While I totally agree with “don’t let any competition get in your way” but I am not sure if you understand why many of us are doing so.
I myself bought an sold hardware for thousands of € of the last few years. I owned nearly every Available MIDI Sequencer, had tons of Synths and am back to only a very small setup. over all those month I spent way to much time in searching for the “right thing”, buying and selling gear and being angry about myself not finding the “right solution” for a problem that is not really there. As long as I don’t spent the time and learn the devices I want to use, and invest the time to find my personal sweet spot in them, more or less every piece of equipment will suck.
this “competition” for me brings the base of sitting down and make music. Experiment with what I have. learn new things with it, explore them, let inspire you what you have and not tell your self that the next piece of equipment bring the inspiration.
I found myself more in a “but I need XY to archive what I want” circle, that is easily described as “well, gear will fix my skill problems!”.
Next year I want to focus on music. I will focus on being happy with what I CAN archive instead of being sad what I cannot archive. focus on trying to archive more instead of pointing at gear for not reaching the goals.
Yes, this is some kind of group therapy, and going to AA and tell them “don’t let others get in the way of you getting drunk” isn’t that helpful at all!
I sort of see both sides. I think maybe he’s saying don’t let this challenge completely suck the joy out of music making, and turn you off from music. I also see your point because many people on these kinds of forums do nothing but buy gear and don’t make any music. I’ve been guilty of that myself (not judging!)
It’s a really complicated issue I think. It’s not like I never want to buy gear again. Last year, I was on another forum and somehow got this crazy idea to buy a flute. It turned out to be a great (and admittedly weird) musical decision. On the other hand, discussions on the same forum convinced me I need all these high-end music sample libraries for composing, which was ultimately a bad GAS-ridden path for me to go down.
In the end, it has to be about learning to get rid of the bad buying tendencies, while being able to buy responsibly, as I don’t think anyone here will ever completely stop buying gear if they like to make music (although they could I suppose).
Perhaps I’m not explaining it well enough, but I don’t think it’s even as simple as “never do X again”. With something like alcohol or cigarettes, the obvious best choice is just stop completely forever if you have a problem.
Again, just putting some thoughts down. I don’t have the solution. Perhaps it’s just about shifting the focus of the hobby. If so, maybe that’s the kind of thing we can brainstorm here. The other idea I had was maybe figuring out what gear purchases have been healthy and what ones haven’t, and figuring out what differentiates those. (Ie, what brings stress and what brings joy). Again, just spitballing.
AA is surely not the best example, but coming to a thread were people gather to do task A and come around to tell everyone why A is bad, neither helps the person who does so, nor all the others.
I quite sure, that most of us OT lovers in here, would go and buy a well designed OT2, if it would be released within the next month and happily come here to tell everyone: “Uh, I lost, but I skipped a ton of stuff until now”
I’d be interested to hear from others here - does the writing of others, have any effect on your mission? What I mean is, when people come into this thread, and kinda question the point or validity, of going gear less, does it sway your own viewpoints?
The reason I ask, is that once I’ve made a descion like this, the battle is with me, and me alone. You can post an endless stream of gearporn, write long and meaningful posts on, why I might be wrong, but it doesn’t change anything.
Don’t get me wrong - I enjoy the discussion, and I love the life of this thread, so my question is purely down to curiousity about, how people function.
It doesn’t sway me but it can be annoying. There’s always someone wanting to naysay someone trying to do something positive in their lives. For example, Person A announces they’re going vegetarian or vegan. Person B says something like, yeah, but what about bacon, or I could never live without cheese, or your belt is made of leather. While valid points for them and them alone, it might be cooler to say, nice one, here’s a good recipe for X that you might want to try or something like that
It doesn’t really affect me either - with things like this I know deep down what I need to do, and just need a nudge and some support to do it. Same as quitting drinking which I did 13 years ago. Drink is everywhere (same as synths on this forum) especially at this time of year, but I have to adjust my attitude to it rather than others changing their viewpoints or actions.
But I do agree with @Craig, the world in general projects a lot of negativity or thoughtlessness towards people trying to change their habits and lifestyles in order to better themselves…
When other people are trying to convince you that you shouldn’t do this and come with rubbish arguments (as @craig described perfectly above) it’s mostly their own fear (or projection) of change that they are feeling, and has nothing to do with your mission.
So I only see this as a sign that you’re on to something that requires courage so that only gives me more motivation to continue!
I do not remember if it had already been covered but is buying a new computer considered as gear? After all a lot of people (like myself) do not use it exclusively for musicmaking.
Just asking because I am still torn back and forth if I should join …
I would say: At the end you define the rules for yourself. You need food and water to be able to make music. I think we agree, that buying food is not included here
Having been vegetarian since 1996 and vegan for a year I’m kinda accustomed to loudmouthed people questioning my life choices. I believe it’s a form of defense system for most of people. Realizing that their own eating/buying habits are somewhat questionable makes people defend their stance furiously.
I won’t budge. I’ve always been a man of many principles. For me it’s a good way to define boundaries for my actions. I’m worried sick about the state of the world so I’ll do my best through my own actions to tread lightly on mother earth.
This is actually the part, I’m curious about - why do they distract you? Are you distracted because they have valid points, or do their mere presence distract you?
I think it’s a kind move, when a moderatorer steps in, and tell people to be supportive or leave, but I honestly don’t need it in any way. If anything, I’m fueled by the weird opposition in some people.
