The bs of Pro DAWs Vs amateur DAWs

[elassi]

Experienced tracker users 'draw' notes with keystrokes way faster than you think, even across lanes (tracks).

[jamcat]

Anyways, I think if Norman had said “I recorded and mixed my entire last album in CoolEdit ‘96,” Jac459 would have had a point.

[VOODOO U]

hired guns to do whatever job they*re asked to do. That's "pro", isn't it?

That's just a job and in an artist's case it's politics when they are paid to "sell out".
If one gets hired to make french toast, I wouldn't call them a "pro" even if they are damn good at their job. If said person opened their own French Toast Diner, it's now a profession and thus are now a professional french toast maker.
An artist that gets paid for their art isn't hired to do a job, they are paid for self expresssion which now gives the artist a profession.

I wouldn't neccessarily mind earning some money from the music I make (anyway), but I most certainly wouldn't ever want to be a professional.

Your definition of professional is different from mine.

I would like to know what makes step sequencing so great in trackers. Programming a tracker sequence is slow and unintuitive compared to the step sequencer in FL Studio (for example).

Well yeah, if you use FL Studio then a tracker is too complicated both in workflow and appearance.
But it's all in how one sets things up to make it intuitive for a fast workflow regardless if it's a tracker or a piano roll that makes it "great."
The thing I like about trackers is it motivates me to be more experimental and sometimes I don't even have to go way out of the box to get a unique sequence that doesn't come as easy with a piano roll. It's all in the layout.
Anyhow, best to just make room to experience it yourself by diving in without any piano roll expectations.

[jens]

Your definition of professional is different from mine.

Seems like... I make a distinction between professional and artist. This has got nothing to do with ability by the way. Many professional musos have amazing skills - these just get wasted because they sold their dream of making a living from their music to the industry (they end up making s living from music - just not neccessarily theirs). Artists didn't.

Either way: if you work for the industry there's typically a certain toolset required/demanded - which is a totally different thing if you produce your own drivel no-one is probably ever gonna listen to.

[lfm]

You can go "Pro" on an "Essential" version of any daw, really. Almost all daws have an Essential version, or similar name.

If you can afford it, there are Pro versions, which give you more headroom if you might need it one day. VCA faders are handy if track count increase a lot. Stretching can be useful if you made a project in one key, and hire a vocalist that needs to raise a few half notes, without redoing the full project.

While you had tape machines only, it was required to have musicians that could play.
- so there were session musicians as a craft for that

If modern daws open up making music for wider range of people interested in making music this is all fine. Sample libraries and some basic keyboard playing is enough, or even programming notes in midi or through notation.

I never heard any condecending remarks if you don't use the most advanced features in a daw.

Daw makers try to add stuff all the time to make you buy upgrades, and on top you get bug fixes too to a degree, which we software fools fall for not requiring a fully functional product to start with.
- smart markering wise this is just bread crums added in each new version to keep you upgrading
- reading specs it usually says "improved" this and that on most stuff

I still go mainly on Sonar Artist, last updates feb 2016, and is all fine in Windows 11 even. But also upgraded to Samp ProX8 recently, and relearning that from ProX2 which was seriously buggy and unusable. The main downside in ProX8 is the cpu used for just running video also, it reduces project with in the range of 30 tracks with plugins before needing to start freezing tracks and stuff(10% higher cpu than Sonar or StudioOne, or even running a plugin that plays video inside ProX8 like VidPlayVst). And also freezing tracks is limited that you cannot reverse freezing on more than last freeze done, you can only edit an older freeze. So dare not swap to Samp fully yet.
- so certain improvements are really useful, like optimizing cpu use etc
- so Pro daw not mean perfect

[jens]

While you had tape machines only, it was required to have musicians that could play.
- so there were session musicians as a craft for that

If modern daws open up making music for wider range of people interested in making music this is all fine. Sample libraries and some basic keyboard playing is enough, or even programming notes in midi or through notation.

Lol... that's the spirit of KVR in a nutshell.

[WackyZoundz]

Experienced tracker users 'draw' notes with keystrokes way faster than you think, even across lanes (tracks).

