Software/Plugin/Instrument Sample recommendations for EDM production 2016

[plumdog]

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Hi guys, I'd like to ask for some feedback on what software people would recommend to have a basic assortment of tools for making EDM music. Sorry for asking such a common question, believe me I'm cringing as I post this but I have been struggling to find a well rounded answer that covers all of the different instruments and things a person would need for making electronic style music (e.g. dance, house, drum n bass, and also to have instruments with flexibility so that you aren't limited to one genre or style). For the benefit of others hopefully I can make this post informative.

I think there is a lot of info available about DAWs and Synths, I've found it harder to find good
recommendations on other types of instruments e.g. Drum kits (essential in all music), piano samples, brass, guitars etc. Personally I feel like it's important to have a broad range of instruments to be able to create music and sounds from. So the main recommendations I could use help with are which virtual instruments or samples should I be looking for.

Some background info for you about where I'm at:
I'm interested in making music as a hobbyist, for learning and fun. I've been researching and learning lots, about music theory and production and tools. Busyworksbeats (http://www.busyworksbeats.com) (not EDM specific) has been really great source of beginner information for me. And has taught me all the basics of the DAW I've chosen to start with - FL Studio. I'm picking up FL Studio for Xmas and have been using the demo version to learn. I really like the workflow and I think it's adequate for my needs so far. I have a few free plugins like Tyrell n6 which is great to start with. I don't mind paying for tools because I very much believe in the adage; you get what you pay for. Since I'm just a hobbyist with limited budget I need to make smart choices towards tools that provide good quality, value and versatility. Over time I will build up a bigger collection, so the feedback here will help me pick the best tools to start out with.

So here is a breakdown of the things I think I will need so that I can have choice and variety when creating music:

Note that demos are available for many music software tools so you can try them out before you buy, this is often the case particularly for DAWs and Synths. The benefit of having a good list of software/instruments/samples that music experts consider being worthwhile allows us beginners to go and demo and then buy the ones we personally like the most. Without a good summary of what experienced people think are good tools it can be hard to know where to start (there are just so many to choose from).

DAW (Digital Audio Workstation)
I chose FL Studio, I found the interface easy to use and the price is affordable for me (see wikipedia for bigger list of DAWs (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_audio_workstation))

Image Line FL Studio, Ableton Live, Cakewalk Sonar, Apple Logic Pro, Bitwig Studio, Steinburg Cubase, Steinburg Nuendo, Sony ACID Pro, Avid Pro Tools, Propellerhead Reason, Presonus Studio One, MOTU Digital Performer, Cockos REAPER, MuLab

General sample Player
Native Instruments Kontact 5 (this can be used to provide many instruments, but I'm not sure which instrument sample packs are regarded as best for each instrument), are there other Sample players worth considering too? I've seen Steinberg HALion 5 but don't see it recommended as often as NI


-- Instruments-- (items listed in no particular order):
Some instruments may be provided by your DAW. e.g. In FL Studio there is FL Keys and 3xOsc. I get the feeling that there are higher quality plugins / samples available for specific instruments, but I'm happy to hear feedback otherwise.

Drum samples
Drums are very important since they're used in most music genres. I would like to find some good general purpose samples. The ones below are ones I have seen recommended for EDM.

Refx Vengeance, Black Octopus Sounds Leviathan, Battery 4 (drum sampler), Thomas Penton's,Converse Rubber Tracks
Steven Slate Drums, EZDrummer 2, Superior drummer, Addictive Drums, Native Instruments Session Drums, FXpansion BFD3, Drumforge, AnalogueDrums Big Mono (Free)

Synthesizer
There are so many Synths to choose from, I have done a lot of research on these and to appreciate the differences between synths requires experience beyond what most beginners would have. My general feeling is that a beginner should try out the demos and get a feel for the plugin to see what they like. A beginner is unlikely to exhaust the features in any of these synths, but it can be a good idea to choose one that has a good variety of factory/user presets to get you started quicker.

SynthMaster, Sylenth, Serum, Circle2, Omnisphere, Diva, Massive, Nexus, Harmor, Predator, Hive, Spire, Dune 2, Blue 2, Nemesis, Zebra 2, Gladiator, FM8, Absynth, Cyclops, Synth1 (free), Tyrell N6 (free)

Piano
I don't know what pianos are good. These are two that I've seen comments on and might be good.
EastWest Quantum Leap Pianos, Native Instruments Alicia's Keys

Brass
Not sure. I saw Native Instruments Session Horns for Kontakt might be ok.

Guitar
Not sure, maybe Native Instruments samples.

Other useful plugins
Sausage fattener (I've seen this one mentioned a lot, I'm not advanced enough for this one yet though)



Hopefully with feedback from other users and experts here we can fill in some of these details of instruments and plugins that beginners might want to consider getting when starting out. I realise that many instruments and samples can be genre specific, so for the purpose of this post if you can think of some that are EDM specific feel free to suggest them, and if you can think of some that are more broadly useful in general music composition also feel free to suggest those too. If you have some favourites you use for other genres it doesn't hurt to suggest it either if you are clear on what the instrument is suited for.

[RichieWitch]

Okay, I'll take a shot at this. I've been on this same path for just over two years now, and here's what I'd recommend based on my experiences:

DAW (Digital Audio Workstation)
I chose Ableton Live and have really been happy with it. I can now do anything I can imagine in Ableton and I love the two different workflows: session view for quickly bringing together sounds, samples, chords, and melodies, and arrangement view for blocking out the song parts and laying in all the stuff I found in session view.

