Product Reviews by KVR Members

Renoise never stops to amaze me, after all those years.

It's just a workflow that once you get the grips, you cannot let that easily. It boils down to the simple facts:

1. Trackers, being keyboard centric, are great for editing music offline and creating music through a thought process. Yes, you can record in realtime with Renoise, you can also record MIDI directly from keyboard, heck, you can even record audio in realtime and put it inside the track, but the real power of a tracker like Renoise lies in the mindful reconstruction of the music you want to create and entering it using the keyboard. It can be quite expressive and quite overwhelming in the same time, but you have to try to understand. It's like using a step mode in regular MIDI sequencer.
2. The most powerful way to use trackers is by tracking song using samples, good or bad, doesn't really matter. The idea of twisting and banding samples is just the appeal of the tracker. Yes, you can also use the VST, VST3 or AudioUnits on macOS, you can smack them up also using the tracker interface, but I believe that the samples bending is the real appeal. You can do some real damage using just plethora of samples.
3. Renoise is stable while running. Renoise is incredibly stable. You cannot crash it that simply. Yes, there are some plugins that in some circumstances can crash Renoise, but I don't think that after 15 years of using it daily I've ever crashed it twice in a row, unless I've found a bug in a plugin itself.
4. Processor optimization is really good. Not perfect, but you can control how the processing is done (how many CPU-s are utilized).
5. It loads modules from my favourite Fast Tracker 2, and they play perfectly. They sound better than in original.
6. It has a tons of modulations, everywhere, you can automate any parameter, using either automation, tracking commands or modulators like LFOs, envelope followers etc. Working with automation is a breeze, there is a dedicated tab for automation only.
7. It works on all major operating systems.
8. It has scripting support, so if you're missing some functionality, you can add it using scripting.
9. It support custom Scala tunings and has integrated MTS-ESP general tuning. It's quite rudimentary, but it works.
10. It has a phrase editor, so you can create complex wave / MIDI sequences that you can then arrange in the main tracker song.

There are actually so many things this program is good at, that making a full list of feature it gives you is just not possible. One of my all time favourite programs out there.

This instrument is one of the secret weapons in the world of VST. I don't want to write some in deep review of this sampler capabilities. I think previous reviews were more than constructive and enough in that approach. This review will be focused on everyday work with liveslice, so my review will be quite subjective.
I'm working with various types of music and I am using many different approaches when it comes to composing. One of basic weapons in my music are loops. This tool let me explore loops and samples in in a way not possible ever before with any other host or instrument. Before this tool I have tried many loop oriented instruments. Although they were fine and professional tools, none of them was so easy and fast in getting the results like Liveslice. You load a loop and you instantly have a result. It's creative approach is just fascinating. You can rearrange slices or crate a new loop in no time. You can combine sounds from different loops to create new layered loops.
Using liveslice's internal effects gives you the ability for creating a new dimension with dull, bad produced or standard loops. You can even control external effects (hardware or software) with Liveslice midi send commands. Liveslice have up to 8 stereo outputs for maximum flexibility of routing and processing. Creating stereo loops is just too easy with this tool: his arranger can hold many instances of same loop, and with little shuffling and panning you can make perfect stereo field in your music.
I am using Liveslice to record sessions directly in his wave table. That way rearranging or just playing some parts that were sometimes just accidents is easy.
I am using Liveslice to chop a vocal and play with him. Pitch shifting, reversing, fast chopping for delight of creation. Doubling vocal to make it fatter and live.
Drums are in many cases the foundation of today's music. With this tool you can make drum loops that have both: the precision and human feel.
This tool is created for on stage live performance in mind. I think it is useful for wide variety of applications and sounds. Midi control is great, any parameter in liveslice can be controlled with external midi controller. It can sync to host clock for perfect loop reproduction.
Customer support is perfect, all bugs are maintained in a day or two. Anybody can talk about Liveslice and his capabilities, and of course how can he become even more powerful.

This just scratches the surface of this instrument. I can use its capabilities in so many ways. For me this is the ultimate tool for loops. Words can't describe all, give it a try and you will find yourself playing with it and enjoying creation for a long period of time. This kind of approach is great refreshment in the world of VST.