Smokingrobot -

Why do you not suggest Reason if you're only making songs? What would you suggest? Abelton or just ProTools?

thanks.

the novation twitch uses the touch strips rather than platters, so while it seems like it'd be fun and a novelty i think i prefer a platter layout. plus i read that itch was crashing on people's computers more often than traktor.

guess i'm going traktor.

maybe my post was unclear - i actually meant the opposite: if you're only making songs in the box, i would recommend reason.

if you have instrumentation you want to record, you still could use reason 6 since i believe it comes with their program called "record" but im not super familiar with it and cant recommend it for recording sounds that require a microphone or DI.

oh **** dude, i thought you wrote "itch", which is a serato midi controller w/ 7" platters. i dont know anything about the novation twitch thats my bad :/

if platters is what youre comfortable wth then the answer is still go with platters though

I'm pretty sure that you can upgrade reason 5 and run record with it as well. My friend does use Reason 6 with record though and does a lot of love sampling and vocals. Pretty awesome program if you ask me.

I've heard only good things about Ableton too. Any experience with it?

Looking into buying a tube pre amp to fatten and warm up my sound a little bit. Anybody know of any good ones that aren't insanely expensive?

There are tons of tube emulating plug-ins that will probably get you close to what you're looking for, without having to buy that, but that's more based on taste than anything. What application are you trying for?

Reason 5. I just want something to run through my interface and will give my sound a nice overall boost.

There should be a lot of VST plug-ins out there that you can demo. If you're just trying to get a really basic tube sound, you should be able to insert the plug-in on your master buss (if you don't have a great interface, a hardware tube pre-amp will hurt you more than help you, in my opinion). I'd imagine a google search using the terms "tube plug in", or "tube emulation plug in" would be enough to find a lot of things to try.

You could also do something like trying to find an emulation of a Pultec plug-in. Waves Audio makes one called the Puigtec, and it should be under $100, though I haven't checked the price on it lately. There are others on here who have used the hardware version of the Pultec (I have not), but it is supposedly a decent emulation of the Pultec. I own the Pultec emulation for Universal Audio, which is a great plug-in, but it requires a significant amount of investment to buy hardware (DSP Accelerator card). If you're just looking for something that will change the character of the sound, by kind of fattening it up, while doing nothing, the Pultec for Universal Audio did that great (just having sound run through it with no settings touched was a pleasant experience. Even though the emulation for Waves probably sounds a little too "smooth" and conservative for me, in comparison to the Universal Audio version, it might be the magic bullet you're looking for.

Please report back your findings.

nunnehi,

Thanks for the info dude. I will probably start out with the easiest of your suggestions in checking out the Pultec. Definitely want to fatten up my sound and think this could help.

If you could, expand on what you mean by emulation for waves sounding too smooth.

Also one more question. The interface I'm using is a presonus audiobox usb and it has 2 inputs for microphones. I've messed around w/ live sampling a little and was able to pick up the sound through my monitors. The only problem is it's not very a "amplified" sound.

My 2 questions.

Will a good pre-amp, like the one you suggested help amplify this sound when played live?

Am I able to use the microphone/live sample in Reason and play it as an effected instrument? I'm only able to create the sample, record/import it from Audio Hijack Pro to Reason and later effect it as of now.

Thanks in advance

No problem, I hope it proves helpful.

It's kind of hard to put into words the differences. The hardware Pultec was a really popular EQ for bass and kick a long time ago, but has probably fallen somewhat out of favor in the digital world. One of the unique things, about the hardware Pultec, is that each one supposedly had its own unique character. Therefore, any emulation that was done would have to be made off a specific hardware Pultec. I might get some of this info wrong, but my understanding is that the guy who helped with the Universal Audio emulation of the Pultec allowed them to borrow his favorite sounding one. To get an idea of what a Pultec sounds like in the mix, I can give you two examples of songs (both guessing that a Pultec is somewhere in the chain).

Examples (listening on big speakers is ideal):

D'Angelo-Jonz in My Bonz on the bass
The Roots-The Next Movement, probably on the kick, bass, and maybe keys

Listen to the way the 60 Hz sounds in that (the deep smooth bass). It has a really nice impact, and in a lot of the old Roots stuff, and a lot of the album Voodoo by D'Angelo gives examples of what can happen, I think. I can't guarantee a hardware Pultec is on those songs, but I'm pretty sure it is.

As for the Universal Audio emulation version vs. the Waves emulation version, the Universal audio has that really superphat 60Hz sound, just by putting it into the chain, meaning that you hear an audible change to the bottom end feel of your mix, just by turning it on (it might also be giving a 1 or 2dB boost to that 60/100Hz bass information, just by turning it on). I had been using the Universal Audio one for awhile, when I decided to demo the Waves version, because Waves plug-ins tend to have a low imprint on Pro Tools DSP wise, and Universal Audio plug-ins are DSP hogs (you can't get many instances of the Universal Audio plug-ins on the type of DSP Accelerator I have). When I tested the Waves version, I immediately thought it lost at least some of the benefit of just putting it in line. I also couldn't hear it working as quickly as I could with the Universal Audio plug-in (meaning I needed to turn the knobs more to achieve roughly the same effect).