General sample Player
Agree, Native Instruments Kontakt 5 for orchestral instruments and other true-to-life sounds. However, I prefer UVI Workstation as a synth ROMpler and for loading libraries field recordings or other mixed sounds. And UVI Workstation is free, so no reason not to have both. I use Ableton Live's Sampler to create my own multi-sample instruments when I want to build something from scratch.

-- Instruments-- (items listed in no particular order):
Drum samples
I think the number of drum samples packs/set is overwhelming, and most of them are centered around kick drums, so I'm going to pass on this. However, I have to recommend Musicrow's 100 Crashes. It is an amazing collection of heavily distorted/crushed/mangled crash cymbals, perfect for EDM. I love this set and use it frequently.

Synthesizer
If I was just starting today, I'd get either Dune 2 or Circle2. They both are easy to comprehend, even for a beginner, have a multiple types of synthesis for future growth, and are two of the easiest soft synths I've ever used for creating your own original patches. And the sound engine on both of them is just amazing.

Piano
Sampletekk makes the best piano sample sets I have ever heard, and I've listened to a lot of them!! I think it's due to their *deep* number of velocities and the high round-robin count. They are incredibly expressive and realistic. I hesitate to recommend a particular one because I find that each of us has a piano sound in our head that is the one we're yearning for. You need to audition these sets yourself and pick the one that sounds right to you.

Brass
No opinion on this--I use the factory content that came with Kontakt. Not really common in EDM.

Guitar
Ableton Live came with a really nice guitar/bass library. Kontakt has some too, but like brass, not very common in EDM.

Other useful plugins
Must-have plugins IMO: EQ, compression, saturation, filtering, glitch

EQ is so task-specific and no one EQ covers them all, so I'm going to pass on this one. You'll probably need five or six different EQs to do everything you'll need.

Compression: There are so many compressors out there, but my favorite by far is u-He's Presswerk. If I could only have one compressor plugin, this would be it. It can fill so many roles because of its extensive feature set, but it also comes with trimmed-down versions so you can focus on the task at hand quickly.

Saturation: IVGI by Klanghelm is my go-to saturation plugin, whether I want subtle or extreme. It just sounds so realistic and smooth. And it's free!

Filtering: VPS Philta by Vengeance Sound, without question. I'll bet over half the tracks in every song I create have this filter on it. It's just amazing and ridiculously easy to use. You can get a free version with Computer Music magazine, but the full version with all the modulation features will change the way you make music. I use both, keeping the free version to handle basic filtering tasks.

Gltich: There are so many glitch tools out there, but my two favorites have to by Cumulus by Loomer, and Eurydice by Inear Display. Like Philta, there are free versions available with Computer Music magazine. Cumulus in particular is an instrument in and of itself. With a little imagination, you can create amazing glitch tracks, noise rhythms, risers, ambient drones--just a crazy-useful tool that grows with you.

So there's my take, for what it's worth.

[thecontrolcentre]

Get Live 9.5 Suite ... Job done.

[plumdog]

Thanks for the detailed reply Richie, plenty of things to look into and learn about. I'm going to keep updating the post as I come across more instruments. Have done some research into what people are using for Drums today and added some ROMplers I found to the list.

[garryknight]

One important feature of EDM is the kick drum. I recommend that you look at Nicky Romero Kick by Sonic Academy. It's a sample-based kick drum synth and is extremely flexible. And reasonably inexpensive.

As for synths, I can recommend Sylenth1, Massive, and Hive for EDM. You can probably also add u-He's Zebra to your list as it's usually highly recommended.

I own Komplete 10 which comes with Kontakt sample player and several good pianos. I recently added Alicia's Keys and find that it sounds better than the ones that come with Komplete. Kontakt itself isn't too tricky to learn to use well, and there are plenty of video tutorials showing you how to build your own instruments. But you'll probably end up spending a fair bit of time mangling samples manually, which you should be able to do in any good DAW.

Oh, and Sausage Fattener doesn't take advanced skills. It has two controls and you just tweak them until it sounds good. Richie has given you excellent advice on some other effects plugins. For EDM you'll use EQ to carve frequencies to place different sounds in the stereo soundscape; compression to bring the various sounds to a similar volume and to sidechain your bass and some of your synths to 'duck' with the kick; and a good helping of reverb and delay. There are videos on YouTube showing you the basics of these, and whatever FL Studio has built-in are probably the best ones to learn first. For other DAWS (and you might end up, like many of us, with more than one DAW) there are tutorials on YouTube, ADSR, Groove3, AskVideo, macProVideo, and even Lynda.com

Hopefully some other people will come along with more ideas.

[rod_zero]

For me:

DAW: Ableton Live, I have Push and it is fantastic. Makes using other DAW's boring to me.

Sample player: Live Sampler, and for drums Drum racks are great, now with the new simpler even better.

Synth: Live's Operator, DIva and for your genres Hive.

Samples: Wave alchemy Synth drums, Snares paperskins and their drum collections.

Piano: For normal piano I got NI Definitive collection, but I also love Live's Eelectric ep emulator, my fav. ep by far.

Other instruments: I don't use a lot of other instruments but when I do I use Live suite included content.

Other durm libraries: Addictive drums, specially good for using with a drum e-kit.

For learning synthesis get Syntorial, it will save you years of trial and error with synths.