First steps into music production and gear

[MK1]

Hi all,

Brand new here , and also no experience at all with anything from a music production standpoint. I know I want to create music just for my own enjoyment. Specifically, I want to create EDM (D&B mostly) and also chilled house/chillstep kind of stuff.

With so many options available for DAW’s / controllers / hardware / Software, it’s very overwhelming in terms of all the technology available to a beginner like me – I’ve already watched lots of video’s which has left me with no concrete conclusions about anything.

One thing that is obvious to me though is that with all this technology available, the interest in wanting to make music could easily become overshadowed by the technical aspects of all of the various options available. I’m looking to make my first purchases to get started making music, but I want these purchases to allow me to get making music quickly without too much of a learning curve, so I can start having fun. With that said, I also want them to allow me to expand when I have learnt them, and want to take the next steps, e.g adding hardware / software if desired etc.

I already own a good PC, and know I will need the essentials (monitors, headphones, possibly audio I/F etc).

So hence my first post here as someone who is right at the beginning is to ask the community what your thoughts are as to the following questions in terms of the quickest way to get started making music without getting too bogged down in technical issues, while still allowing expandability options for the future…

1. Choose and learn a stand-alone hardware instrument (e.g Akai MPC, Elektron, Maschine etc) VS Choose and learn a DAW.

2. If the answer to the above is turns out to be the latter, should my choice of DAW be governed by the DAW controllers available for it and how well they integrate? Just as an example, I know push2 has been designed solely for ableton live so would it be a good idea to learn the DAW with the controller from the outset?

I like the idea of having a connected / hands on approach to making music rather than spending hours staring at the screen and clicking the mouse. I can imagine it would be more fun that way, but would love to hear your thoughts and opinions.

Any advice for a newbie to get started on the right track would be wicked and greatly appreciated.

Many Thanks
Mark

[Tricky-Loops]

Many years ago I started making music with MULAB and was very happy with it because it's not overally complicated and there's everything included, even a modular synth...

https://www.mutools.com/mulab-product.html

You could also test the free LMMS studio...

https://www.lmms.io

Or this free one if you want to make beats...

https://www.akaipro.com/mpc-beats

[clipnotic]

Don't start with hardware today, because if you want to produce and record full tracks, you'll always need a DAW independent if you're working with hardware or VSTs, so you can simply use VSTs instead of hardware synths, especially as a beginner!

And yes, there are many DAWs and VSTs available today and with all of them you can produce good music. The difference is the workflow, so you simply should try the demos, to see which one works best for you.

For electronic music often Ableton is used today and the Push controller is optimized for it. But I'm using FL Studio, because I like that workflow more. But that's a matter of taste ..

So, finally you have to try what suits you best!

[Passing Bye]

You can't go wrong with Live + Push combo, especially for the music you are interested in and there will be no shortage of great info from the respective and vibrant community, personally I don't like Live, but I can see how you could really benefit from using it and getting all-in with whole ecosystem.

[vitocorleone123]

The advantage of a hardware synth is how much faster you’ll learn the basics. The disadvantage is how limited it is and how much harder it is to integrate into an otherwise software workflow.

One of the first things is to try out various DAWs: Ableton, FL, Waveform, S1, etc. to see if any “speak” to you. For me, I can’t stand Ableton or anything other than Waveform. But that’s me.

If you’re not getting a hardware synth like a Rev2 or Peak, etc, then you’ll want a quality MIDI controller. If you plan on using Native Instruments and NKS then that constrains you to that line of controllers. Otherwise, I’d suggest a Keystep pro and/or Push (if going Ableton). Don’t forget that if you have an iPhone or iPad you have a powerhouse music studio available with the purchase of a few apps. If nothing else, it’s a powerful sequencer and generative MIDI source.

Depending on the DAW and hardware synth, you may or may not need any additional software synths. Stick with the DAW effects at first, though Valhalla Delay, Valhalla Supermassive (free) and maybe a reverb like Nimbus or R4 or SonsigA would help a lot for depth. Given the desire for EDM, you’ll probably want to learn Serum, Sylenth, and/or Spire.

[Passing Bye]

Over the years user base kinda influences development of one DAW, on the other hand if there's big following of particular DAW in particular genres, chances are big those features are met and that's the reason why that particular choice is speaking to those people, of course, you might end up hating it, but there's also bigger chance that someone really made your path easier and learning curve to do what you want is minimal.

