KVR Audio

bobhva · Post by **bobhva** » Wed Dec 07, 2016 2:35 pm

Let me start by saying all of this is just my opinion... I own everything listed below except for Trillian Bass
- try a demo(if available) before you purchase anything
- be patient, you can waste a lot of money if you just start buying stuff
- Don't buy a DAW based on price, this will be your main software for music making

Drums:
Toontrack EZ-Drummer 2 or XLN Addictive Drums 2 are both great options
EZ-Drummer has more add-on content for Rock and Metal.

Bass:
Spectrasonics Trillian Bass is the most "all-around" product(I don't have this so I can't give my opinions on the product)
Native Instruments has several options and I like them all, these are probably my favorite option.
Many synth have pretty decent if not at least useable bass sounds.

Guitars:
AAS Strum GS-2 has a decent variety of sounds and playing options.
Virtual Guitarist has 3 plugins each suited to different playing styles and they all sound good and are very playable.
Impact Soundworks has the Shreddage line of Guitars which are very realistic and they sound great but are the most difficult to "play".

Like I said above, don't rush into any of this or you could get a huge dose of buyers remorse.

bobhva · Post by **bobhva** » Wed Dec 07, 2016 2:47 pm

And now for the DAW...(putting on bullet proof vest)

Try as many as you can before you make a decision, the workflow and tools have to be a good fit for you!
My main program is Cakewalk Sonar Platinum. It was reasonably priced and I like the workflow as it fits good for me. It has all the tools that I need and comes with some pretty decent stuff as far as plugins that come with it.(it has bass and drums that are useable)
I also have Ableton Live Standard but I just can't seem to like this nearly as much as Sonar. The workflow is difficult for me to grasp and my biggest gripe is that it does Not support vst3 plugins.

skipscada · Post by **skipscada** » Wed Dec 07, 2016 2:53 pm

mynewday wrote: [...] lack of realism there [...]

Adjust you aesthetics. Embrace the lack of realism. Obviously artificial rock could ... rock. Impossibly fast and long solos, a drummer who seems to have 5 arms and a quadruple bass drum, insanely complicated rhythm patterns and tempo changes, a bass guitar covering the whole range from subsonic to supersonic. Just a thought for you to take or leave. Making it sound real just seems to hopelessly difficult and futile to me, but good luck anyway.

malachy5 · Post by **malachy5** » Wed Dec 07, 2016 3:58 pm

Reaper should be fine, I haven't used it but it has a good rep.

One thing I wish I'd known about when I started was this: https://www.audiovitamins.com/contra-free/

You use it to compare plugins that are level matched, normally almost impossible to do. It makes it much easier to see if you can actually hear a difference between plugs instead of just preferring something that's 1dB louder. Very useful.

Zexila · Post by **Zexila** » Wed Dec 07, 2016 6:14 pm

malachy5 wrote:Reaper should be fine, I haven't used it but it has a good rep.

Yeah, especially for the buck and on Windows, for the money he saved up on DAW he can actually get few things and compensate and he's good for next major version also, so more money to buy stuff.

Guess he will need to explore piece by piece instrument after instrument and than see does he need full Kontakt or not, does that pays off and where to cut his losses and all that jazz, pretty major task at this point and it will seek plenty of time, but hey.

Google is your friend, especially here we talk about "The best...." and all that funk all the time, so just do little research, listen to some demos and see how does that all fits to your vision and wallet.

Lejurai · Post by **Lejurai** » Wed Dec 07, 2016 8:05 pm

At least don't rush on spending money on drums. Excellent freeware available http://de-de.sennheiser.com/drummica
Just register and download.

When it comes to DAWs, Reaper is great. Lacks native synths n stuff but the DAW itself is great. I'd maybe suggest Reason 9. Has piles of built in stuff. Great synths, nice fx and usable sample libraries. May need some tweaking to get the best out of them but works anyways.
Pretty much everything you need to keep busy.

And for those guitar sounds.. Buy a guitar and learn it

malachy5 · Post by **malachy5** » Thu Dec 08, 2016 8:26 am

https://www.creativelive.com/courses/mi ... lection_13 Highly recommend watching this tomorrow or buying the session, it's a Metalcore mixing masterclass but much of the techniques can be used in other genres. Showing live for free tomorrow.

mynewday · Post by **mynewday** » Sat Dec 10, 2016 4:51 am

First of all, I want to say I'm really surprised at the speed and quality of the replies here. It really seems there's a good group of people here, and it seems I've found a home for music production questions and discussion.

To respond to some of the things mentioned so far:

1) I like Reaper. It's not perfect I'm sure, but I've gotten used to it and it's amazingly cheap compared to most other full featured DAWs. Yes, it lacks native instruments, but otherwise it's pretty much perfect. In fact, probably the only reason I'd change is if there's another DAW with a bundled instrument that would really make my life easier.

2) Over the past few days, I've been searching for guitars and downloading demos, and then patiently waiting. After I evaluate some more I'll let you know I've chosen.

