statas

well, the obvious starting points. you can go to a college/tech school that specializes in creative career skills. think full sail, art institute, and others like those. you can take college courses that help develop those skills. i personally took some community college courses like "audio and media" and a couple others that i forgot the course names for (of course, all the skills i learned are now outdated- i can cut and splice 1/4" tape like a ninja master...) you can also try to intern at a music studio. get your foot in the door. offer to do all their errands if you can sit in on sesssions. you have to make it a priority and put in a lot of hard work. don't sacrifice EVERYTHING, but you really have to be driven.

yeah. i was afraid of having to bounce down to audio (bandwidth/ filesize/ transfer rates). just seems like there is going to be a lot of time spent making slight changes and emailing variations over and over...

well, it depends on your viewpoint on legality. Bridgeport Music, Inc. v. Dimension Films (court case) was the ruling that all sampling was illegal unless the samples were cleared. There is a lot of gray area with regards to "fair use" and whatnot though. i sample, and i'm not ashamed about it. the real question is whether YOU feel like you are ripping something off, or making something new and (slightly) original with it. be creative and don't use it as a crutch.

so, does anyone have any ideas or suggestions for when you want to do a collab with someone else who uses a totally different sequencer/DAW?.. i mean, when you have zero shared software..

the kick needs more distortion and it needs to be sustained a little longer. my 2 cents.

needs to be longer.... ended before i knew it.

never posted one of my tracks on here before.... curious to see what y'all think.... www.myspace.com/statas it's the first track in the player- torment (version)

i feel dirty now.

lfo to freq cutoff... or freq envelope. you want it to hit and then either open up the filter, or close it (depending on the exact way you want the bass to hit)

i really hate the way ableton handles its add-ons.. the program is moderately expensive as is, but then you have to pay over 100 bucks for a synth that is pretty narrow in focus? i mean the add-ons (sampler,operator, tension, electric, analog, whatever) are nice, but together with ableton ups the total price to over $1000+

brain. try making music without this.

the thing about reaktor is that it also gives you access to the reaktor user database library. 70+ synths and fx? no, more like 2000 + synths and fx.

so.... i've actually been staring at this thread for about an hour... digesting and letting it percolate in my brain... so, you have decided to try to play out live....some thoughts. first you might want to take a look at the echo indigo series of soundcards, very compact, good for laptop gigging, and little chance of losing or misplacing it, and no power/usb cords to worry about getting unplugged. http://www.echoaudio.com/Products/CardBus/ http://www.zzounds.com/item--ECHINDIGOIO http://www.zzounds.com/item--ECHINDIGODJ second, forget about monitors. bad idea.(i'll come back to this in a moment.) third, if you are doing everything out of the box(laptop), don't even worry about an external mixer... somewhat redundant, as any venue with a p.a. will have some way to input signals, most likely a house mixer of some sort. besides what would you use a mixer for? you won't need to combine signals of any sort. fourth, also forget about all that other external gear, exciters, compressors, lights,tents,banners, etc etc etc... if you are starting to play out, worry about the music, not about the lights. that other stuff might be useful in certain scenarios, but until then, don't waste time worrying about it. since everything is from the laptop, you won't need any external processing. fifth, as far as midi controllers go... i recommend the trigger finger, and the x-session(not x-session "pro") for knobs and pads...the evolution uc33e is also decent if you need a ton of knobs and sliders.. these are all extremely compact.. and combined with your laptop will easily fit into a shoulder bag. i don't really use midi keyboards in my live set ATM, but an oxygen 08 is also pretty small and portable. if you play enough shows, your keyboard WILL get banged up and what not.. cheaper and disposable is better... i have used midi keyboards before, and most of them will get ruined at some point.. my oxy 08 is battered (but still functional) some keys don't work so well now, one of them is bent upwards and a couple are loose. better that this happens to something that is cheap to replace, rather than a $400 controller... http://www.zzounds.com/item--EVOUC33E http://www.zzounds.com/item--MDOTRIGGER http://www.zzounds.com/item--EVOXSESSION sixth... and this is probably the most important part, where are you trying to go with this? what places WOULD you like to play? where CAN you currently play at? are you trying to do something a little more experimental and arty or something that's some straight up clubbin' trance bangers? do you want to play some small coffee shops or would you like to get a night at transit? do you know anyone in the scene? would you throw an underground party just to play? each of these has its particular merits and drawbacks... the club definitely has a sound system, the coffee shop probably not... the club might be harder to get a foot in the door, while the coffee shop probably won't be...the club will probably also be a bigger financial risk (bar gaurentees vs straight renting the club out for the night)... there is also the problem of "how many ppl can you draw?" for any venue.. are there any other artists you can team up with to make something happen? it's a lot easier to do things if you have a support crew than it is to try and go at it alone. there is a lot more to making a "night" happen than just showing up to play. and lastly, some background on me just to put everything into context. (just so you know i'm not talking out my ass).. i have been putting on shows and throwing parties here in philadelphia for the last ten years.. i have performed in many clubs throughout the city, and have contacts in many places. i have a record (yes, vinyl) out on No Room for Talent Records, and have several more in the pipeline for release in the next few months.. i have travelled and performed all across the u.s, and am going to be headed to europe to perform there soon as well.. zircon-you can pm me for contact info if you need to... oh yeah...forgot to add this... bounce down to audio pretty much anything that you don't need to control/tweak in realtime... and EXPECT your computer to crash. it WILL happen.

