BouwHouse

All about reverbs, SLap delays, combined early-reflections--decay settings or better DEPTH for vocals.

Ignore the first third part about sponsoring and high fives.

All about Reverb and Vocals - Pensado's Place #206 Dave drills down into an all-tutorial show! We start off with Part 2 of last weeks ITL on drums with Erik Reichers and a 30 minute deep-dive into vocals and ...

However cliche, following opinion from one of my favourite online productions forums will be inspiration for some experimentation:

Right... even a lowly Behringer Composer (old school model, not the newer cheapo stuff) is "better" sounding, more depth, more life, more punch, more reaction and more actual real honest to goodness compression than any software compressor with possible exception of Nebula/Acqua but I've not tried too much of that yet) so what makes you really think a £30 soft comp is gonna go toe-to-toe with a real 1176/WA76 or SSL G-Bus Comp (or Real Vari Mu etc). It's just pipe dreams, really.

Now, there's no doubt the technicalities of compression are working fine in software land, and better every day (and maybe Acustica can nail some more hardware like aspects like they have already with EQ ITB), but compressors are living beasts that you can use, abuse, warp and push and if you actually spend time with even a cheap but ok comp like a composer or cheap DBX/Drawmer and use it in your music you'll soon realise why software can't compete. Extrapolate up from those cheap hardware comps to the good stuff (WA76/1176 etc) and you'll have your own answer.

No, algo software comps and algo eqs are NOT going to "beat" hardware when it comes to sound, same as soft synths can't really beat Analog synths. It aint happening and as soon as you accept this fact and either live with it or buy hardware the sooner you'll get on to making some great tracks without second guessing yourself (or endless research).

The fact is the vast majority of people who now make music have NEVER heard a hardware compressor, those of us who started out hardware (in the 90s as I did) knew already that software could be decent but missing something (the ever stated "3D", depth, mojo and beauty... flowery words but every one of them TRUE!). Many of us sold hardware to go ITB thinking it could do it, believing the immense hype pushed out by the plug-in makers year after year, but while they technically compress, while they technically EQ, they also technically make your full mix a flatter, harsher, more 2D version of what it could have been had you stuck with hardware. People who haven't tried both or won't try both (and stick to software) really shouldn't be here telling people that hardware is a waste or software can do just as well, it can't. Not if you care about sound.

Also there is no hardship to using hardware, not with the thing software actually does WELL. A modern daw with great "pipeline" routing to hardware, easy printing and reuse of your sole 1176 (for example) actually makes a small selection of quality hardware more usuable than ever beofre, more exciting and more worthwhile. Nobody needs to run a mix through live hardware 100% up to the wire, you are allowed to print and move on and that is NOT limiting...

.. it is empowering, creative and productive. Make your choices, print and move on, you CAN revert to an untreated track if you make any major mess of it and realise later. Leaving all mix options open right to the end is not what got records finished 'back then' nor now, so the "hardship" of having to route and print should in fact be embraced and seen as a way to get you music finished rather than endless tweaking and still being unhappy with the game of shifting 1s and 0s around in your 100 compressor plug ins and the sound it produces.

No matter how close my own results have been able to get with hardware vs software, when you use it it in the right places the software always loses... there is a sucking out of life effect to too much digital processing, subtracting goodness from the signal over and over till you are left with... a shadow. While hardware actually can "improve" the original signal and doesn't destroy it just by passing through.

I think the people who record flat into the box would benefit more than those that are "just" mixing other's great recorded projects front loaded with tons of neve, 1176 etc.. there is so much character and dimension in a well tracked session that a little bit of software corrective eq is fine, then they say "I mixed it in the box" - well of course, but many these days think of mixing as the whole process (production/tracking) and if you do it ALL ITB then you'll find at least front loading with great hardware will make a massive difference.

Printing through decent hardware is always going to give your sound more balls and life than piling up the plug-ins. And on top of that the fun and creativity of working with music multiplies 100X when you really get to know what hardware can do.

(by EBDA1176; www.gearslutz.com)

One of best albums ever.

A warm glow of abstract hope:

Talk Talk - Spirit of Eden (1988) FULL ALBUM Copyright 1988 Parlophone. (Part 1 suite) 0:00 The Rainbow 8:03 Eden 15:43 Desire 23:00 Inheritance 28:23 I Believe in You 34:39 Wealth

Please visit my music at:

soundcloud.com/rattledrums

A passion for 'bad taste': creating 80s snare sound...

10 tips to create the perfect 80s snares The great 80's style snares are now back in fashion once again! Here is a list of 10 tips that should help you recreate these typical sounds and hopefully inspire you to experiment and reapply these proven techniques in new creative ways:

Some interestingly applied perspectives on performance. Study material.

Does anyone have ideas on how to translate this to dance music performance?

SIX DRAWINGS SIX DRAWINGS is a short instrumental audiovisual performance where a percussionist uses an amplified balloon as an audiovisual instrument. With a contact microphone…

Drums can come from our computers, they are built in Ableton. We use and transform samples, use a softsynth from a company like D16 or hardware like MFB, jomox, 808, 909 (if you have the money) or the new elektron rytm. But you can also go further and buld your own hardware machine (if you have the money II)

So how can it sound?

Modular Breaks, Circadian Rhythm - Hexinverter- Mutable Instruments Dinkys Taiko, Hexinverter K-HH-CP , Basilimus, Mysteron, Clouds and more...

What about Ableton's Granulator?
In the Electronic Music Labs we will find out how to apply this technique to Techno. Follow us for updates on future events.

The Greek composer Iannis Xenakis stated:

"All sound, even continuous musical variation, is conceived as an assemblage of a large number of elementary sounds adequately disposed in time. In a complex sound, thousands of pure sounds appear in a more or less short interval of time."

Curtis Roads is often credited as the first person to implement a digital granular synthesis engine. Canadian composer Barry Truax was one of the first to implement real-time versions of this synthesis technique. We will get back to these guys later on.

Modell 5 - Granular Synthesis "from a few expressions on the face of the performer Akemi Takeya to a frenzied exploration of the alter ego, any known context of meaning ends in the dissol...

Clouds of Beats:

So you can send a note to a synth or drum-machine. But what happens if you send a whole 'cloud' of notes to such machines?

A cloud can be described by its density, boundaries, focus and grid. These can change over time and can be linked to groove or phase in the beat, leading to rhythmically pumping textures of beats or synth-sounds.

So how does this sound? Our instructor gave a first presentation at Ableton's Artist Space during Amsterdam Dance Event some time ago.

Participants of the LABS come up with their ideas, implementation in dance music and further experimentation with these concepts.

Ableton on Twitter “olaf kerckhaert generates clouds of midi notes to produce in Live in the Artist Space at . ”

'Kann ein Club denn Kunst sein?'

Berghain:

During the Electronic Music Labs we sometimes go back to the roots… And change them.

Ableton 0.1 :

Monolake (2009):

The best possible sound system only serves as a giant amplifier of every mixing mistake one makes as a result of the sound on stage not matching the sound of the PA...

Live Performance in the Age of Supercomputing II In 2007 I wrote a fragmentary essay, "Live Performance in the Age of Super Computers". It mainly focused on the challenges and open quesions when it comes to live performance with a laptop. I never finished it, because I was not able to come up with satisfying answers or solutions. However, the topi…