remember the days...

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Hink wrote:
Neon Breath wrote:I remember the days where I had specific sounds in mind and not being able to create them, because of technology, budget & physical room limitations. Honestly, I would never like to go back where I started I'm really happy in the era i'm living into :D
+1...but I'm glad I went through all that, I learned a lot that way :)
:tu:

That's the real problem today. There are not only many tools available but also much (maybe wrong) information. That's why there are so many beginners who ask how to master their tracks and stuff like that every few days. They think that's the solution to their problems because they read about it somewhere completely out of context.

It has definitely many advantages to learn things the hard (read: fun) way. An own, unique "style" can be one of them :)

Cheers
Dennis

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Bronto Scorpio wrote:My main goal regarding workflow always was to minimize the time from the idea to the result. 10000 plugins don't help me with that.
I find that 10,000 plugins do! Not that I have that many! But I do sound design as well as music. Sometimes having the right tool for the job just ends up saving you time and sweat.

It's also why I use Bidule and I still use QuantumFX: sometimes what I want to do doesn't currently exist in a plugin and wiring same in a DAW would be too complicated, so I make one up.

When I started out, an SPX-90 audio processor offered 30-some effect, one at a time and cost, IIRC, around $500. A good 4-track cassette recorder was around $1000. I did loads of work on MIDI back then on an Atari, synched to the 4-track. I could never think of that time as the "good old days"!!

It's people like me that have been spending money for 30 years, helping companies push the boundaries of the technology that makes it possible for a kid today to download software without paying a dime and actually get some real production value coming out of a cheap computer!

To me that's extraordinary!!

With great flexibility comes great creative power; the power to find the shortest path to bring what's in our heads out into the world for others to enjoy and appreciate. Creativity is not everyone's gift and there's a lot of people in this industry letting the technology play with them rather than the other way round.

I'm glad I'm still around to have gotten to this stage, but I can see it getting even more exciting over the next couple of decades if people can lose the paradigms that have traveled across this industry from the pre-software days. Subject of the next chapter... ;)

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Bronto Scorpio wrote:My main goal regarding workflow always was to minimize the time from the idea to the result. 10000 plugins don't help me with that.
So it's all about saving time not about the quality of the results? :P
Breeze wrote:When I started out, an SPX-90 audio processor offered 30-some effect, one at a time and cost, IIRC, around $500. A good 4-track cassette recorder was around $1000. I did loads of work on MIDI back then on an Atari, synched to the 4-track. I could never think of that time as the "good old days"!!


Sounds exactly like my past.I had an SPX-90 (still do come to think of it) a Tascam 4 track and an Atari....I wouldn't go back to those days for anything. The wonderful range of tools we have at our disposal now for a fraction of the cost of equipment from the old days is simply amazing. To not embrace that blessing is a mistake in my opinion.....I have a ton of plugins and I love how they enhance my creativity each in thier own special way....

I've never bought into the "Less is More" concept. It's like a Painter saying "I'll limit myself to Blue and Green because having so many colors to choose from slows me down"........until it's time to paint a Sunset or Fire or a Red Apple or....

But to each his own.... :shrug:
None are so hopelessly enslaved as those who falsely believe they are free. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Hink wrote:
+1...but I'm glad I went through all that, I learned a lot that way :)[/quote]

Oh yeah, I'm definitly with you on this! I'm not a very nostalgic person and just don't feel it was better 'back in da days'.

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Even in VST terms i have whitnessed so much change.
But we as humans don't evolve at that rate.

I think a lot comes down to understanding things in a physical way.
I bet squillions of new and old producers don't know there things like ADSR.

I really learnt so much more by starting to use wave-editors to check things out.

I also think in the past people were often 'musicians' first - tools second.
Lots of people today prolly have very limited knowledge of musical theory but
start out using Waves plugins etc. to start with.

But i am sure we will look back at today and it's 'limitations', soon.
no sig

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rpc9943 wrote:Damn. 500 takes, dude.