http://www.soundrangers.com/sound-categories.cfm?cat_template=sound good source for online fx...just do what i do and record the demos into your DAW of choice...

stereo detune- makes the sound seem wider, and the detuning tends to add a sense of movement to the pad. (this also works awesome on bass, just make sure that you bounce back to mono if you are going to get pressed on vinyl.)

nethack ftw!

dumb question, but get it out of the way... are you arranging/remixing on a computer or are you just making notation for live play? the easy way= fills. plain and simple. shuffle some of your hits on divisions of 4/8/16/32 etc... often used to add some momentum to a song.. give me an example of your drum line, and i'll show you how to do some simple fills that add + enhance your rhythm section.

i'd also recommend the axiom. trust me... those pads will prove so much more fun than any keys...

i assume you mean MOTU 828 mk2? that might be overkill unless you are looking into a ton of sound modules.. i might recommend the echo audiofire or indigo i/o if you only want a pair of inputs. as far as plugging your new toy into the computer, you can get a stereo to mono y-cable or adapter to merge your l/r signals. oh wait.. not sure if echo has vista drivers yet. <checking>... appears to support vista...

basic hard dance kicks take a 909 or 808 kick drum sound... distort and then compress heavily... use that for the "tone" or prescence.. then layer with a single osc sine wave lp'ed to give it some "punch"... and final layer, need a short sharp percussive attack... a drum with a distinct "klick" ... sandwitch those layers together, buss them through a master compresser..

http://www.em411.com/show/blog/79 http://www.digitalprosound.com/2002/03_mar/tutorials/mixing_excerpt1.htm http://www.recordingwebsite.com/articles/eqprimer.php

i think the easiest way is just volume automation in the sequencer.

two things- no, you don't NEED a soundcard, but i highly recommend one. what you do need is a good environment to precisely hear everything. proper quality headphones are good, but the best monitors you can get will help much more. as said before, the soundcard facilitates getting the audio out to the speakers, but a pro sound card usually has better conversions (in the driver), grounding, connections etc. also most soundcards have better latency then then the onboard ones. just a warning, trying to mix on headphones is usually a bad idea. even with awesome 'phones, the frequency responses are different and coloured by the placement over the ears. panned sounds also leap out more from the mix because each ear is isolated soundwise from the other ear. monitors will improve your mix immensely. you need something that will impart as little frequency curve as possible. most home stereos are not optimised for being flat frequency-wise... as far as reason goes, many people say that it sounds better rewired, or to just use another program. one of the primary reasons (no pun) is that reason attenuates stereo inputs by 6db. a simple work around is to flip the rack and unplug one cable on a stereo track in the mixer and put it in another channel. pan both of these(one hard left, the other hard right) and it will come out louder.

testin my sig

wow. best remix i've heard on this site. very lush and quite professional sounding. nice and intricate too....evolves nicely and the pauses help to give it a little tension... drives the song along... amazing use of sounds too.. the choirs and electro drums mix very well....