Native Instruments Massive X Synth - Sequel to Massive (Out Now!)

[dangayle]

I’ve been following sadowick for years on YouTube and he sounds like a really nice guy and I’ve definitely learned a lot from him. He’s not one of those “it’s ya boy” wankers.

I don’t think I’ve ever heard the words “What’s up ninjas” come out of his mouth

[BlitBit]

Again, you're missing the point. Yes, they have to EQ the hell out of all instruments, guitars, drums, horns, you name it. Nothing gets put into a track of music straight out of the box. We all understand that.

My point is, the appeal of Massive X is it's sound. The patches are all bigger than life. Sound as good as anything I have.

But NONE of them are usable as is. They all have to be tweaked. Some a ton. Suddenly, all that "big sound" is gone so that you can fit it in the mix.

If that's the case, I don't need Massive X's big sound just to make it small, just to fit it into a mix when I already have HUNDREDS OF SYNTHS THAT CAN DO THAT.

I'm no longer impressed, nor do I care about synths that sound great out of the box because I know that if I want to use them for a song, they won't sound ANYTHING like that when the track is done. That's the trap I'm not getting myself into anymore. I already have more than enough synths to make music. I don't need Massive X to make music.

I can't make it any clearer than that.

I understand your point. But perhaps these patches are not even meant to be put in a mix but are just there to show the capabilities of the synth. Or perhaps they could be used without many other elements because they can stand on their own, e.g. cinematic sounds. However, I understand that these patches are not usable for your needs. Everyone has different needs and yours have just saved you some money.

[JoeCat]

So you might be ready to ask, "Why can't you make music with THIS synth?"

Well, I could. Absolutely. But, and this is where I finally stopped falling into this trap, when you take these synths with a sound that's bigger than life, and try to fit them into a track of music, well, you end up having to EQ the hell out of them so that they DO fit. Otherwise, they drown everything else out. All that low end on pads? You know that has to go, thinned out to almost nothing so that it doesn't drown out the vocals...

Hmmm.. i don't understand this statement. You have to mix all tracks in a song what else? Sayin' the pads sound thin alone? Of course they do they are mixed but if you want to talk about why it's better not to use those "overdressed" factory presets in a track then that is a different story.

That's just my point. All these wonderful patches you hear in these demos? Almost none of them are suitable for actually making music. So you end up creating patches that you CAN use. Well, I've got enough synths to do that already so I don't need Massive X to do it....

To me that's a rather strange argument. What about those engineers that have to mix real recorded instruments? I don't think they would go: "Hey, you! Your electric guitar sounds too wide and takes up too much bandwidth on the spectrum. Could you please get yourself a guitar that sounds tinnier and also dial in some thin sound on your amp? I don't want to work that much..."

I have had that happen, though not so much with "a guitar", but guitar stems, etc., that were already processed. As an instrument, a guitar is mono and without modulation (short of a tremolo bridge), and even with an amp is generally static in terms of EQ (i.e. you can easily notch problem frequencies, remove low end).

But with modern synths, you get sounds that are all over the stereo field, and have complex modulations, sometimes with resonances that bounce in and out of the mix, etc. You often need dynamic EQ and multi-band compression to tame them, and in a lot of situations so much of what you liked about a patch gets lost in the mix.

It's different if you're producing electronic music / edm - Wags' productions tend towards the more "traditional" even if produced mainly with electronic instruments. You might use one of those big soundscapes as the basis of part of a track, but they really do serve more to stand on their own and show off a synth, and don't tend to have much use in a pop track, etc.

[EvilDragon]

Yeah I hate acceleration like this. Hopefully a settings to remove it will be given.

Or at least a setting to control the amount. But I also prefer just to use a modifier key when I need slower speed aka high resolution, like all daws and a lot of plugins have implemented.

Right mouse drag on knobs is the slow speed modifier in MX.

[BlitBit]

Yeah I hate acceleration like this. Hopefully a settings to remove it will be given.

was cleaning my glasses as i scrolled, really thought you said "i hate accordions..."

Echoes in the Attic walks down the street and sees an accordion player. Get's really disgusted and thinks: "Where's the setting to remove this thing?"

[wagtunes]

So you might be ready to ask, "Why can't you make music with THIS synth?"

Well, I could. Absolutely. But, and this is where I finally stopped falling into this trap, when you take these synths with a sound that's bigger than life, and try to fit them into a track of music, well, you end up having to EQ the hell out of them so that they DO fit. Otherwise, they drown everything else out. All that low end on pads? You know that has to go, thinned out to almost nothing so that it doesn't drown out the vocals...

