What are you making music with?

[x_bruce]

I was going to make this a poll but the area is far to large and the synths would make a simple pole impossible.

Before we start, I'm asking for my own interests mostly. I am interested what people are using as host(s). I'm interested in why more than what though both would be appreciated. I plan on using this data for an article later this year.

Please note, if you do not want you name or email in the article, please note your desire not to be included within the responses.

Here's the questions:

1. What are you using as your host?

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?

4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom. E.G.

sample list, meant for display

1. rgc:audio z3ta
2. Native Instruments Absynth 3
3. VirSyn Cantor 1.6
4. ConcreteFX Kubik 2.0
5. WhiteNoise Audio Dopplemangler

meaning, the fictional person that made this list posted z3ta as their favorite synth, the next favorite is Absynth 3 and so-on. In other words in descending order. Your explainations are important too, we want to see what people are using and why.

I'd greatly appreciate it if this didn't end up a joke thread. If you want to debate, that's good, just be civil. Anyone's comments will be credited unless that person does not wish to have their opinion expressed beyond this thread.

I'll try to stop by now and then, I'm pretty busy of late. You can always reach me at x_bruce@yahoo.com.

Thanks in advance. I look forward to seeing what folks are using and why.

[Armadillo]

Here's the questions:

1. What are you using as your host?

Cubase SE . I've used Cubase for a long time so it's a natural choice. I'd probably have something like SL3 instead if I could afford it, but with my limited amount of cash it's a much higher priority for me to have very high quality instruments instead of the best sequencer available. No point in having Nuendo 3 if you only have a 15 year old Yamaha GM module.

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?
Reason 2.5. I won in a competition and it compliments Cubase well. It has excellent instruments opposite Cubase and very low cpu hit.

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?
I'll choose 5 I actually own.
1. Z3ta+
2. Stylus RMX
3. Pentagon I
4. EWQLSO Silver
5. Reaktor

4. Explain why these synths are your favorite
Z3ta+, great sounds for the music I make and tons of options to manipulate and build sounds.

Stylus RMX, great hits/loops and very fast to get a great beat going fast by mixing different loops and manipulating them.

Pentagon I, great for those "filler" sounds, where I don't need a monster like Z3ta+. Very light on cpu is a major bonus.

EWQLSO Silver, haven't really used it that much yet, but the articulations are great and it certainly gives my music "something else".

Reaktor, millions of possibilities. Once I get a 3+ GHz PC I'm sure it'll be used much more, but it really annoys me that it uses over 40% of my cpu in some (a lot actually) of cases. So if it's not used when I begin a tune, it probably won't be as there's not enough cpu left

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom.
1. Breakbeat / Big beat
2. RnB
3. Goa / Euro trance

[pw]

1. What are you using as your host?
Tracktion. It works well for me.

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?
No. Well, minihost sometimes just to play a plug-in without all the other sequencer stuff to distract me.

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?
1.RMIV
2.Wusikstation
3.EVE
4.Harptime Pro
5.Sonic Synth 1

4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

RMIV-
the only VSTi in everything I do. It is so easy to use, no clutter. Synth modules sound great, a couple of really nice acoustic drumkits, and then another gig of drum samples I can pick and choose from.

Wusikstation-
Just an allround great VSTi for ambient textures. Less than half of the famous keys samples are any good to me, but with the add on sample packs, and ability to map any samples into wusik format, the FK samples are hardly the issue. The routing capabilties within the VSTi are excellent, the wave sequencer is really great, I find the filters pretty good. I create lots of presets when I play it, as I find it inspiring to work with.

EVE-
Very excellent GUI. Made by Liqih, one of the best guys out there. Easy to do anything I need to do to the sound quickly. I find all the samples included to be great, and the AOS and FM sample packs are also must haves. Good enough for me for analog synth sounds (although I also use 2 free VA's for these purposes too), really great for analog ensemble patches (tron, solina, polysix, oberheim). It does need some new features, but Liqih is working on it.

Harptime Pro-
It just sounds beautiful!! It is really gorgeous and I can't believe more people do not need a harp in their VST folder.

Sonic Synth 1-(with extra piano rom and extra strings rom)
It is cheap. It gives me piano's, strings, a nice rhodes patch and a nice B3 patch. It gives me other stuff like horns which I haven't used yet, but good to have around in case. If I could afford better Piano and String samples, I would buy them. until then, SS1 does the job pretty well, and I call it up often.