Dude. FL Studio's step sequencer has been designed on purpose to be faster and more convenient. Three to four keystrokes vs a single (!) click. Trackers have been designed to be memory-efficient but not to be fast and convenient. What takes twenty minutes in a tracker is done in two to three minutes in FL Studio. And I'm not even talking about the piano roll which is even faster than the step sequencer.

[WackyZoundz]

Question: How do you record a live MIDI performance in a tracker including modulation and pitchbending? How do you even program pitchbending in a tracker? How do you program swing? Or polyrhythms? And where are all the Rock/Metal/Jazz/Classic compositions made with trackers, with varying BPM and a large dynamic range? Why does everything made with a tracker sounds like it has been made with a tracker?

[WackyZoundz]

Double post

[eLawnMust]

Would be nice if WackyZounds could just prove their points rather than cause chaos...

I don't understand the bashing of trackers... They are very good step sequencers... those who are good can go amazingly fast in them using 'subtraction' by step method not possible in piano rollers...

I am not fast often redoing sections being unsatisfied & this is the POINT!... What does it matter if you can do some crap in a few minutes if it is garbage? Some complain about poor sound quality listening to some old tracker tunes but what about the MUSIC?... Some of the best tunes I have heard are old tracker tunes sure they are not the best quality but you try using the same & see how you do...Do it! They were good because the music had to carry it through... Nowadays it's single-finger dabbler with a ton of FX & big fat sound of...nothing... take away all that FX & you got playskool for sure... Why is it always about speed & not quality, if it's good who cares how long it took to make?!!

Here is a good example of what you may have not 'seen' in a tracker... A whole spreadsheet seeing it all before you & here is Protrekkr I can select just an area of a number of tracks & edit that specific area-



Pitch bends vary from tracker to tracker some are from pattern commands, the Impulse Tracker format has all kinda tricks going on, some are curves or sliders in ingenious vertical config you see how everything lines up in BUZE?



Now I can convert those sliders to curves or HEX as well... There's one for modulation, one for pitch bend & one each for X-Y pad...

Perhaps also trackers are good for the nostalgia or the challenge of them... Can you leave all those features & 'eat bitter'? You may find it much more satisfying when a tune is completed... Here is AXS which is well less than 500 KB full directory, has internal multi-timbral synth that still sounds good today, other than that you can load up to 128 samples that's it but AXS is Crash-Proof!!... How many can claim that? Plus you can feed it large samples... Now it is satisfying to compose in something absolutely crash-proof-




The developers were geniuses for sure, Two Danish university students & yes, the tracker view is small but they had clever way of navigating... You got a 500 KB piano roller you'd like to challenge with I am up to it, throw down...

Yes, It don't have 'big fat sound' but that would mean bluegrass, folk, many ethnic musics would be considered crap as well which they are clearly not. Big fat sound is great for covering lack of ability...,

Anyways here's some I have done in AXS-

Most recent-

https://alonetone.com/TalkOrBell/tracks/axs-jazzmonger

Before that- (Vocal hits were special addition for BONES on here)

https://alonetone.com/TalkOrBell/tracks/pulp-friction

OR

https://soundcloud.com/waxing-and-waning/pulp-friction


Short jingle-

https://alonetone.com/TalkOrBell/tracks/kernel-klink

WIP-

https://soundcloud.com/waxing-and-wanin ... me-a-river


None of these have any post process other than trim-fade & convert to MP3...

So let's hear anybody else's 'minimal DAW' compositions...

You can get AXS here, click on the 'Files' on the left-

https://web.archive.org/web/20030527131 ... naudio.nl/

[WackyZoundz]

Would be nice if WackyZounds could just prove their points rather than cause chaos...

Ah yes, "causing chaos" because I pointed out the technicial limitations of trackers. Sure. This is just too stupid. Blocked.

[Jac459]

Well, it's more than that.

Because Norman is using a DAW, as well, I'm sure. And it is probably one of those "pro" DAWs with all those "pro" features. And he probably even uses some of them.

Nope, that is the point. He doesn't. (or at least publicly claims he doesn.t, but use a ton of samplers).
Of course he is not mastering and mixing himself I guess... He tried to go to Ableton but not successful for him...

