Let’s get something straight: this is NOT a dumb question.  In fact, it’s almost impossible to answer most of the time because it it so very complicated.  Most producers spend a LOT of time working on their sound, refining the different elements, synths, and structure of what they do. They go through a ton of different hardware and software, fiddling for hours with small details that make the whole picture come together.  And since this is such a big subject, I’m going to try to break down the important pieces to try to fill in some of the many gaps between starting out and actually making music.

“Where do I start?”

This is usually where people get bogged down, as it can be a very expensive piece of the puzzle.  In my opinion, in the modern age every new producer needs to decide on a DAW, or digital audio workstation.  This is your bread and butter…what all of the work you will be doing is placed into.  The DAW allows you to write, arrange, record, and otherwise go nuts with music.  Without a DAW, you might as well go buy a portable voice recorder from Wal-Mart and make music on that.  Every single major producer uses one, and if you are serious, you need one as well.  Which DAW you get depends a lot on how much you can spend, and what type of computer you are running.  Personally, I’m a PC guy till the end and I love a lot of flexibility, so the Cyborgs produce with Ableton.  I have messed with FL studio and Reason, but Ableton finally gave me the full compliment of features I like in a DAW….easy audio routing, automation, plugins, etc.  I will say though, that Ableton has it’s fair share of issues though.  First, it’s not cheap, though the savvy user may be able to find their way around this.  Second, it’s not the most stable beast in the world.  The Cyborgs have dealt with many a strange issue including random crashes, strange driver conflicts, and processor/memory creep.  These things are all minor for the most part, but they do stem from the biggest issue Ableton has:  It has a steep learning curve.  Often times I call it the Photoshop of music creation, because, while it has a MASSIVE amount that it can do, finding all of teh functions that you want takes time and dedication to learn.  We are STILL learning new tricks that this software can do, and we have had ti for years.  That said, once you learn what can be done, the limit to what you can do musically only lies in your own creativity.

I am talking a lot about Ableton, since it is what I know best.  However, there are plenty of other DAWs (even some free ones!) that can be found on the web.  Even Wikipedia can turn up a short list of DAWs, so anyone can go out and find software to get their music desires off the ground.

“Okay, I get that, but what about the sick sounds?!?!”

Once you have a DAW up and working, you might notice that the sound that the included synths make (assuming you even get any!) is not professional sounding.  This is because designing a software synth is tricky and expensive, and developers are not just going to give them away for free.  This is where VST plug  ins can take you to the next level.  A VST is essentially an extension of your DAW, which allows you to generate new and fascinating sounds that your DAW cannot make alone.  Most of them work both within your DAW and in so-called stand alone mode, but mostly people choose to run them inside a DAW so the new sounds that you are making can be recorded and arranged.  The blessing and curse of the VST though, is the sheer number and variety of VSTs that are currently on the market.  Now, a word of caution: NOT ALL VSTs ARE CREATED EQUAL!  Specifically, not all VSTs are stable and bug free, meaning that you should save regularly when working with a new or questionable (read:free) VST, as they can crash your DAW and make you lose all of your work.  I’m not going to tell anyone which plugins to use, as there are so very many, but I will point those that are interested toward synthtopia.com.  This site has anything and everything related to synths….including reviews of VSTs and usually videos of them in action.  Check em out!

When I first wanted to start making music, I did some checking, asking, begging, etc, and found that a lot of the big producers in the genre that I wanted to make music in (bass, dub, glitch) were using a VST called Massive to make their synth lines….so I went out and bought it!  There is no better feeling than walking out of my local music retailer KNOWING that I would soon be an internationally known producer once I started making music with this sweet synth.  Imagine my disappointment when I got home to realize two things: 1) Massive does not have a “Make Awesome Sounds” button as I had hoped, and 2) It’s really hard to play music on your computer keyboard.  Now issue #1 I’ll talk about in a minute, but let’s be clear about #2…anyone that is serious about producing should pick up a keyboard to play with.  You don’t have to be an amazing pianist or anything, but it helps, and there are a ton of very cheap keyboards to be had.  Here is the one that I ended up getting:

That little gem is the Akai MPK mini.  It’s cheap, fits in a laptop bag, and can take having several beers spilled on it and still work like a champ.   With this, I was now able to stumble through melodies in Massive, but no matter which keys I pressed, it still didn’t sound like I was the next Truth or Bassnectar.  This is where the next layer folds in.

