Software Hoarding

[dexrow]

vcv rack is amazing for hording... I started to put together my own instruments for the vcv pro version... doesn't look like many people distribute separately to be used as vst's'..

[BONES]

I find the whole effort of making everything forever perfectly editable/repeatable a burden that sucks the fun out. Having to keep all plugins/DAWs ever used, old computers to run some of those plugins/DAWs.

To my way of thinking it is a lot less work that going to the effort of rendering it all to audio, then having to store it somewhere.

Bouncing to audio is a relief. It frees one up to stay in the present.

... whilst condemning your music to being stuck in the past. What's more important, you or the music?

What is stopping anyone from revisiting something they did in the past if they don't have the entire DAW file, stems, and MIDI? The entire purpose of going back to rework something is to make changes anyway

Don't you think those are decisions you should be free to make yourself, not have them forced upon you by missing plugins? And it's often easier to work on something when you start with where it was at last time you worked on it. It gives you a baseline reference to work from. Interestingly, I also find sometimes that if you don't have the original sound, you waste time re-creating it instead of moving it forward.

When it comes to old projects every single tool I was using has been upgraded or swapped out for something else from DAWs, to sequencers, to hardware, Outboard, and plugins

That's not really a problem for us, as my Orion install is self-contained. All I have to do when I am setting up a new PC is to copy a single folder onto my new drive and then install Orion and it's all there, both 32 bit and 64 bit. It's easy because 80% or more of the parts use either native Orion instruments and effects or VST/VSTi I made myself. 3rd party plugins mostly seemed like a waste of time when we had awesome instruments and effects built in. Since moving away from Orion, only a few years ago, we've largely used instruments that we've got no reason not to keep installing so it hasn't been relevant since we started using mostly 3rd party plugins. Overall, I can't see how it is any kind of issue.

All I need is the audio files or even just notes written on staff paper or chords on a lead sheet

All of which you need to create and/or store. Much easier to simply retain the original project file. Of course, all our stuff is on CD and/or Spotify, so we could just use that as a reference/starting point if we wanted to but I'm too lazy to want to start from scratch when I can just open a project and have it all there for me. That said (again), a couple of weeks ago I decided to remake my first single, from 1987, even though I haven't had any form of back-up for 25+ years. I used a version on YouTube to work it out and really surprised myself that I could pretty much immediately play it all into Studio One, part by part, with almost no need to do any re-takes, once I gave it a go. I could even remember all the lyrics, which is probably better than when I used to perform it regularly. (I can never remember lyrics when I'm on stage.)

If I started something in 1984, 1994, 2004, 2014, or 2024 and didn't finish it, it was either because I lacked the tools to bring it to a conclusion, the skills to do so, or it just wasn't a good idea in the first place

Yeah, that's not all we're talking about, though, is it? We're also talking about things you do finish, things you are happy with at the time, that you want to revisit at a later time. To be fair, anything of ours that doesn't end up on an album is pretty much immediately forgotten about but songs that make an album are things we might want to do live at some future date. Saving everything is easier than being selective, so it's all still in there somewhere.

Ultimately, though, as our oeuvre grows, it's harder and harder to find room for old songs. What would be harder still is to make the decision that there are songs we'll never want to play again. It would be like picking a favourite child. They are all important to us, we want them all to live on, not stagnate and be forgotten.

[whassup]

vcv rack is amazing for hording... I started to put together my own instruments for the vcv pro version... doesn't look like many people distribute separately to be used as vst's'..

Yeah, this is so different than the thinking that I HAVE to do all things from scratch every time.
It's like saying "No, I gonna use that prefabricated guitar again..."
And the gazillions of cool modules don't help with commiting to something more long term. LOL

[dexrow]

vcv rack is amazing for hording... I started to put together my own instruments for the vcv pro version... doesn't look like many people distribute separately to be used as vst's'..

Yeah, this is so different than the thinking that I HAVE to do all things from scratch every time.
It's like saying "No, I gonna use that prefabricated guitar again..."
And the gazillions of cool modules don't help with commiting to something more long term. LOL

I could see where I spend more time setting them up for reuse than I do using it for music.. It is a shame I can only use one instance on a track as a vst. It is fairly easy to make over 100 of them to make the price go down to $1 per instrument or effect. There is a cherry audio one that I used the demo of that might help me get around that limitation

[IvyBirds]

vcv rack is amazing for hording... I started to put together my own instruments for the vcv pro version... doesn't look like many people distribute separately to be used as vst's'..

