Dwight Davis
Offline
The Wisconsin

I am trying my best to work my way up the musical design ladder. Right now, I'd say I'm very low on it. One of the reasons is that I have not put much effort or money into upgrading my scenario. I'm ready to do that, but I don't know crap about what to do. Therefore, I ask this:

I currently use the FL Studio Demo Version for my music design. It's nice, because I'm used to it, but it requires me to make things all in one sitting. I am growing uncomfortable with the inability to load, so I know I need to upgrade. I could always blow $200 of my money to get basically the same set-up I have now, with a load file button, or I could switch to a different program. I've heard that Reason is good, but FL is the only thing I've ever used. Any recommendations for better software?

I feel like I post too many question threads on this forum, so sorry about that. I don't know much about music, but it's still one of my favorite things to do. Therefore, I figure I'd be wasting any talent I may have in this department by not improving my knowledge on the subject. If you guys could help me out, that'd be awesome! It might also be nice to have a musical advice thread, or something, so that I can ask all my little questions without having to spam up the forums.

Thanks

AndrewKilpatrick
Offline
Worthing

I use musagi. It's versatile as fuck but buggy as hell, and to be honest I wouldn't recommend it to people (I've been using it for 4 years, feels like my child).

I have limited use of Ableton, but every time I HAVE used it I've enjoyed it. Pretty easy to pick up and also has a lot to fuck about with underneath the surface, though if I remember rightly it has a hefty price tag...

Sphax
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Paris

It is very hard to give the proper advice on which soft to use as it really depends on the way you are writing or making music.

As a sound engineer I learned to mix with Cubase and ProTools, but the one that really suited me the most was definitely Logic, firstly because I like its interface and its design (as always with Apple). I like the fact that this soft is really oriented for both Mixing and Editing, as well as providing you a very easy way for creating, combined with the Komplete Instruments it is just a dream! But as you said it is also f****** expansive and I couldn't afford it as well, I just learned in a University in Wales and worked with my cracked version of Cubase and a little bit of Fruity Loop as well.

I would advise you to use Reason more as a VST as there a some good Synth and Effect in it, but the Sequencer view is a pain for me...

Anyway, when I came back to France I also learned a lot on MaxMsp as an Internship Work, which carried me to have a big interest on Ableton Live, and this was a real revelation to me. The way with software is designed is totally oriented for Musicians. The fact that you can work with loops and arrange them in real time really helps you to be very creative and improvise music with a smaller amount of musical theory (and on this side FL and Live have maybe a lot in common) but you'll need to do Tutorials and learn the minimum anyway. Besides, because there is a big community of Max developers, there a lot and lot of plug-ins that comes with it and assists you for writing in the good keys for example (cf. your other thread on musical scales and also have a look on that:   http://www.ableton.com/schwarzonator  ). I still think that the arrangement (where you can edit, copy, past, write your automation, etc...) view is not as clear as the one from Logic, but it's still better than reason.

My last advice will be about fruity loop. If you started with this software, I think you should continue to work with it, as their are many professional musicians that use it and make very professionals production (example: http://www.pogomix.net/category/videos/) If you have enough money to buy it, just do it, but I'm also still a student and must admit that I don't use an official version of all my soft (i think Try before Buy is good wink ).

You said you don't have a lot of knowledge about writing music (and i don't have a lot either) but if you feel it you can always do something, Just Listen and Play!!!

jiffypop23
Offline
Riverside, CA

If you like FL Studio and don't want to buy it or acquire it by "other means" you should give LMMS a shot. It's Free and open source and works very close to FL. It has VST support, built in Gameboy and SID synths, and I'm pretty sure can even import .flp files.

george bowles
Offline
St Louis

I bought FL Studio for $50 a long time ago, and it has paid off big time now that the sound quality is pretty great and it is more stable with the vsts... still needs some work in that dept, unless it is just my computer. i love using this program and making super weird time sig patterns. like that sunsawr one I did was sequenced in 6/5. I'm probably just using the looping features wrong though, but I like what it ends up sound like. I'm just so used to using it that when I use other programs it feels like it would take a while to learn some thing new. that said audiomulch.com gives you 60 days free of a pretty easy to use program (if you use it just in a live sense). I'll check out lmms though, sounds interesting. I also dl'd a copy of nodal, that should be interesting...