I most often use the first of maybe 3-4 takes. Most often I keep the first take. If I spend more than 4 hours on a song, it's pretty much dead to me and goes in my "BSIDES" folder.
I call "500 takes" "practice." I'm with you. Any more than 2-4 takes and the life is gone. I'd rather have a take with a few mistakes than one that's dead. Hink, how do you keep it fresh after take 362? :hihi:
Zerocrossing Media

4th Law of Robotics: When turning evil, display a red indicator light. ~[ ●_● ]~

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I remember being frustrated using my tascam 4track. I recorded stereo impulse tracker songs and then recorded singing and guitar on the other two tracks, two times. I was a teenager right at the time where the tapes turned to digital studio software, I think. ;)

I even made a cd when making cd's was COMPLETELY UNHEARD OF. Remember that?

I'm glad I had a taste of tape and I'm also glad what I've got now, I can actually match the intensity in my mind instead feeling frustrated with my 4track.

this was my final 4 track album I made.
http://theconsolationproject.bandcamp.c ... nniversary

Sigh :)

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loopdon wrote: I also think in the past people were often 'musicians' first - tools second.
Lots of people today prolly have very limited knowledge of musical theory but
start out using Waves plugins etc. to start with.

But i am sure we will look back at today and it's 'limitations', soon.
Sure, we have entered the era of "The Producer." It's a double edged sword. I scratch my head when I hear guys like Dead Zimmermou5 and to me it just sounds like pretty sounds arranged in a rhythmic pattern. His shows seem to be him standing in front of turntables, mixers and laptops where they raise their arm every now and then to show you he's not checking his email. Looks to boring? Put a light up mouse head on. To me that music sounds like "VSTi preset demo" tracks. Yet, I've heard other stuff by that Skrillex fellow and it seems to me like he's on to something. It's not music that I'm going to run right out and buy, but I can hear a threshold has been crossed where it's clear that he's using the tools as an instrument. It's not new though, Brian Eno has been doing the same thing for a long, long time.

So I guess the world of the laptop as studio is so new. It took some time to ruminate and we'll see a flurry of new artists who have both the artistry and mastery of the tools. They're the kids who grew up using free synthedit plugs and cracked copies of Live and tried every thing they could get their hands on. Like anything else, most of those kids got bored after a while and stopped leaving an aftermath of crappy mp3s strewn across the internet. But a few, had something and kept going. Same with guitars or anything else. We're just old and like to complain. :clown:

I love my own vantage point. I grew up wanting to be the next John Lennon, but not "Imagine" John, more like somewhere between "I Am The Walrus" and "Revolution #9" I spent a lot of time wringing out sound out of cassette decks, crappy guitars, buzzy amps and hissy pedals. My first time in a proper studio made me angry because I didn't have the words to tell the engineer what I wanted and he wasn't a musician. So I took that experience and let it fuel me to go and learn. I went to an audio engineering school and lucked out with a sweet internship working for the queen of electronic music, Laurie Anderson. It was still frustrating though because the toys then were so out of reach. It's only now that the convergence of cheap toys and my knowledge and experience has come together. It's awesome. :love: I can have 1000 plug ins in my folder because I know what all the building blocks do so it's a small matter to just find out where the developer hid everything. :roll:
Zerocrossing Media

4th Law of Robotics: When turning evil, display a red indicator light. ~[ ●_● ]~

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zerocrossing wrote:
rpc9943 wrote:Damn. 500 takes, dude.

I most often use the first of maybe 3-4 takes. Most often I keep the first take. If I spend more than 4 hours on a song, it's pretty much dead to me and goes in my "BSIDES" folder.
I call "500 takes" "practice." I'm with you. Any more than 2-4 takes and the life is gone. I'd rather have a take with a few mistakes than one that's dead. Hink, how do you keep it fresh after take 362? :hihi:
keep in mind what I said about a growing circle so to answer how I keep it fresh...I simply move on to something else and by the time I get back to it often it's quite different. I think the problem is that it's always fresh but not as fresh as the next take, some songs are over 5 years old. :hihi:

Of course any playing has a practice element to it but for me it's just me doing what I love, playing guitar. Kind of like you once said, it's just you and your cat...I have no real reason to finish anything except for the fact that I have grown a lot since my last finished song and I honestly need to change this flaw because as I talk about gear and techniques people may go listen to my music and assume it's a good example of what I am talking about but it really isn't at all.

Getting a new machine today so this week I have been going through my projects folder and damn, there are so many things I dont even remember doing :oops:
The highest form of knowledge is empathy, for it requires us to suspend our egos and live in another's world. It requires profound, purpose‐larger‐than‐the‐self kind of understanding.

