest 'new' thing isn't even the DAW, it's an overpriced controller that I don't want. inside the DAW, much has been changed, and not for the better: the browser barely works and has numerous unresolved issues re: importing your old library content, stuff got pointlessly relocated, and the only real improvements are some **minor** but very cool updates to EQ8, compressor, etc. Sorry kids, that's 8.5 level stuff, not 9. You can invert or reverse midi notes, NO WAY, in 2012 REALLY!!!?!? You can rip off people's beats with a right click on an audio file? CRAY!

2. have you seen Cubase 7's UI? I mean, really looked at it? It's a joke. An absolute joke. It's bad enough they decided to copy Propellerhead's already dumb idea of creating an SSL mixer in a DAW, but on top of that, the fonts are blurry and hard to read, everything animates slowly, it's so dark it feels like you're starring into a cave....and the new features of the upgrade? Oh, it makes chords and chord progressions for you, WOW THANKS. So we get a 'channel strip' of hardwired eq, comp, sat (limiter on every channel? the hell?) that looks even worse than Reasons' mixer, and chords, and... zzzzzzzzzzzzzz. oh and, funny thing, they released it this week and turns out MOST OF IT DOESN'T WORK YET. Woops, embarassing!

3. Studio One 2.5 -- people are freaking out about it positively, but wish I knew why. Still has the fugliest, flattest clip colors of any DAW out there, and basically offers NOTHING innovative, just one more DAW in the pile of Old-school, traditional-style, linear arrangement daws. Same FX, same useless stock instruments, same workflow, same everything. It's like "other logic" or "other cubase" with less overall functionality, which fans will tell you means its "streamlined." WOW REVOLUTIONARY. I use this program for the project page, which is incredibly useful. But as a DAW for composing material, it's the worst case of SEEN IT, DONE IT, NOTHING TO SEE MOVE ALONG imaginable for such a 'new' player in the game.

4. Reason 7. They spend millions to launch 'record' alongside reason and then the very next year say NEVERMIND! WE TAKE IT BACK! HERE JUST BUY REASON AGAIN! That was pretty amazing to watch unfold. Anyway, it has the most oversized eye-sore of a mixer imaginable. And it's latest, greatest innovation? A proprietary plugin format for duplicating things that have existed for years. You can buy VSTs that aren't VSTS! Ancient KORG plugins are now available! Ancient U-he plugins are now available!! WOW!

5. Renoise. ----- this is a great program, and cheap. but it's a tracker, so, you know, you have to want to work that way. but as someone who has followed the development closely, it's definetly been a very impressive product, and continues to improve. Which is a lot more than I can say about the products above, which seem to be literally de-evolving in front of our very eyes.

6. Logic X ......... hello? logic x? are you...?

7. protools......no comment. never looked at it.

8. Microsoft Songsmith -- you can't even FIND this thing anymore! WHAT HAPPENED?!

9. best for last: BITWIG STUDIO. I *do* think the 'real brains' of ableton are the guys who left to form this company. why? BECAUSE JUST LOOK AT ABLETON'S NEW WEBSITE. yeah, I know, that has nothing at all to do with bitw---BUT JUST LOOK AT IT. SERIOUSLY. Have you ever seen such a monumental leap BACKWARDS for a dignified, quality company? anyway, bitwig: nice website so far, but we wont' know until we try it. I'm sure it will have it's share of bullshit and letdowns. I'd just like a chance to FIND OUT so c'mon guys.

meanwhile, lets get psyched about Push because it costs 700 dollars and offers chromatic scales to be played on pads BECAUSE THIS HASN'T EXISTED BEFORE NOW, REALLY. I CHECKED. AND PIANOS SUCK? RIGHT? YOU HATE THOSE KEYS ON YOUR CONTROLLER, PIANOS ARE SO LIKE -- 1800'S, C'MON. Hi, my name is Push, I'll be your Maschine for nearly twice the price, thank you. You can Load Ableton-Stock-Library-Presets with me, and nothing else, isn't that wonderful? All while never having to look at your horrible, ugly, scary, useless computer monitor. FINALLY, the freedom to regress fully into LCD based MENU DIVING!!!!! HOORAY!

and if it's not obvious, yes this is truly how I feel but yes, I'm also just having some fun venting/ranting (thus posting in Lounge).

[mholloway]

dude, tl;dr.

[LoopStationZebra]

Has BITWIG been released? I honestly don't know...

[Slightlydelic]

fucking awesome!!!!

[Machinesworking]

I enjoyed that.

IMO here's what I'm seeing more and more in the industry, electronic music is dominated now by percussion and production techniques over live instrumentation and composition concerns. We're seeing essentially drum pads presented as keyboards and we will see more and more remix tools over composition tools.

Live 9 does address a number of requests; I think we have to give Ableton that, but the new MIDI stuff is pretty dumb IMO. Remix tools are not the same as I dunno? an event list with the current state of a note etc. It's a sad state of affairs when better MIDI editing translates into reverse tools. That's not getting user requests on a very core level.

I've long ago succumbed to the conclusion that I'm destined to use multiple DAWs...
On that line Apple bought Redmatica, who made top notch tools for the EXS Sampler. I've always thought that the one thing a DAW should just have as a full featured integrated instrument is a Sampler. So it's very possible I switch back to Logic when Logic X comes out if they integrate all the Redmatica features into Logic and the EXS. Of course Logic has always sucked ass when it comes to live performance and Mainstage is awkward at best.