Yeah, this is so different than the thinking that I HAVE to do all things from scratch every time.
It's like saying "No, I gonna use that prefabricated guitar again..."
And the gazillions of cool modules don't help with commiting to something more long term. LOL

I could see where I spend more time setting them up for reuse than I do using it for music.. It is a shame I can only use one instance on a track as a vst. It is fairly easy to make over 100 of them to make the price go down to $1 per instrument or effect. There is a cherry audio one that I used the demo of that might help me get around that limitation

You are talking about Voltage Modular by Cherry Audio. I actually prefer it over VCV rack even though I own both

V.M. doesn't have a lot of the branded clones of various actual Eurorack modules that VCV rack does but it still has a ton. You can also host other VST plugins inside of it which of course means you can host VCV as a module inside of and and send MIDI and multichannel audio into and if it so if you have a module in VCV rack you really like you can just use it in VM

I greatly prefer the way VM handles MIDI and audio over VCV Rack that is for sure, sometimes I think VCV rack tries to emulate Eurorack a bit to much both the good and the bad

[_leras]

I find the whole effort of making everything forever perfectly editable/repeatable a burden that sucks the fun out. Having to keep all plugins/DAWs ever used, old computers to run some of those plugins/DAWs.

To my way of thinking it is a lot less work that going to the effort of rendering it all to audio, then having to store it somewhere.

Bouncing to audio is a relief. It frees one up to stay in the present.

... whilst condemning your music to being stuck in the past. What's more important, you or the music?

Both have pros and cons, but there are definitely advantages to bouncing out audio tracks. (Which I used to better at with worse computers)

Once in audio the options to change things is still there, it's just more focused on the audio processing, chipping things up.

Also in audio you're kinda locked in and a step closer to something being finished, so it encourages forward movement.

I have seen people making short sections and bouncing out groups of things quite early in a process, sometimes to free up their laptops CPU sometimes just to turn a complicated drum part into a loop, but that step them moves them onto the next stage of their track.

I tried to revisit a really old track recently and had an old Cubase project, a smattering of drums samples, some reaktor ensembles, a few bits of bounced out audio, and the finished track. I was able to get the project open but it had lost a lot of information. Between those I still had the timbre of the main sounds available to me, which was actually the critical part.

[_leras]

Yeah, this is so different than the thinking that I HAVE to do all things from scratch every time.
It's like saying "No, I gonna use that prefabricated guitar again..."
And the gazillions of cool modules don't help with commiting to something more long term. LOL

I could see where I spend more time setting them up for reuse than I do using it for music..

I think there's a balance to this. Not everything needs to be setup for reuse, but perhaps for an album/ep or project where you want continuity creating a set of sounds to pick from is helpful.

I make quite a lot of 'presets' in Bitwig, but they are more for utility and mixing. For a given project I'll create a drum kit and reuse with variations, choose a reverb/delay combo and then perhaps reuse a few sounds for cohesion.

[seafire]

... whilst condemning your music to being stuck in the past. What's more important, you or the music?

What a stupid comment. You write a song, release it, and move on. You can remix it, play it differently live, but ultimately, the song is what it is when you wrote/finished it.

If you never consider your songs 'finished' , then you shouldn't release them.

You said you recently went to see Soft Cell, but were disappointed that they sounded as crap as they did when they released the stuff. Why did you go?

People don't go to gigs to hear new versions, they want to hear what they loved at the time.

[CrystalWizard]

As for hoarding music software if you are just buying it for that sweet hit of dopamine, and you're not going to use it, consider giving it away to someone. Not everyone on this list has such unbearable first world problems.

Regarding hoarding music software, a while ago I got rid of 80% of my installed plugins and my productivity went up. It was a relief.

Did you give away what you could?

[pdxindy]

As for hoarding music software if you are just buying it for that sweet hit of dopamine, and you're not going to use it, consider giving it away to someone. Not everyone on this list has such unbearable first world problems.

Regarding hoarding music software, a while ago I got rid of 80% of my installed plugins and my productivity went up. It was a relief.

Did you give away what you could?

I give away what I can to friends or people I encounter whose interest/talent inspires me to do so. That includes software and hardware.

[pdxindy]

What's more important, you or the music?

Me of course. I'm the one who is alive and made the music in the first place. I'm the creative source and as long as I'm able to keep making fresh new stuff, there's no reason I should concern myself with what I've done in the past.

You, and everyone else, do it the way you want to.

[CrystalWizard]

As for ...

Regarding hoarding music software, a while ago I got rid of 80% of my installed plugins and my productivity went up. It was a relief.

Did you give away what you could?

I give away what I can to friends or people I encounter whose interest/talent inspires me to do so. That includes software and hardware.

Very cool.

[mjolnir]

I sometimes hoard a lot of freeware at times.
But I was recently able to whittle it down and prune the list down to something more manageable.
When it comes down to it, I'm addicted to other people's presets sometimes.
But it's a good thing I'm not trying to hoard samples, because I don't have the disk space.
My computer only has 64 GiB maximum for everything.

[BONES]

Once in audio the options to change things is still there, it's just more focused on the audio processing, chipping things up.

Only because you've taken away your other options. You're hobbling yourself for no good reason.

Also in audio you're kinda locked in and a step closer to something being finished, so it encourages forward movement.

Not for the stuff you've locked in. Again, that's focusing on yourself, not on the music. If you want to get stuff done, make plans and set deadlines. We used to just waft along and our first four albums took us 13 years. Since we started to plan a bit more and set deadlines, we've finished three albums in less than five years and they are much better albums in every way.