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I agree with alot of what peeps are saying. I limit myself to 2 synth sounds from Ni reaktor (prism) and a bass from massive plus piano/guitar and vocals. i also limit my drum kits cause after wasting hours of my life finding the right snare sound i just load up my 1 kit in ultrabeat and i'm away. keeping things simple works if you really want to craft the songwriting part of the song. But we're all different.
Sound Sonic Team
www.soundsonic.com
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SoundSonicTeam wrote:I agree with alot of what peeps are saying. I limit myself to 2 synth sounds from Ni reaktor (prism) and a bass from massive plus piano/guitar and vocals. i also limit my drum kits cause after wasting hours of my life finding the right snare sound i just load up my 1 kit in ultrabeat and i'm away. keeping things simple works if you really want to craft the songwriting part of the song. But we're all different.
This is good advice. I should take it. :hihi: One thing I do that I know is bad is just start adding instruments. I don't obsess too much about making the perfect drum kit or anything, but on many occasions I find myself on some crazy tear to keep adding instruments and then try to find a way to make them fit. A lot of times I'll end up with mush and then have to start removing tracks. :lol: My motto in college was "work on it until it sucks and then go back to the last revision." I used to always think "Beatles." One track for drums, one for bass, One rhythm guitar/chord, a lead track and a "George Martin" track. I should go back to that.
Zerocrossing Media

4th Law of Robotics: When turning evil, display a red indicator light. ~[ ●_● ]~

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It's all good. Just different.
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I remember the old days... Well, if you consider 2001-2004 "the old days". :lol:
Seriously, I remember using a Tascam 488 with an Alesis MicroVerb to record my friend's bands. I don't miss it but I picked up some good habits and some bad habits with that rig.

I also remember moving up to a Soundcraft Spirt with an HD24, a TC M-One and 3630. I'm slightly more nostalgic about those days but more because that was when I was in school and I had a lot of fun learning.

I remember then moving up to a large format Neve console with a whole studio worth of outboard gear, nice mics and pres and a number of live rooms that were tuned for their specific purposes. I really miss those days... but not because I miss some notion of perceived limitations. I miss it because I truly felt that I wasn't hindered by limitations. I had anything I could want within reach and more importantly, I had the time to get the results I wanted. In those days I learned to slow-the-f**k-down and pay attention to the details.

These days my options are more limited (still not 'that' limited). I don't work in a big fancy studio, I don't have nearly as much outboard gear (which is fine because plug-ins can replace a lot of that stuff) and I don't have co-workers/PAs to bounce ideas off of (which is fine because I have KVR :hihi:). Even so, I feel that if I take my time, the tools I have are more than enough to do good work. I know the tools at my disposal very well (and there are a lot of them in my tiny studio) and I have the skills to learn new tools very quickly. I know what to use and when and more importantly, I know that I don't need to use everything all the time.

I'm happy because I feel content, right now. :)

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Try playing an SH101 live with a Peavey guitar practice amp that has a torn speaker :) That's what I'm talking about from 'the good old days', and I still had an incredible blast.
If you have requests for Korg VST features or changes, they are listening at https://support.korguser.net/hc/en-us/requests/new

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Bronto Scorpio wrote:
Hink wrote:
Neon Breath wrote:I remember the days where I had specific sounds in mind and not being able to create them, because of technology, budget & physical room limitations. Honestly, I would never like to go back where I started I'm really happy in the era i'm living into :D
+1...but I'm glad I went through all that, I learned a lot that way :)
:tu:

That's the real problem today. There are not only many tools available but also much (maybe wrong) information. That's why there are so many beginners who ask how to master their tracks and stuff like that every few days. They think that's the solution to their problems because they read about it somewhere completely out of context.

It has definitely many advantages to learn things the hard (read: fun) way. An own, unique "style" can be one of them :)

Cheers
Dennis
there is surely a false belief as well in old schoolers that using a computer is just pushing buttons. I get this a lot (or have in the past...not so much lately), not once has any of them taken me up on the offer to come over and just push buttons :hihi:

There is never a shortage of new things to learn and master, for instance at first jamstix was a chore to learn to use but worth it. I sure dont miss tape though :)
The highest form of knowledge is empathy, for it requires us to suspend our egos and live in another's world. It requires profound, purpose‐larger‐than‐the‐self kind of understanding.

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