“Dude…this still sound like a dude in his basement trying to make music!”

So, let’s say you have all the parts but it is just not coming together.  Maybe it sounds generic, or you just can’t make the BAAAAAASSSSSS, well, not to worry.  We live in the information age!  As my associate Trip Spacey put it, “Everything that I have learned about making music, I have learned from the internet.”  Specifically, our favorite place to learn from is dubspot.

These guys are a music school that is based in New York, and have decided to put a massive amount of content on the web for people to look at and learn from.  They have a gigantic youtube channel on DJing and music production, whic will tell you everything from the basics to the most advanced, bleeding edge info.  And don’t be worried that what they are teaching only applies to one genre.  Most of the lessons that the Cyborgs have seen apply to most kinds of music, if used creatively.  Seriously…..if you have not been to their amazing youtube channel, go now….I’ll wait……………

Back?  Great, right?  :)

“That’s a lot to think about”

Yes, yes it is.  Making music is not the “push buttons, make hits” type of experience that some folks might hope for, but the era we live in provides ANYONE who has an interest with all of the tools to at least take a shot and see if they have a passion for it.  I know that the Cyborgs were not at all sure that we wanted to stick with it, but now, after over a year and much capitol investment, we seem set to keep doing it as long as we can afford to.  Hopefully this can set a few folks on their way.  Cheers!

-TR

This is what I would expect to see when looking to buy a musical instrument…it has keys, and many knobs that can be configured to alter the sound in interesting and amazing ways.  But these are not the only type.  There is a second, and far stranger breed that lives on the fringes of the music and sound design realm, called the modular analog synth.  These beasts very greatly in size and shape, but usually look something like this:

That thing that looks like it belongs in a mad scientists lab actually makes sound (and video in some cases), and throws the whole idea of a “musical” device straight into the garbage.  I’ll get to this in a minute.

Now, the Moog style synth is great because it compares directly to software synths that many modern producers are familiar with, such as Massive and Alchemy.  You get a set of oscillators to tweak, plus a variety of filters and LFOs to assign.  What sets the analog versions apart from the software devices lies in the sound, and the direct feel of the knobs and switches.  The analog oscillators have a warmer sound, which is very hard to put into words.  The best analogy I can think of is that if the digital synths sound like scissors cutting a sheet of paper, then the analog synths sound like scissors cutting a damp piece of paper.  Very similar, but with just that touch of hard edge removed.  That might not make a lot of sense now, but I promise it will when you get your hands on one.  And when it comes to the direct feel of the input devices, there is no comparison, even when you midi map all of you soft-synth parameters.  The Moog stuff in particular has a great sort of ‘click’ and ‘snap’ and ‘glide’ feel to the controls that feels both fine and secure, and makes you feel very close to the final sounds that you make.  Now I realize some people out there might be thinking, “Yeah, that’s all great, but what happens when you change something and lose a great sound that you made?”  And my response is that you get to go back and keep playing with the sound.  It almost demands that you know the device extraordinarily well, and that you be as creative as possible.  That might seem like a limitation, but I believe that when you know the device well enough, your limitations fall away.

So as much as I have been gushing about these things, why would you want to use a modular synth that has no keys, or direct input?  Well….the truth is that modular synths are not for everybody.  They can be fiddly, difficult to operate, and not user friendly in any way.  But for all their issues, what they give you is something that has become a MASSIVE problem in the current era of digital music making and publishing…a truly unique sound.  To better understand how this is possible, let’s go over a bit about how modulars are put together.