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom. E.G.
1. Postrock/Ambient/Electronica type stuff.
www.mp3.com.au/paulwalsh ( )

2. Lofi and ever so occasionally experimental pop/rock.
www.mp3.com.au/PaulRWalsh ( )

[b2d]

1. What are you using as your host?

orion and fruity

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

i get bored fast and a change of host can lead to new inspiration. each host has something unique about it that i aswell

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?

virus kc

4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

it's fun to make presets with and i like the sound for the most, and i simply the design.

it's alot more then the new TI imo

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom. E.G.

pretentious electronic music

[The Chase]

1/2)Host:

FLStudio. I use to use reason, but I needed an open host, and FLStudio is perfect for me. I will most likely never use another host besides FL. I love FL. I've tried a lot of other hosts (but not cubase), and in my mind FLStudio kills them by a landslide.

3/4)Synths:

I can't put them in order from most favorite to least, but I'll list the 5 i love:
-- Pro-53 (Native Instruments) -the best synth for Trance leads.
-- Morpheus (Land of cockaigne) -Free. Takes a bit to get used to, but when you learn how to control it, you can make the sickest sound.
-- Dreamer (Odo) -free. I can make some SICK gurgly Jungle bass with this
-- KarmaKILLER (Novakill) -Free. This is THE BEST free VSTi.
-- Buzz Generator adapter/BuzzVST (Jeskola) -Free. Not so much as a synth as much as a (kinda weird) interface that allows you to load different Buzz machines (preset synths). The GUI concept is a bit different, but it sounds very good.

5)Music:

1 Jungle/DnB
2 Trance
3 Experimental/Misc Electronic

[SuitcaseOfLizards]

1. What are you using as your host?

I use Tracktion - does all I need it to right now.

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

Nope, although I do final processing of my stereo audio mixdowns in Goldwave.

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?

1. Rhino
2. Kubik2
3. Cameleon
4. Pentagon I
5. Ravity(s)

4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

1. Rhino - flexible, amazing variety of excellent patches for it, I love the sound!

2. Kubik2 - my go-to synth now for eerie sounds from hell. Makes noises I haven't heard from anything else.

3. Cameleon - excellent synth for strange evolving sounds, a good compliment to Rhino and Kubik2.

4. Pentagon 1 - thick, phat VA without the serious CPU hit of z3ta (which would be here otherwise).

5. Ravity(s) - having had this for only a short time, I've ended up using it as my "fill-in" synth.. never really mixed up front, but adds the finishing touch to every track I've thrown it into.

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom. E.G.

1. Ambient electronic soundscape kind of things
2. Electronic goth-rock with spoken word lyrics.

[shamann]

1. Audiomulch - for my way of working, it is the most effective host out there. Leaving its synth capabilites aside, its two most important features for me are its modularity (with feedback paths) and its killer automation envelopes. Parameter automation is so easy to use in Mulch, it works like notation for me now.

2. EnergyXT - gets used a lot as a secondary host in Mulch for its MIDI implementation. Also has become invaluable as plugin chainer in Sound Forge. I guess Sound Forge and VAZ Modular both count as hosts, and do use them a lot.

3.1 Vaz Modular - Covers almost all of my synth needs. I don't tend to do a lot of wavesequence type synth sounds, so it may come up short there, but it can do a lot very well. It has so many modulation options, such great filters, and fantastic step sequencers.

3.2 SynthEdit - Lately, I've probably been using stuff I've made in SE more than anything else. SE in combination with Audiomulch is great, as I can bang out so many useful utilities and sound generators quickly and string them in a chain in Mulch.

3.3 Audiomulch - I use its internal generators and effects as much as anything.

That's about it for synths, I have others and like them quite a bit, stuff like Rhino and Symptohm, but truth be told I haven't really made much music with them. In fact the next few on the list I could think of would be TickyClav, ChaotikMind's Bowed Synth and OnePingOnly.