I have seen people making short sections and bouncing out groups of things quite early in a process, sometimes to free up their laptops CPU sometimes just to turn a complicated drum part into a loop, but that step them moves them onto the next stage of their track.

Whereas I would consolidate a complicated drum part over multiple tracks into a single track, using a single instrument. Drums are really easy that way because you can retain multiple outputs if you need to (but I never bother) and most drum instruments are multi-track by default. We might start out with drums from two or three Ujam instruments but they'll all end up on a single instance of Battery, which simplifies the mix without taking away any options.

I think this is probably where some people feel the need to bounce to audio - they allow their projects to become far too unwieldy to be able to cope with, so they bounce down to simplify. OTOH, I go to great lengths to simplify all my arrangements/mixes to keep it all manageable. If my bandmate hands me something with 20 tracks, I'll have no trouble knocking it down to 6 or 7. Ditto for MIDI files for my covers side-project, some of those things are absurdly over-complicated for absolutely no reason. From there I might end up adding another one or two but, even with three tracks of vocals, I've never finished a song that's needed more than 15 mixer channels. Most come in at around 10.

I see it all the time in YouTube videos - ridiculously complex arrangements that sound really simple when you hear them. You could mute half the tracks and it wouldn't make a blind bit of difference to the mix.

For a given project I'll create a drum kit and reuse with variations, choose a reverb/delay combo and then perhaps reuse a few sounds for cohesion.

Whereas we tend to use the same kit in every song. My bandmate likes Arena Kit in Battery, where I prefer Autopsy Kit. I might add a better snare and a few sound effect samples to it occasionally but mostly we use whatever is in the kit and put the FX samples into an audio track. If he's put Arena Kit into something, or used one of the Ujam drum instruments, I'm not going to be bothered changing it unless he's used several different things that I need to combine. They're only drums, we don't usually need to put much effort into them to get what the song needs.

What a stupid comment. You write a song, release it, and move on. You can remix it, play it differently live, but ultimately, the song is what it is when you wrote/finished it.

It's what it is about 10% into the production process, so why not leave it there and move on? Everything I've ever worked on can always be better, especially after a few years when there is so much new technology to be thrown at it. What was as good as it could be in 2015 can be much, much better in 2025 so why not at least leave open the possibility of making it so?

If you never consider your songs 'finished' , then you shouldn't release them.

Why not? Good enough is, as the name implies, good enough so why not get it out there? But, again, good enough in 2015 was a much lower bar to clear, compared to good enough in 2025. If you're not lifting your standards as your "career" progresses, as technology improves, why even bother any more?

You said you recently went to see Soft Cell, but were disappointed that they sounded as crap as they did when they released the stuff. Why did you go?

Because I'd never seen them before, I really like their first album and I love experiencing live music. If I spend a grand on a dozen gigs and get that one magical live experience, which I got from The Stranglers a few months ago, then that's money well spent. Interestingly, the thing I got the biggest kick out of at Soft Cell was finding out that their sax player was Duncan Kilburn, who was the original sax player in The Psychedelic Furs. When I saw The Furs a few years ago, Mars Williams was playing sax and now I can see why they preferred him to Kilburn.

People don't go to gigs to hear new versions, they want to hear what they loved at the time.

Yes, people are stupid and pathetic, this is not news to me. It's why I hate them.

Me of course. I'm the one who is alive and made the music in the first place. I'm the creative source and as long as I'm able to keep making fresh new stuff, there's no reason I should concern myself with what I've done in the past.

And you're quite comfortable with that? Really? I find that attitude little bit disgusting. If it was up to me, nobody would know who we are. Our names wouldn't appear anywhere and there'd be no photos of us. But it's not just up to me so I am happy to put aside my desires and do what we're asked to do by the label, because it is not about me at all.

I think playing live is a motivator for updating old songs - if we played something from our first album the way it sounded in 2003, it would sound shithouse next to anything from our last couple of albums. We need to update them for the song's sake, or not bother playing them any more. After hearing what Soft Cell did last weekend, I believe that more strongly than ever. Nobody at that gig would have noticed if they'd used a better drum machine or updated some of the bass patches to give them more clarity and punch. If you have confidence in your material, you shouldn't be afraid of doing that kind of stuff and trusting that your audience will appreciate it.

[IvyBirds]

Once in audio the options to change things is still there, it's just more focused on the audio processing, chipping things up.

Only because you've taken away your other options. You're hobbling yourself for no good reason.

Also in audio you're kinda locked in and a step closer to something being finished, so it encourages forward movement.

Not for the stuff you've locked in. Again, that's focusing on yourself, not on the music

If your focus Bones really is about the music and you claim, why is having a recording of the actual music not enough?

As Eddie Van Halen famously said "“You've only got 12 notes and however you mix them up is your thing.”

If you can't reproduce anything you have done in the past with an audio recording maybe it's time to hang it up. All having the MIDI and/or DAW file available does is make it easier for you, demanding you have those things is focusing on you and your personal laziness most certainly not the music

If all you have is the audio file itself you are not locked into anything as you get to create a clean slate to reproduce the music, again you only have 12 notes after all