Hmmm.. i don't understand this statement. You have to mix all tracks in a song what else? Sayin' the pads sound thin alone? Of course they do they are mixed but if you want to talk about why it's better not to use those "overdressed" factory presets in a track then that is a different story.

That's just my point. All these wonderful patches you hear in these demos? Almost none of them are suitable for actually making music. So you end up creating patches that you CAN use. Well, I've got enough synths to do that already so I don't need Massive X to do it....

To me that's a rather strange argument. What about those engineers that have to mix real recorded instruments? I don't think they would go: "Hey, you! Your electric guitar sounds too wide and takes up too much bandwidth on the spectrum. Could you please get yourself a guitar that sounds tinnier and also dial in some thin sound on your amp? I don't want to work that much..."

I have had that happen, though not so much with "a guitar", but guitar stems, etc., that were already processed. As an instrument, a guitar is mono and without modulation (short of a tremolo bridge), and even with an amp is generally static in terms of EQ (i.e. you can easily notch problem frequencies, remove low end).

But with modern synths, you get sounds that are all over the stereo field, and have complex modulations, sometimes with resonances that bounce in and out of the mix, etc. You often need dynamic EQ and multi-band compression to tame them, and in a lot of situations so much of what you liked about a patch gets lost in the mix.

It's different if you're producing electronic music / edm - Wags' productions tend towards the more "traditional" even if produced mainly with electronic instruments. You might use one of those big soundscapes as the basis of part of a track, but they really do serve more to stand on their own and show off a synth, and don't tend to have much use in a pop track, etc.

Thank you. Somebody gets it.

[JoeCat]

Again, you're missing the point. Yes, they have to EQ the hell out of all instruments, guitars, drums, horns, you name it. Nothing gets put into a track of music straight out of the box. We all understand that.

My point is, the appeal of Massive X is it's sound. The patches are all bigger than life. Sound as good as anything I have.

But NONE of them are usable as is. They all have to be tweaked. Some a ton. Suddenly, all that "big sound" is gone so that you can fit it in the mix.

If that's the case, I don't need Massive X's big sound just to make it small, just to fit it into a mix when I already have HUNDREDS OF SYNTHS THAT CAN DO THAT.

I'm no longer impressed, nor do I care about synths that sound great out of the box because I know that if I want to use them for a song, they won't sound ANYTHING like that when the track is done. That's the trap I'm not getting myself into anymore. I already have more than enough synths to make music. I don't need Massive X to make music.

I can't make it any clearer than that.

I understand your point. But perhaps these patches are not even meant to be put in a mix but are just there to show the capabilities of the synth. Or perhaps they could be used without many other elements because they can stand on their own, e.g. cinematic sounds. However, I understand that these patches are not usable for your needs. Everyone has different needs and yours have just saved you some money.

Sounds like we're actually all in agreement

Wags - lack of more traditional patches for Massive X sounds like a business opp. for a sound designer, hint, hint...

[BlitBit]

[...]
To me that's a rather strange argument. What about those engineers that have to mix real recorded instruments? I don't think they would go: "Hey, you! Your electric guitar sounds too wide and takes up too much bandwidth on the spectrum. Could you please get yourself a guitar that sounds tinnier and also dial in some thin sound on your amp? I don't want to work that much..."

I have had that happen, though not so much with "a guitar", but guitar stems, etc., that were already processed. As an instrument, a guitar is mono and without modulation (short of a tremolo bridge), and even with an amp is generally static in terms of EQ (i.e. you can easily notch problem frequencies, remove low end).

But with modern synths, you get sounds that are all over the stereo field, and have complex modulations, sometimes with resonances that bounce in and out of the mix, etc. You often need dynamic EQ and multi-band compression to tame them, and in a lot of situations so much of what you liked about a patch gets lost in the mix.

Ah, ok. Thanks for the clarification! That indeed sound like a lot of differences between a guitar sound and a "big" synth sound.

It's different if you're producing electronic music / edm - Wags' productions tend towards the more "traditional" even if produced mainly with electronic instruments. You might use one of those big soundscapes as the basis of part of a track, but they really do serve more to stand on their own and show off a synth, and don't tend to have much use in a pop track, etc.

See my remark above.

[midi_transmission]

Yeah I hate acceleration like this. Hopefully a settings to remove it will be given.