[beats me]

Has BITWIG been released? I honestly don't know...

In the year 2012 vaperware is no longer a deal breaker.

[H20nly]

to keep from


so i guess based on your review... i will hold onto Cubase 6.5 a little longer. i was going to look into updating it tonight. i'll roll with Live 9 beta instead and see just how fucked the "new" file browser is. i have to admit though... i'm stoked to see/use a spectrum analyzer behind EQ8. since the price of the upgrade and the price of a really good EQ with a spectrum analyzer behind it are about the same (in most cases) it will help take the sting out. as mentioned, PUSH is just too much $$$$ though.

[simmerdown]

1. Live 9 (and yes I'm beta testing it) feels like it should have been live 8.5. The biggest 'new' thing isn't even the DAW, it's an overpriced controller that I don't want. inside the DAW, much has been changed, and not for the better: the browser barely works and has numerous unresolved issues re: importing your old library content, stuff got pointlessly relocated, and the only real improvements are some **minor** but very cool updates to EQ8, compressor, etc. Sorry kids, that's 8.5 level stuff, not 9. You can invert or reverse midi notes, NO WAY, in 2012 REALLY!!!?!? You can rip off people's beats with a right click on an audio file? CRAY!

think i'll start waiting for 10, mostly because this is just not what i need live to do...just me maybe, i think Live8 will be my win7 ( = Xp)...i have almost none of the problems people are often talking about, stable as shit...i will be looking for an apc40 for sure when those push come out, i think theyll be stacked like cordwood on ebay (or here)

[rozling]

AAA+ would read again!

That's surely not true about Push & library-only presets though?

Right?

[Slightlydelic]

1. Live 9 (and yes I'm beta testing it) feels like it should have been live 8.5. The biggest 'new' thing isn't even the DAW, it's an overpriced controller that I don't want. inside the DAW, much has been changed, and not for the better: the browser barely works and has numerous unresolved issues re: importing your old library content, stuff got pointlessly relocated, and the only real improvements are some **minor** but very cool updates to EQ8, compressor, etc. Sorry kids, that's 8.5 level stuff, not 9. You can invert or reverse midi notes, NO WAY, in 2012 REALLY!!!?!? You can rip off people's beats with a right click on an audio file? CRAY!

think i'll start waiting for 10, mostly because this is just not what i need live to do...just me maybe, i think Live8 will be my win7 ( = Xp)...i have almost none of the problems people are often talking about, stable as shit...i will be looking for an apc40 for sure when those push come out, i think theyll be stacked like cordwood on ebay (or here)

yeah ill be looking for a launchpad for using with numerology. im already finished with live.

[aisling]

and no mention of digital performer

[Machinesworking]

and no mention of digital performer

If I was to comment on what was maybe backwards about DP it would be that it still has areas of it's workflow that were designed when it was mostly a MIDI sequencer.
The issues are technical and uninteresting to people outside of a DP forum. Except that some of it's fonts were designed when monitor resolution was like 640-480 dpi!
That's true of other DAWs as well!

[H20nly]

Surprised you've not included FL Studio actually. It's still very popular. As is Reaper.

i think his reasoning is that he's speaking to DAWs that he actually uses vs. talking out his ass. it just so happens that his list is longer than the average bear's.

unusual yes, refreshing... yes...

[mholloway]

Interesting that you've looked at all those different DAWs anyway. Surprised you've not included FL Studio actually. It's still very popular. As is Reaper.

I looked at all them because over the years I've used most of them, and know them pretty well. Live is by every measure my "main thing" and I do my albums entirely within it (except mastering, which I do with Studio One and its Project page), but I still keep up with the others most of the time, whether for a different project or simply because, I dunno, DAWs are still (supposed to be) a very exciting thing to me and whenever something announces a new version, I'm all like "WOOOO BET IT'S GONNA RULE!!...OK NOT SO MUCH". It's like with car dudes, right? They can't buy them all or drive them all every day, but they can buy a few and take them around the block....

as for the one's I left out:

I have no experience with Double Penetrator 8 -- sorry, too easy -- but I'm pretty sure it's "JUST ONE MORE DAW" if you know what I mean. Quirks, qualities, the usual fare....

As for FLStudio 10 -- I've never used it, but I instantly hate anyone who shows up in a forum just to dog on it, as obviously they are geniuses for using live / protools / cubase / logic / renoise whatever they use that makes them so infinitely superior to the wimpy, acne-riddled, girlfriend-less losers who would be so misinformed as to call anything they squirt out of FLStudio "profesional music." I actually remember demo'ing it once years ago and thinking, Fuck, this is more complicated / less intuitive than most shit I've used. But I've never really been a step-sequencer person, so that's probably part of it. Anyway, from what I've seen of recent versions, the GUI looks too dark but some of the features seem quite cool...shrug. Oh and it's not on MAC without bootcamp, so it's not even really an option for me.

[Machinesworking]

I have no experience with Double Penetrator 8 -- sorry, too easy -- but I'm pretty sure it's "JUST ONE MORE DAW" if you know what I mean. Quirks, qualities, the usual fare....

Double Penetration 8, featuring the return of Dirk Dongstein and Patty Prolapse!

It has quirks, it's the only DAW that's not object oriented, but for me anyway, along with Live it becomes a complete solution.
Best mix down environment IMO.