Modulars are built into a rack a lot like a PC computer tower.  You get the case, and that comes with a power supply and a bus bar.  After that, you look at what the different module makers have, make sure they all fit your rack, and start building your sounds.  And that is one of the parts that can make your sound very original.  On a Moog, everything you have is made by Moog, and you Moog will sound like every other one on some level.  With the modulars, you can get an oscillator from one company, filters from another, and some crazy effects built by a guy in his basement as a hobby (I met these guys at NAMM, and they love what they do).

So okay…now you have this insane Frankenstein box that makes funny noises, and you have spent many moons creating the perfect combination of settings to set the world on fire.  Only one problem…there is no keyboard, no way to play the device musically!  Never fear, as the digital world will be your salvation.  The beauty of most DAWs now is that they can sample, chop, and pitch shift almost anything.  Is your sound too high pitched?  Try shifting a sample down a few octaves.  Is it too long/short?  Time-stretch baby!  Starting to get the picture?  There is a good chance that no one in the WORLD will have the exact sound that you have made, and odds are that they never will.  There will not be a youtube video where some kid describes how to set up Massive to make your sound, and when people get curious about how you do you thing, you get to show them a picture of the insanity you went through, and feel proud of your accomplishments.

Does all this seem like a big effort for nothing?  Then maybe these little guys are not for you.  They certainly are not light on the pocket book.  The Moog stuff runs at LEAST 800 bucks for new items, and goes WAAAY up from there, and the modulars get even more insane.  That big 6 deck monstrosity above?  Try $60,000.  But that’s been built over a long time as well.  For my money though, these guys offer an amazing chance to make truly original sounds and music….and that is priceless.

-TR

A TON of people bum rushed the Akai booth on openeing day to get their hands on the new MPC Renaissance, and for good reason.  It’s the new big daddy of their line, and has a whole bunch of fancy things that most people buying it won’t really read till they get it home.  When I was finally able to get my hands on it though, I had one thought alone…”why are the pads so damn hard to play?”  And so I asked….turns out that was the biggest concern that came out of the beta testing, meaning that it was very, very hard to get a good roll, or even a feel for the velocity sensitivity. Thankfully they are reverting the pads to the MPC 3000 pads, which are much, much nicer.

The one issue with this beast is that it’s built for the boss pros, and comes with a boss pro price (around $1500 bucks), and as such is not the best option for your average bedroom producer.  However, they did have two other offerings that fit that niche a lot better….the MPC Studio and the MPC Fly.  Now, they both look cool, but your choice really comes down to, “Do I have an iPad?”.  Both of these devices attach to a computing device of some sort (either and iPad or a computer), and offer much of the same functionality as the Renaissance, as well as a smaller foot print, for less.  The MPC studio also screams “NI Mashine is my target!!”.

The Fly:

The Studio:

For my money, and for the fact that I have an iPad, the Fly is a better option, but to each their own!

The Rane booth, and a whole bunch of expensive things that combine other expensive things most people already own:

So the Rane booth was debuting a couple of their new mixers, aimed at taking sides in the Serato vs. Traktor battle (they choose Serato!).  The 61 and 62 are great mixers, don’t get me wrong….they feel nice and durable, and they had Z-Trip at their booth!  But when I think about what they are asking people to buy, it gets a little silly.  Allow me to explain: most DJs that have gone full digital realize that they need to have a control of some sort to so what they want, and so, in addition to the mixer that they invested many, many rolls of pennies into, they shook out their couch cushions for change, and then sold their couch on craigslist to get a control.  Okay….”all set” you would think.  But then here comes Rane with their new line of mixers and says, “Here is the new, more affordable version of the 68 that we made just for you…BUY IT!”, even though most of us have eaten anything that would be worth selling by this point.  And that is not to say that these will be all that cheap, given the built in sound cards and mesmerizing blinky lights.  I guess though, if you have not gone all in on your setup, and are just breaking in, this would be a good choice, until you have to go to a club and they look at you funny for bringing your own mixer.

Pioneer: “dude, do you think the size of that booth is compensating for something?”

