Thinking of going back in the box

The Lounge General Discussion
#41

Yes this is ridiculous, use what works, to hell with trends.

This is not to be underestimated, for me the main problem with my all hardware no DAW setup is putting arrangements together and mixing, for composition and jamming I vastly prefer hardware though. For years now I have been trying to find a solution to bridge the gap, but as far as I can tell nothing yet exists, closest thing is the OP-1 but obviously it lacks a bit of horsepower for anything more than 4 linear tracks of 6 minutes, not to mention syncing and outputs, fx, eq etc. But the way audio can be lifted and dropped around is great. Deluge also comes close but the similar criticisms apply, plus the workflow is a bit sub optimal due to the button combos and no screen.

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#42

That’s one of the ones that I was wondering about.

I have a Keystep and Beat Step Pro, both of which I bought on sale at various times. Right now I mostly just use the BSP for a bank of knobs, and it’s actually not bad for that if the thing you want to control has midi learn.

#43

The tittle of this post is pretty funny if you don’t know what going back in the box means… made me chuckle…

To be honest, I love Ableton. I was thinking about it the other day how the UI makes me feel safe.

I treat hardware like instruments and record all the jams into Ableton and the arrange, mix and add more layers there…

if I had to choose Ableton or hardware? I would go probs Ableton because of current time restraints. If I was full time music I would probs go hardware… I find trying to get all the hardware to talk to each frustrating…

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#44

The only reason to work with something else than the computer is the workflow situation. I can easily play an improvised liveset with hardware sequencers and loopers. But when I try to create a liveset in Ableton which allows me a similar flexibility I always fail. And I have Push 2, Midifighter and a few other controllers. But at a certain point Ableton explodes and I don´t feel to be in control of the music anymore.

But when it comes to music that doesn´t need to be played live the computer setup beats everything else easily. For every hardware that I own I have a tool in my computer that works faster, better and more to the point. Only exception is the Moog synth which I will probably keep even if I went to a computer-only setup.

The Dawless-thing (of which I am also guilty) feels like a sporty excercise. Only a listener who also makes music will understand the concept of what you were trying to achieve. A “normal” listener who just looks for nice music to play doesn´t even know what a DAW is or why playing DAWless is better or special.

I the past five weeks I have been livestreaming 10 concerts with different setups and different music. Only the first one was a dawless set, which I was able to play because I prepared this set for a long time. The other sets are more or less computer based but I still use my hardware to control different aspects of my ABleton sets and VST instruments. In the end a lot of people really want to see hardware but to me it makes less sense every day.

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#45

I like to make sound and I like to sample that sometimes, have no time to arrange that in a sensible way for now, that’s fine too. In the box - out the box, who cares?! As long as I can play with my OT I am :cool:

#46

yes that‘s a big one for me.
I was making a lot of tracks in recent weeks in ableton. Next to my laptop there were ready to record mother32, digitone and analog four, instead I used repro, tal, operator etc. Loading them takes me less time than setting the other stuff up to record and I can just copy instances and vary the sound for other elements of the track.
I set up ableton overbridge templates many times but it‘s always faster if I just use the plugins or work completely on the elektrons/hardware synths…
For me the main thing about the hardware is the toy aspect, the discovering, the touching, the looking at it and be a proud owner :upside_down_face:

I‘ll try the deluge as dawless wonderbox next. Probably I will have tried them all soon and still going back to ableton all the time

#47

I sort of accidentally ended up itb over the last year. I started out as one of those “dawless” people and refused to look into itb production for literally years. I spend a non-trivial amount of time at work on a computer and was positive that I didn’t want to spend my creative time in the same physical situation.

Then life happened, I had to let go of some gear, and had to replace my computer in a pretty small window. I ended up with less gear and a beefy pc.

Since then, I’ve basically moved slowly fully itb. The only hardware I really kept was an octatrack, which now I struggle more and more to find the motivation to use. My current workflow is basically just work in Ableton, then I’ll move some stuff over to the octatrack. But for probably the last month once I get something down in Ableton, I have no motivation to start all over getting it into the octatrack.

I suspect I’ll end up selling or trading it and getting an MPC live just to make the transition between these two workflows easier. And even that may go away at some point. I’m just so much more productive itb and it turns out I enjoy getting things done as much as I like to turn knobs, which can be reasonably approximated with midi controllers.

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#48

I ended up downsizing to an ITB set up with OT off to the side. Some brutal bills landed over xmas so had to let the OT go. The annoying thing is that I probably jumped the gun a bit and have managed to “fix” the finances somewhat. Having said that, I’ve been coping quite well with what I’ve got. It’s motivated me to convert a load of old Maschine projects in to Live and to start sorting through the countless half ideas I’ve had over the years to distil things down to a couple of dozen tracks I’d like to finish.

But, in a way I do miss the OT. I’ve owned an MPC Live and it’s a great bit of gear, def works better in a hybrid set up, but I’ve found I can’t really be arsed with hybrid set ups. Don’t be too hasty with the OT. It’s absolutely fine to park it on the shelf for a few months and to return to it. Sometimes it’s just great to sit down with only the OT.

I have def realised over the past year that I get from A to B much, much quicker ITB. And I’m realising regularly I’m barely scratching the surface with Ableton or the many soft synths I’ve got.

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#49

what i was thinking lately is to try to hook up the OT as a send-return effect in ableton. this way you may use it in a number of scenarios instantly with any sound in ableton: be it OT’s fx chain or resampling stuff, which can be, again, easily recaptured back in ableton as a new clip or whatever

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#50

This would be lots of fun! I’ll have to try this as well.