[WackyZoundz]

I have never seen tracker software in a commercial studio, for good reasons. Because you can't do with trackers anything beyond simple sequence programming. No audio recording, no audio clip editing, no mixing, no mastering, not to mention third-party plugin support. Trackers are fine as a musicial instrument if you go for that typical tracker lo-fi sound as a result of its technical limitations. But they're just toys compared to DAWs like Logic, Reaper, FL Studio, Cubase, Pro Tools and so on. Anything else is simply wrong. It's like telling me that mixing and mastering on a single DIY speaker with a frequency response of 200 Hz to 10 kHz and a signal-to-noise ratio of less than 60 dB is better than using two (or more) professional monitors. That's just ridiculous.

[Jac459]

Would be nice if WackyZounds could just prove their points rather than cause chaos...

I don't understand the bashing of trackers... They are very good step sequencers... those who are good can go amazingly fast in them using 'subtraction' by step method not possible in piano rollers...

I am not fast often redoing sections being unsatisfied & this is the POINT!... What does it matter if you can do some crap in a few minutes if it is garbage? Some complain about poor sound quality listening to some old tracker tunes but what about the MUSIC?... Some of the best tunes I have heard are old tracker tunes sure they are not the best quality but you try using the same & see how you do...Do it! They were good because the music had to carry it through... Nowadays it's single-finger dabbler with a ton of FX & big fat sound of...nothing... take away all that FX & you got playskool for sure... Why is it always about speed & not quality, if it's good who cares how long it took to make?!!

Here is a good example of what you may have not 'seen' in a tracker... A whole spreadsheet seeing it all before you & here is Protrekkr I can select just an area of a number of tracks & edit that specific area-



Pitch bends vary from tracker to tracker some are from pattern commands, the Impulse Tracker format has all kinda tricks going on, some are curves or sliders in ingenious vertical config you see how everything lines up in BUZE?



Now I can convert those sliders to curves or HEX as well... There's one for modulation, one for pitch bend & one each for X-Y pad...

Perhaps also trackers are good for the nostalgia or the challenge of them... Can you leave all those features & 'eat bitter'? You may find it much more satisfying when a tune is completed... Here is AXS which is well less than 500 KB full directory, has internal multi-timbral synth that still sounds good today, other than that you can load up to 128 samples that's it but AXS is Crash-Proof!!... How many can claim that? Plus you can feed it large samples... Now it is satisfying to compose in something absolutely crash-proof-




The developers were geniuses for sure, Two Danish university students & yes, the tracker view is small but they had clever way of navigating... You got a 500 KB piano roller you'd like to challenge with I am up to it, throw down...

Yes, It don't have 'big fat sound' but that would mean bluegrass, folk, many ethnic musics would be considered crap as well which they are clearly not. Big fat sound is great for covering lack of ability...,

Anyways here's some I have done in AXS-

Most recent-

https://alonetone.com/TalkOrBell/tracks/axs-jazzmonger

Before that- (Vocal hits were special addition for BONES on here)

https://alonetone.com/TalkOrBell/tracks/pulp-friction

OR

https://soundcloud.com/waxing-and-waning/pulp-friction


Short jingle-

https://alonetone.com/TalkOrBell/tracks/kernel-klink

WIP-

https://soundcloud.com/waxing-and-wanin ... me-a-river


None of these have any post process other than trim-fade & convert to MP3...

So let's hear anybody else's 'minimal DAW' compositions...

You can get AXS here, click on the 'Files' on the left-

https://web.archive.org/web/20030527131 ... naudio.nl/

I think opposing trackers and FL Studio is exactly what I wanted to oppose in this thread.
I discovered music creation with trackers and trackers unleash very particular type of inspiration. FL Studio unleash another type of inspiration. both are fine.
Don't see why we should say one is better than the other...
I mean Guitars have 2 full strings more than Bass... Doesn't it means that bass as an instrument sucks ?

[Jac459]

...
I never heard any condecending remarks if you don't use the most advanced features in a daw.
...

Considering your number of posts in the forum, I will assume you are kidding.
Good joke man!

Condescending is the reason itself why some of our friends are in this forum. So they can brague and diminish the work of the others...