I’ll be up front and say that I like Pioneer stuff.  I have the 800, and it says nice things to me when I’m setting it up.  That said though, I was a bit baffled with my first hands on with the Nexus, especially given the price.  I’m all for adding new features to keep your products fresh, but when I actually plugged in and played with the Nexus, I had a hard time figuring out what all the fuss was about.  Yeah, some of the few new effects are kinda cool, and the limited edition white model they had was indeed very, very shiny…but all I could think about was the many hours I would lose trying to keep it clean.  And that little X/Y pad?  Nice try, but give me a Kaoss pad any day.  And having seen the Nexus, I made my way to the very lonely 2000 series setup.  Seriously…a bunch of kids were gathered around one of the 2 channel mixers, leaving the DJM 2000 and the 4 CDJ 2000s all alone.  And looking just now at a Google shopping, I would shell out the few extra (hundred) bucks for the much, much nicer 2000.

Reloop, various other control makers: “have I seen this before?”

This might feel like variations on a theme, but the feeling that I kept getting with the controller makers was, “These all look the same.”  It may seem like a weird thought, but when you get right down to it, there are only SO MANY buttons that you need on a control.  Play, pause, load and transport stuff, a few effects, and MAYBE some looping and sampling madness, and that is really all.  So when you get down to the comparisons, most of the controls look very similar, and work in very much the same way.  I guess then it comes down to build quality and feel, and to be honest, it’s tricky to guess how one control versus another is going to hold up over the months/years/pints of beer spilled on it.  In the end, these controls were just fun to mess with, and none of them really gave me the fizz.

Synthasizers: “that costs how much again?”

One of the real treats of the show was the chance to get hands on with the synths that have and will define electronic music going forward.  One thing that was very clear is that there is a group of folks out there that think analog will live forever, and after playing some of these synths, I have to agree.  For those of us that have come into music production in the era of Ableton and Logic, it’s easy to get very proud of the sheer number of software synths that we can use.  A quick search of the internet turns up TONS of companies making tons of little programs that really make amazing sounds (and that’s the truth….they guy demoing Ivory by Synthogy proved it), but there is really nothing like the direct feel of the knobs and switches you get on a Moog or one of the Dave Smith synths.  These guys know their stuff rocks, and when you walk up and start playing them…it’s a special experience.  I walked away from these booths knowing that, yes, these devices will require me to sell the kidney of my first born, but that I will do it anyway.  I will get a bit deeper into the weird world of analog in my next post as well.

The Basement: “the floor space is cheaper”

The basement proved to be the area that I liked the most, because it was full of “everyone else”.  There were very few big name companies down there, and an avalanche of ukulele makers, but that’s where some of the neat stuff was hiding.  First, I almost fell over when I saw the tiny booth with the Reactable folks in it.  If you don’t know, this is what a Reactable looks like:

….and it’s awesome fun to mess with.  Those blocks are different sound and effect functions, and the whole thing plays like a little kid’s busy board.  As luck would have it, I have the iPad version of this, and was able to jump in and start playing.  I’ll never afford one, but this was great.

Finally in the basement, I met my favorite exhibitor at the whole show.  Sadly I didn’t get his name, but the ‘Little French Guy’ gave the best demonstration of any product at the show.  He was demoing this:

That’s the Rhizome SXT, and again, I want one.  This little puppy is a true all in one work station…drum machine, synth, sequencer, it does it all.  And that’s because it is actually a hard interface built on a consumer level PC, so everything that you see looks familiar and works the same as any Windows based production machine.  It even runs VST plug-ins, and as such becomes a stand in replacement for Ableton.  As you would imagine, it’s out of this world expensive, but looks like loads of fun to play with.  By the time he had finished his demo, the NAMM noise police (yes, they have them), were already on their way to reel him in.  Awesome.

Overall: “whoa…”

It was a truly great event, and it’s practically a lock that I’ll beg, borrow, and steal to see it again.  I’ll do a follow up to this post on the analog guys and their crazy, collective systems, but until then…..110101!

-TR