5. Music I make 1- Noise/Drone/Ambient/minimalism and 2- Psychedelic synthpop/IDM-ish beeps

[sluggo]

1. What are you using as your host?
Mostly Project5.

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?
I'm starting to use Muzys again because I bought a hardware synth. I use Live for some dj mixing, or for adding audio capabilities to P5. I use Samplitude Studio for audio only stuff (recording, mixing)

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?
Reaktor sessions: very diverse in capabilities and sound character. great bang for buck. lots of cool instruments for making funky chords

Dr-008: my first vsti (bought it when it was still in beta). Handles drum sampling superbly. Nice synth modules. Excellent integration with sequencing (dd modules, slicydrummer). Stable.

z3ta+: great sound quality and flexibility. lots of presets with diverse sounds. Can be complicated, but you can also easily program simple patches

Tera2: great sound quality and flexibility. Second to only Reaktor in diversity. one page editing. had to sell because I needed $$.

Stylus RMX: easy to use, great sound quality, has a lot of variations on beats (chaos feature). A little too rigid in types of sounds offered, but the best at the moment.

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom.
House
Techno
Electronic (ie diverse, non-specific...)

s.

[Hink]

FL5, AA, Vsampler3, NIB4, dfh, EastWest Real Basses, Sytrus, Wasp and my guitars mostly. I do also have a lot of hardware (including a 76 key controller, 49 key controller and and a 61 key synth) I spend more time dusting then playing...with the exception of the 49 key Edirol PCR50...I use that a lot and now it's my midi card. I gave up on my other midiman crap...

[Lunatique]

1. What are you using as your host?

Sonar 3 Producer Edition (upgrading to 4)

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

Cubase SX 2, because some VSTs work better in it, and I like the included instruments, and I always use two major packages in my workflow for any creative work I do--be it art, music, photography..etc, so I can get the advantages of each.

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?

1. Korg Legacy Collection
2. Virsyn Tera
3. Superwave
4. Absynth 2
5. Edirol HQ Orchestra

4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

1. Korg Legacy Collection - Just beautiful sounds, wonderful presets, and easy/pretty UI.

2. Virsyn Tera - Monster of a synth, with multiple synthesis methods and powerful features.

3. Superwave - Love the sounds, and I find most of them very usable (as opposed to synths that have tons of presets, but many I can't use for my songs).

4. Absynth 2 - Awesome sounds, easy to use.

5. Edirol HQ Orchestra - I love that it's a VST and not a sampling library where I have to deal with tons of samples. I love how easy it is to use, and how good it sounds for being only a bit over 100MB and a hassel-free plug-in.

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom. E.G.

1. Progressive House
2. Orchestral
3. Trip-Hop
4. Jazz
5. Industrial
6. Pop
7. New Age
8. Rock
9. A hybrid of all those mentioned above.

[zircon]

1. What are you using as your host?

FLStudio 5.

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

Once in awhile, I use an external WAV editor because FL is not the best for that sort of thing. I plan on getting Samplitude 6.

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?

1. Albino 2
2. fm7
3. Synth1
4. Reaktor 4
5. Pro-53

4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

Well.. these synths don't really jump out at me as my "favorites". Generally, because I write such a wide range of music, I need a wide range of synths, so I use dozens and dozens. I guess those are just the ones I use most often. Albino 2 is easy to use, light on CPU, fairly powerful, and has a huge variety of excellent presets. fm7 has excellent presets, and while harder to edit, is not too hard on CPU and can produce some powerful sounds. Synth1 is perfect for bread and butter subtractive sounds, and even though it sounds blatantly digital (to me), it's still a reat workhorse. Reaktor 4 is great because it can do.. well, just about anything, and I'm using it more and more for funky effects. Finally, Pro-53 is an extremely good analog simulation and can produce ultra-fat sounds with little effort. easy to program, too.

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom.

1. General electronic (eg. The Crystal Method)
2. Video game music (WIDE variety of styles)
3. Orchestral
4. Hybrid orchestral/electronic (eg. filmscore style)
5. Trance/Dance

[ew]

I'm sure you know my choices, Bruce - but here they are anyways...

1. What are you using as your host?

Sonar. I'm still using 2.2 XL, but I plan on upgrading sometime in the near future. I'm used to using it, and I know all its little quirks. I haven't lost a project in a couple years; need I say anymore?