Sphax
Offline
Paris

Check this as well:

http://www.image-line.com/documents/pow … e-oldfield

So, i'm sure you can continue to produce some good music with it wink

Pocaille
Offline
Montreal

If you want to give Ableton a shot there is a Demo version available.

FL Studio is good too! If you are confortable with it you should go with that.

little-scale
Offline
adelaide

Personally, I prefer Ableton and ProTools - but I think software use is largely a very personal choice, and depends what you are comfortable with, what your aims are and where you are at.

spry
Offline
Cincinnati, Ohio

MagiX Music Maker is pretty cheap and has some serious capabilities.  you should look into it.  its cheap it you want to buy it.  its even cheaper if you dont.......

george bowles
Offline
St Louis

I really like Ableton Live... but have yet to get the full version.

Dwight Davis
Offline
The Wisconsin

I should have given more info. I am still a student, and I have a bit of money, but not much, and I don't wanna spend it all. I could buy some of these, including FL, but I wanna make sure I know my way before I do. I don't play keys, but I sing and play guitar. I've never done anything with recording sounds from real life besides doing vocals for one 15 second intro for a friend. I don't have any accessories, like soundboards or midi controllers. I have plenty of time to get some though. I've heard about Ableton, but I don't know if it has anything like FL's Piano roll, because that's what I like, and what I'm used to. I think I'd be crap at recording myself playing something. Also, I can't spend too much, because I need moneys to buy headphones as well.

Also, Sphax, thanks for the feedback on my music. It's not that I'm bad note-wise, but that I'm feel unprofessional.

Sphax
Offline
Paris

You're Welcome!
The piano roll is almost on every Music Software i guess!
Becoming professional means buying stuff! lol! Sorry to say that!
Not that you can't produce professional music without good gear, but considering you are making techno and if you want to play guitar you'll need a good microphone and good pre-amp, good DAC converter,etc...

But I think starting by producing a lot (like this site allows), trying to do lots and lots of tutorial and above all sharing your ideas and your work is the best solution to become professional. That's why I do it!

Dwight Davis
Offline
The Wisconsin

I couldn't get LMMS to produce any sound... At all... It sets itself to having no audio output, and when I change it, it asks me to restart the program. It goes on and on like this. I guess I'll download the ableton demo.

Also, excuse my lack of knowledge, but what exactly does VST even mean? I hear the term thrown around a lot, but I don't know what the heck it is, or how it's relevant to me.

Last edited by Dwight Davis (January 25, 2012 1:18 am)

e.s.c.
Offline
chicago-/-il-/-us
spry wrote:

MagiX Music Maker is pretty cheap and has some serious capabilities.  you should look into it.  its cheap it you want to buy it.  its even cheaper if you dont.......

pirating ~$20 software is just silly...im weird enough though that while i have better recording options available (ableton, audition, pro tools) i stubbornly still use cool edit 96 and magix music maker 7 for most of that...
but for the OP, id say you should look into renoise or LGPT if you are comfortable creating your own synths out of oscillator samples

DrumurBoy
Offline
Saskatchewan, Canada

Flstudio has by far the best piano roll i've used.

midimachine
Offline
Gosford, Australia

If you like FL's interface and workflow a lot you will probably have trouble getting to grips with other software (especially Reason!).

If you're not planning on recording anything then you can get the "fruityloops" edition of FL which doesn't have the advanced routing and recording capabilities of the producer edition but is half the cost and still lets you use VSTs and all that jazz. Then if you ever need to upgrade you can pay the difference later, or if you want to start using a more recording-centric DAW like ProTools or Cubase you can run the fruityloops edition inside other DAWs as a ReWire client.

btw: been using FL for all of my WB stuff so far. It's pretty great!

Last edited by midimachine (January 25, 2012 2:57 am)