Or at least a setting to control the amount. But I also prefer just to use a modifier key when I need slower speed aka high resolution, like all daws and a lot of plugins have implemented.

Right mouse drag on knobs is the slow speed modifier in MX.

thanks for educating. I will check it out, but the issue is that mx knob sensitivity way too low, a lot lower than on most other producs. I have to move the mouse too much and or very fast for 0-100%. both is uncomfortable. tenosynovitis is calling

normal knob speed + modifer for high resolution was what I meant.

[RobertH2]

My point is, the appeal of Massive X is it's sound. The patches are all bigger than life. Sound as good as anything I have.

But NONE of them are usable as is. They all have to be tweaked. Some a ton. Suddenly, all that "big sound" is gone so that you can fit it in the mix.

Interesting. So maybe the problem is not trying to "fit it in the mix".

Modern synths are capable of creating such complex, evolving, fascinating sounds, that maybe instead of music with 20, 30, 60 plus tracks you only need 2 or 3. Just a thought...

[wagtunes]

Again, you're missing the point. Yes, they have to EQ the hell out of all instruments, guitars, drums, horns, you name it. Nothing gets put into a track of music straight out of the box. We all understand that.

My point is, the appeal of Massive X is it's sound. The patches are all bigger than life. Sound as good as anything I have.

But NONE of them are usable as is. They all have to be tweaked. Some a ton. Suddenly, all that "big sound" is gone so that you can fit it in the mix.

If that's the case, I don't need Massive X's big sound just to make it small, just to fit it into a mix when I already have HUNDREDS OF SYNTHS THAT CAN DO THAT.

I'm no longer impressed, nor do I care about synths that sound great out of the box because I know that if I want to use them for a song, they won't sound ANYTHING like that when the track is done. That's the trap I'm not getting myself into anymore. I already have more than enough synths to make music. I don't need Massive X to make music.

I can't make it any clearer than that.

I understand your point. But perhaps these patches are not even meant to be put in a mix but are just there to show the capabilities of the synth. Or perhaps they could be used without many other elements because they can stand on their own, e.g. cinematic sounds. However, I understand that these patches are not usable for your needs. Everyone has different needs and yours have just saved you some money.

Sounds like we're actually all in agreement

Wags - lack of more traditional patches for Massive X sounds like a business opp. for a sound designer, hint, hint...

The problem is, and I have found this out from experience, most people WANT those over the top sounds. The stuff I make, which does attract a small market, is not flashy. It's usable right out of the box. The bulk of the people here tell me I'm a crappy sound designer, and that's fine. What they don't understand is that I design sounds that I don't have to jump through hoops to make fit in a mix. So they sound dull and boring. Well, news flash, most sounds, after all the EQing, sound dull and boring. That's why you have all these synths with patches that are of almost no use to anybody in a real world scenario unless they're doing very specific kinds of music.

That's why, when I make a library for those "dedicated" EDM synths (and we all know which ones they are) they just don't sell well. The only exception was Serum and to this day, I still don't get it. My best seller is Softube Modular. I guess you can figure out why.

Anyway, buying Massive X to build a library would be a total waste of time. I'm sell 2 copies and that would be the end of it.

I've got better things to do with my time.

[midi_transmission]

When you want to attach modulation or macro knobs to a source you have these little white boxes on bright background as a target.

They are hard to see and therefore I find it sometimes not easy to find the modulator target I want. Compare this to massive were they are clearly visible.

Does really no one have a problem with the small white rectangle on bright background as a modulator target?

[wagtunes]

My point is, the appeal of Massive X is it's sound. The patches are all bigger than life. Sound as good as anything I have.

But NONE of them are usable as is. They all have to be tweaked. Some a ton. Suddenly, all that "big sound" is gone so that you can fit it in the mix.

Interesting. So maybe the problem is not trying to "fit it in the mix".

Modern synths are capable of creating such complex, evolving, fascinating sounds, that maybe instead of music with 20, 30, 60 plus tracks you only need 2 or 3. Just a thought...

Except I don't make that kind of music. Go to my Music Cafe page and you'll understand.

[drdriller]

people complaining about the presets sounding too fat so they can't be mixed ?

in my world a preset never sound too fat, we use multiband compressor to get it even more fat, and we heavily compress other tracks...

that is maybe because i produce edm.

[wagtunes]

people complaining about the presets sounding too fat so they can't be mixed ?

in my world a preset never sound too fat, we use multiband compressor to get it even more fat, and we heavily compress other tracks...

that is maybe because i produce edm.

Yeah, maybe.