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?
Reason 2.5- it's a great scratch pad for working out tunes, and it makes a great synth rack when ReWired into my other hosts that use ReWire
Live 4.1- Still IMO the best loop manipulation tool out there. Plus, it can be either a ReWire master or slave
Tracktion NFR- I got into Tracktion because of the buzz about it (and the NFR version ).
So far, I use it mostly for testing plugins.
EnergyXT- a great minihost with tons of features. I use it as a chainer/arpeggiator.
Chainer- my main testing bed/standalone wrapper.

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?
Reaktor
Absynth 3
Tera 2
Xphraze
WN Additive


4. Explain why these synths are your favorite
Reaktor- it's just so versatile. I do a lot of building specialty instruments that are designed for the tune they're used in. EIv2 is stunning, and the user library always has something new for me to steal ideas from

Absynth 3- it's Absynth. There's still nothing that sounds quite like it.

Tera 2- great sounds and flexibility, plus the multitimbral/built in sequencer plusses. One of the best sounding synths out there, period.

Xphraze- I'm a former WS owner. Xphraze is the best thing I've found yet for being able not only to emulate the WS, but to take it into this century. The new Xpansions are a big shot in the arm for it- there's some stunning things there.

WN Additive- the most user friendly of the additives out there. It also helps that it has a great sound.

5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom.

Aldebaran polka ...
Actually, I'd suppose you'd say
Ambient
Electropop
Neo-orchestral
Indie rock

ew

[Notron User]

1. What are you using as your host?

Live 4.1, because it's quick and easy in terms of using loops and arranging on the fly.

2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

Logic pro 5.5.1 works well with my external midi gear. Love the rock solid sync and the virtual instruments. Also use EnergyXT for arpeggiation and running plugs in logic that might not work otherwise.


3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?

Tera 2 is my favorite due to its sound and flexibility. Hary Gohs may not be a marketing genius, but he has created a sublime instrument.

Xphraze, Damn glad they finally released the xpansion packs...tho I enjoy making sounds with my own samples. The layout and access to its internal sequencer is perfect.

fabfilter one. Simple and honest. Great oscillators, great filter.

Kubik. The sound of waves clashing against each other. Trevor Horn eat your heart out.

Vanguard. Another quick results synth...very easy to program and hey--my first synth was an SH2.

5. What kind of music do you do?

80's influenced electro?

[xoxos]

1. What are you using as your host?

logic 4.5 something. why? some nice perosn sent it to me for free and it does what it says on the tin, i love their (f**king straightforward, sensible) step sequencer. ~ basic, but good solid foundation.

plus i have an aw2 soundcard, which is pretty cpu crappy w/o emagic product.



2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

synthedit :p


3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?

doesn't matter. my stuf, simple stuf.


4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

familiarity :p


5. What kind of music do you do? If it's more than one please note from top to bottom.

usually just a demonstration of structure/form in some capacity.. usual ideological application is ~ "anti-music," eg. to make the musics that "people like" appear less fascinating. why? because there's a fuckload of music appreciators, but not so many people who can sing in civilised culture, which is ~like pod-person-reception imo. hopefully listen to my catalogue and it kills it for them..

lately been doing stuf like making a 'cardbord box' snare with a couple of plastic bags on it for 'sizzle' - loving stringed instruments.. each string makes the same note, but they're not the same like in vsti :p

[Borogove]

1. What are you using as your host?
2. Do you use additional hosts? If so, why?

Orion for creating loops - it's very quick for piano-roll sequencing.

Audiomulch for turning loops and found sounds into bizarro electronic mush. It ain't done until everything is unrecognizable.

Acid for putting loops and samples all together into songs.

3. What are your favorite synths (limit of 5)?
4. Explain why these synths are your favorite

Meridian 'cause it's mine.

Heartburn 'cause it's mine.

Orion Plucked String XT to sequence things that I can't manage to play on my bass (i.e. anything more complicated than straight quarter notes on two frets). The fact that I consider Plucked String and a bass guitar equivalent tells a lot about the amount of manipulation I do in mulch.

PolyIBlit when I miss my Oberheim Matrix-6 and really want a classic analog synth sound.

Not exactly a synth, but Edge 2 (a tone generator) + Pegger 3 (an "arpeggiating mixer" or filtering gate) to just get a steady pulse sound to build things around, sort of the 303 role but with less rhythmic and melodic control, more timbral control.

5. What kind of music do you do?

Electronic, experimental, industrial-tinged, audio sculpture, electroacoustic, algorithmic, dark ambient, laptop.