In case of Live, you could find out quickly about anything and there will be people throwing devices, chains, presets, know-how's and tutorials at you about that particular thing plenty of them are doing too, as it turns out, most of the niche electronic musicians are indeed into Live big time, personally can't stand the DAW or even look at it, but I can't pretend it's not great thing to get into if you are into particular genres you are into and don't want to have big learning curve and bunch of people helping you out.

Personally I use Bitwig now, biggest opponent and alternative to Live, but not because it's alternative to it and not because of what majority of people are excited about (modular aspect of it), but because it fits my kind of workflow, but I spent years using different DAW's successfully and reached a point where I could actually determine if something is more suitable than other, helped a lot that plenty of people used those ones to do similar things, so I had no doubts about my choices at that time, today you might have and it's clearly over your head right now, but as I said, for starters use something majority is using for the exact thing you are after, that might not be the case for majority of genres, but you are really into particular thing that screams Live from balcony, if you can get into it, don't think twice.

[excuse me please]

Three main DAWs for this: Ableton, Bitwig and FL Studio.
FL Studio gives free updates for live, it's very popular.

However, FL Studio uses a lot of menu diving. So I do prefer Bitwig. Check out these 3 DAWs.

Then there are two options: learn it the hard way or use fancy plugins to get "quick results." When you learn it the hard way, you are able to craft your own sound. Music theory, mixing techniques et al. If you do not, then you'll sound like everybody else and use OTT and such. I assume that's what everybody wants, so here are two popular FL Studio vids from Avicii and Martin Garrix:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-dIcuU58Oy8

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CfCmoEixxro

[vitocorleone123]

It doesn’t matter what DAW you use. Who cares what popular musician of the moment used what DAW. Find the one that works for yourself that you can afford - maybe a less expensive DAW allows you to buy Serum as well. DAWs are about workflow (generally speaking). Then provided sounds and effects.

[Passing Bye]

It doesn’t matter what DAW you use. Who cares what popular musician of the moment used what DAW. Find the one that works for yourself that you can afford - maybe a less expensive DAW allows you to buy Serum as well. DAWs are about workflow (generally speaking). Then provided sounds and effects.

if DAW's are about workflow and some workflow fits some particular genre he's (and majority of others that are into same thing) into, than it does actually mater a little? Especially in this case, for someone who doesn't want to have big learning curve to do music he is into?

Don't get me wrong, I agree with you, but not in this particular case, OP wants smallest learning curve and something to get him the most out of the particular thing he's into, he can make that thing with any DAW in reality, but most resources and users that are actually doing that same thing and that can help him immensely are using something particular the most, dunno, it's like asking for cinematic music production with libraries and than discrediting Cubase, Digital Performer and Logic as best choices for that particular thing and demo-ing Live, MuLab, FL and whatever and workarounding like mad without much reason to do so.

[excuse me please]

If it does not matter which DAW to use, then why are people swapping their DAWs all over the place? "It does not matter which DAW you use" is the worst beginner's advice ever! Otherwise we would all use the same DAW, no?

[imrae]

The point is that one can get similar results with any DAW, but the journey is different.

If OP wants to make music quickly from scratch, I'd suggest looking at which DAW includes a decent library of loops and presets. For a beginner this helps one learn by example, and get listenable results quickly. I know that Logic, Acid and Reason score highly in this regard. I'm not familiar with what is included with FL Studio or Ableton.

[excuse me please]

Some great tips for audio production IMHO:
https://www.renegadeproducer.com/music- ... -tips.html

[Lotuz2019]

Check out these DAW controllers:

https://www.presonus.com/products/Control-Surfaces

These include the Studio One Artist DAW.

[MK1]

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Thanks for all your replies - most helpful. It seems obvious then that all of you consider that learning a DAW first is the best route.

I've been looking at NI Maschine, and I've read that they are working on development of this to make it more of a fully featured piece of software (although probably not comparable to a fully featured DAW like the ones mentioned above).
https://www.native-instruments.com/foru ... 10.376665/ (https://nativeinstruments.sjv.io/c/4241666/2395443/29910?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.native-instruments.com%2Fforum%2Fthreads%2Fcoming-in-the-next-update-of-maschine-2-10.376665%2F)
Maybe something like this that allows me to get started with a bit less to learn and a smaller learning curve, could be good by keeping my interest levels high ? I'd like to hear any thoughts you have on that.

If you plan on using Native Instruments and NKS then that constrains you to that line of controllers.

Could you elaborate on this ?

[pekbro]

Maybe it would be better to get your feet wet with some free stuff before spending a bunch of money.
See if you actually enjoy it and all.