As a different kind of equipment example, I would probably compare it to the Mackie HR824 or whatever they were monitors that everyone used to love in the late 90s. Those monitors were way hyped on the bottom end, which really helped out the amateur musicians, since one of the biggest problems in most modern music is putting too much bass in the mix. Because the bass was hyped in those monitors, it was very difficult for musicians, and a lot of engineers who used them, to make huge low end mistakes. That's not how you want to listen in a real environment (my goal is that I want my monitors to sound completely accurate, and that what I'm doing is real, but that's insanely difficult to achieve cost effectively), but it worked for a lot of people.

The reason I make that comparison is that the Waves emulation seems to be operating on the same philosophy. The Pultec, by nature, is a very dangerous plug-in, in the wrong hands, and it's known for dramatically changing the character of bass. Remember what I said about bass mistakes? The Universal Audio Pultec makes it very easy to make bass mistakes (it assumes that the engineer or mixer understands what they are trying to accomplish), but the Waves version makes it harder to make those same mistakes. If you hadn't heard the hardware (as I have not) or emulated Universal Audio versions, it's likely you wouldn't know what the Pultec really offers anyway. Therefore, the Waves emulation is safer, while still having some, and maybe even a lot of the tangible benefits of the hardware and Universal Audio emulation of the Pultec. Unless you're in an exceptional listening environment, there is probably absolutely nothing wrong with using the Waves version, as it will still provide enhancements you can't easily get otherwise. I just looked up the Native version, and it's $187.50. A friend of mine who is a recording engineer used it on something he did on the string parts, and he loved it, so I'm sure it is still a very good plug-in for what it does, but I doubt it would be considered anywhere near a perfect emulation.

I'm not a musician so I can't help you with the Reason questions, but someone else probably can.

Pre-amps are generally considered the single most important thing in the recording process (I am just learning Ableton, and there's almost no reason to ever go outside the box unless you need to record vocals). Until recently, nearly every MIDI keyboard or whatever interfaces were being used were extremely noisy. These days, I'm able to work professionally, specifically because I never need to record anything INTO my box from an external source. Everything is delivered to me on .wav files or OMFs/AAFs. My final mixes are always exported as .wav files, so I never have to worry about those kind of conversions. It's a really cool and affordable way to work, too.

So, getting a great interface, (there are others like maybe DC11 or Mitch who might be able to steer you in the right direction), is really important if you're trying to record anywhere near professional quality (which I always think should be anyone's ultimate goal). I haven't done too much research on that stuff, but I know there are a lot of relatively cheap interfaces that should have high quality pre-amps. Then, you have to make sure you're in a clean recording environment, and that you have a good mic. None of this stuff is ever super easy, or cost effective. One product that we discussed elsewhere in this forum is the Universal Audio Apollo. I'm going to be buying one of those in a few months ($2499), and they claim it is best in class by miles, and you can use the Universal Audio plug-ins on it.

If you're just wanting to record samples, then you just want to get something that has a good enough quality (through the line inputs) that you hear no significant degradation of the sound (no hiss or hum added, and that it sounds as similar as possible to the sample, unless you're trying to screw it up intentionally). Again, hopefully others can advise you out of their own experience, as I try to work completely internally, and am setting a relatively bad example with the interface I use (that I have never recorded anything into).

Again, I don't know anything about Reason, but you can record something in, at a lower level, and then boost it in the box. Then, you can output (export) the sample at a volume that's acceptable to you (hopefully without extra sound degradation), and then just import the .wav file or whatever file type it uses back into the program, and chop it up.

I hope some of this was useful to you.

Nunnehi,

Thanks for the response. I'm still pretty new at all of this, so a lot of what you said went over my head, but I was still able to make sense of what I took as the important points. Much appreciated.

Anybody care to walk through their music making process? Doesn't need to be as in depth as it really is, but I feel like I have hit a slump and get stuck on songs lately.

I could be approaching it entirely wrong as I am a noob at this, but i feel a different approach may help keep the flow going.

I play drums and want to add some beats by playing on my own but the only way I have of recording it is the ****ty default mic built into my mac. It sounds awful and way to loud when I record myself playing the drums.

What should I look into to finding a better sound or just being able to sound proof the room my drum set is in? thanks....

Recording live drums is a task. You will probably need a multiple input audio interface and multiple mics and yes sound treatment helps.

If you have an electronic kit you can plug right into the audio device or even record midi and program samples for each drum.