#51

Templates are your friend.

I have all kinds of templates in Logic for different setups. Makes things super fast. Load template and you’re off. Not mucking about setting up tracks, routing, plugs etc.

Load and go.

(Just make sure your labeling is clear :wink: )

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#52

I was strictly itb for awhile but the quality of the tunes I was making was garbage. That’s on me and not the box tho. Now I use a little of both but I wish I could cut out the box completely.

#53

I’ve always been kind of hybrid but since lockdown and my partner toughing it out here with me I’ve given up the spare room for their office and am using the desk at the back of the living room for my home working/music stuff. So, it’s just the laptop, DT and M:C for me and I’ve been way, way more productive - or maybe had more time on my hands. Been revisiting Reaktor and really digging into front panel patching and it’s so satisfying… I’m re-evaluating my whole approach tbh and may continue with the combo of laptop/couple of pieces of gear after this is all over.

#54

For my taste, my itb tunes sound better most of the time. So the hardware thing is only for the fun, not even for the sound. But fun is a major part of a hobby I guess :slight_smile:

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#55

Haha just thought about this topic this morning

Interessting thread which i think nowadays is more valid then it used to be some years ago. I started doing music quite some years ago. Back then not even timestretch was a thing in DAW’s and i’ve done my first years mainly using the keyboard and mouse. I had a midi keyboard but if i’m honest back then i never took the time to properly use it and map it so productivity gets increased. Hardware was just way to expensive to afford (the EMU E6400 which i got for two beers cost its previous owner around 12 000$) .

In the last years hardware got a lot more affordable and had more features too. I guess this might have been a reason why more people switched or started to use hardware.

I do agree that a lot of DAW Tools just make it so easy nowadays to work with music and mostly they do it better then hardware does. Here’s a little practical example i experienced yesterday:

I own an Octatrack which i like a lot to mingle around with and i took the time to get to know the device so i know it’s capabilities (well most if it :-)) Recently i got interested in changing the music i make to instrumental Hip Hop and just out of curiosity i tried the Serato Sample demo yesterday.

Honestly: To swap some samples there is now way on earth that the octatrack even comes close to the easy of use and speed of this piece of software. Load an Audio file find slices, hit some keys on your midi keyboard and boom. First off they are perfectly in sync with your bpm ( the octatracks timestretch algorithm is not closely comparable to any daw’s) and then it also shows what key the sample is in. Flipping some old jazz record with this in comparison to the octatrack is a huge difference. On the OT you would need to record or copy your sample, slice it, and if the bpm is to far apart don’t even think about using a 4 bar loop straight away. With the searto sample the whole process took 3 seconds.

When it comes to Mixing and Mastering Tracks i personally think that there is no better way then doing this ITB just because of the amount of plugins. I use Fabfilter ProQ in the DAW. Mixing and cleaning up drums with this is so easy. Trying it with hardware only works if i constantly keep an analyzer on the computer open.

I can see that people get drawn to making music with outboard gear and i believe it’s a lot of fun, but when it comes to what plugins can do most hardware is just not comparable.

So having a midi keyboard and some pads mapped correctly can make you forget the mouse and keyboard quickly. So really i’m thinking now of just using my midi keyboard and maybe a cheap akai mpd controller.

I do have a lot of fun using the octatrack and i might come up with more creative approaches and i also tend to jam around more, but honestly when it comes to finished tunes i haven’t really finished or even recorded anything done on the OT. I thought that i would finish more stuff on hardware then in the daw, but if i don’t want lie to myself i really haven’t :slight_smile:

So in the end it’s all about personal preference and maybe music genre too, but daw’s have advanced as well as hardware did advance and feature wise any daw with plugins is miles ahead of hardware.

The only thing i’m annoyed with when it come to all DAW’s are that tools get old and are not supported with the next Operating System anymore, you need to get a new license and stuff like that. So for example if you buy a Maschine or a Push they are both great devices which combine the two worlds a bit, but then i ask myself how long will you still be able to run ableton push 1 ? Maybe in 4 years no computer will run ableton 10 anymore and push will not be supported anymore and then you have to keep and old Operating System with your old ableton to use the gear (or obviously buy something new). This is something that definitely doesn’t happen with real hardware ! :slight_smile:

#56

Exactly this happens with hardware, too, isn’t it? You need to keep it around as separate pieces of gear. When you treat your audio workstation/computer in the same way just to make music with it it will still be there for you in 10 or more years, too.

It’s just that nonsense of running after the latest, greatest, shinny programs and upgrades and run everything in parallel on them from office to gaming that make computers seems so short lasting (and don’t get me started on “always on” requirements). Carefully and - most important - restrictively used they last as long as your music hardware.

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#57

True to that ! I still have a PowerMac G5 with Logic 8 in the basement which when i used it never got connected to the internet and the only programm installed there is Logic and nothing else. I’m sure i could just take it out of the box and i would still run as it used to some years ago

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#58

I think DAW is perfect for real music production. It’s limitless powerfull in comparaison to hardware.
But, I prefere making music on my Digitakt than on DAW with bunch of plugins.
I have the feeling that my DT is my instrument. It’s my universe. I love it, I learn it, I show it to my friends. I know how to do anything on it. It’s not complex, but it’s incredibly deep.
It’s an object, I have something in my hand. Computer is abstract, spending money to buy plugins or daw is different feeling. I don’t feel owning anything.

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#59

Boxes, man…boxes.

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#60

How are you liking TAL?