Two things - Is there a list of guitar VSTs with free full featured demos?

And second, do I need to buy the Kontact sampler? It seems most of the best guitars are Kontact only, not VST. Is there a problem with using VST that most companies only want to use Kontact?

3) In order to get classical instruments, am I forced to buy a big orchestral bundle or are there any high quality smaller bundles, like a chamber group or something of that nature?

deastman · Post by **deastman** » Sat Dec 10, 2016 5:02 am

bobhva wrote:And now for the DAW...(putting on bullet proof vest)

Try as many as you can before you make a decision, the workflow and tools have to be a good fit for you!
My main program is Cakewalk Sonar Platinum. It was reasonably priced and I like the workflow as it fits good for me. It has all the tools that I need and comes with some pretty decent stuff as far as plugins that come with it.(it has bass and drums that are useable)
I also have Ableton Live Standard but I just can't seem to like this nearly as much as Sonar. The workflow is difficult for me to grasp and my biggest gripe is that it does Not support vst3 plugins.

My two main DAWs are Sonar and Ableton Live. I use Live when I want to play around and experiment. I use Sonar when I need to buckle down and actually create a piece of music.

Aleatoriac · Post by **Aleatoriac** » Sat Dec 10, 2016 5:54 am

Everything, just buy all of it

Buy my albums too

I'll dance like a monkey for you

No seriously though you're gonna need Fabfilter Pro-Q2.
If I only ever recommend one thing that's it.

keyman_sam · Post by **keyman_sam** » Sat Dec 10, 2016 6:29 am

I'm going to contradict some popular KVR advise and tell you to stay off the freeware stuff for your main sounds. Not that they're bad but you'll have a hard time hunting down good libraries where some $$$ towards a professional product will get you there faster.

Already a good set of tools have been suggested - my advise, listen to the demos of fxpansion, toon track, east west and other popular libraries and try them at guitar center if you can. You can't go wrong with the professional stuff. And once you have them, if the sound sucks you'll KNOW it's you and not the gear. With the freemium you'll keep convincing yourself that it's the gear.

I have Composer Cloud and I find only 3-4 libraries actually useful. That being storm drum series, pro drummer and sometimes twisted textures. The rest (including the hollywood strings) i don't have much use for at the time being.

brainzistor · Post by **brainzistor** » Mon Dec 12, 2016 9:33 am

Let's see how many people created threads about emulating Yes' sound (artsy rock), asking questions about guitar sound libraries, have EWQL orchestra, who said they are shitty at guitar playing but want professional sound with guitar sound libraries and who practically created 2 same topics on the same day on 2 different places on forums...

hmmm, let me think about it....hmmmm....hhmmmm....still thinking, the name is on tip of my tongue....hmmmmmm...

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=474920

Nice try Wags, nice try...

Nielzie · Post by **Nielzie** » Mon Dec 12, 2016 10:05 am

For guitar AAS Strum is very nice

https://www.applied-acoustics.com/strum-gs-2/

Toontrack EZdrummer for Drums is nice

http://www.toontrack.com/product/ezdrummer-2/

SteveWZ · Post by **SteveWZ** » Mon Dec 12, 2016 3:41 pm

mynewday wrote:Hello everyone,

I am Mark. I am mostly new to music production. I have played around a bit with free plugins, but now I want to move on to making more professional stuff. I would like to buy some plugins, but I don't know where to start.

The music I want to produce is a kind of arty rock, so guitars, bass, and rock drums are dominant, but with synths and some classical instruments as well. What I really need is the following:

- Good rock drums
- Good guitar with strumming and amp/effects (acoustic and electric sounds, but I don't need metal sounds, just a little fuzz)
- Bass with effects/multiple playing styles
- A few individual classical instruments (maybe violin, flute, clarinet, trumpet) - I don't need a full orchestra, just a few to color my sound a bit in places. Of course I want it to sound realistic, so multiple playing styles for each instrument.
- A decent synth for ambience and occasional leads, although honestly I might just go with a free one here since some of the free options are quite amazing and I'm familiar with them. (Do the paid synths really offer that much more than the freebies?)

I ideallly would like to spend less than 500 USD in all, but it's not a hard limit.

In short (because I've triggered a spam warning, I won't go into heavy details), I've been debating between VSTs, Kontact complete package, or doing something like the EastWest subsciption model. Which will best serve my needs?

Thanks for helping.

For good drums (rock and more), its hard to beat EZDrummer.
Its simple, sounds great and affordable this time of year.

There are some more advanced/expensive programs for drums but you will still be hard pressed to get a better drum track.

imagegod2000 · Post by **imagegod2000** » Fri Dec 16, 2016 3:24 am

mynewday wrote: 3) In order to get classical instruments, am I forced to buy a big orchestral bundle or are there any high quality smaller bundles, like a chamber group or something of that nature?

Free Full Orchestral Sounds:

http://virtualplaying.com/virtual-playing-orchestra/

Free Soundfont Player:

http://www.plogue.com/products/sforzando/

Sounds:

Priceless.

New to music production... What to buy?