kz
Member
Registered: 9th Aug 02
Location: Southend, Essex Drives: Mini Cooper S
User status: Offline
|
My girlfriend bought me Ableton for my birthday and I've finally cracked it open for a look this week seeing as though I'm off work (see other thread)
It's a bit overwhelming! 
Gone through a few of the built in lessons but it really doesn't explain the process of making a track, it's more about learning where things are. Looked online for some guidelines but it seems you have to pay top dollar for anything decent... wondered if anyone had any recommendations?
Looking to start with a house track really as probably the easiest!
|
Dom
Member
Registered: 13th Sep 03
User status: Offline
|
quote:
Originally posted by kz
....but it seems you have to pay top dollar for anything decent... wondered if anyone had any recommendations?
What are "top dollar for anything decent"? 
Sample packs are relatively cheap, £0-100 or so; plugins (compressors, effects or virtual instruments, synths etc)/sound libraries on the other hand can be anything from free to thousands, really depends what you're after.
Ableton does include a load of plugins and instruments that are reasonable, so i'd just grab your midi controller and start playing around with them.
It might be worth looking at buying Future Music or Computer Music (Sound on Sound as well but it's aimed more at engineering rather than virtual synths and sample packs) mags; personally they're a bit mickey-mouse (except SoS) as they're aimed at the "Copy'n'Paste" generation of music production but they do monthly Ableton tutorials that might be worth looking at.
Otherwise there's thousands of Ableton tutorials on Youtube.
Edit - If it's EDM you're looking at then i'd recommend you look up sidechaining, particularly sidechained compression and sidechained reverb, and using gates for gating. And don't just look at Ableton tutorials on sidechaining or gating, look at analogue equivalent tutorials/guides as you'll get a better understanding of how it works in the real-world outside of your computer.
Similarly it's worth looking at bus'ing and routing within Ableton.
And it might be worth investing in a decent audio interface (with pre-amps ideally for using mics/external instruments/DI'ing guitars etc) as you'll reduce buffer size and in-turn latency.
[Edited on 17-12-2014 by Dom]
|
Brett
Premium Member
Registered: 16th Dec 02
Location: Manchester
User status: Offline
|
Youtube has some great tuts
|
Tiger
Member
Registered: 12th Jun 01
Location: Leicestershire Drives:Astra VXR
User status: Offline
|
I use FL Studio and it's awesome.
|
Dom
Member
Registered: 13th Sep 03
User status: Offline
|
quote:
Originally posted by Tiger
I use FL Studio and it's awesome.
FruityLoops is what i started with but when you learn other DAW's, especially ProTools and the likes, you'll realise how backwards (routing and automation are the two that stand out) it is compared to them.
It also doesn't translate particularly well to the analogue world.
However, it was originally created as a digital sampler and it was always good at being that.
|
evilrob
Premium Member
Registered: 16th Mar 12
Location: Your mum's house
User status: Offline
|
ProTracker is where it's at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9zmLQGBTIw
|
GB123
Premium Member
Registered: 21st Nov 11
Location: Kent
User status: Offline
|
Music 2000 on playstation
|
Dom
Member
Registered: 13th Sep 03
User status: Offline
|
ProTracker, a bit hardcore that! Cubase on the Atari was a lot, lot easier
Good documentary with SquarePusher and Photek - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96PfTcGHZ4Q
|
evilrob
Premium Member
Registered: 16th Mar 12
Location: Your mum's house
User status: Offline
|
quote:
Originally posted by Dom
Cubase on the Atari was a lot, lot easier
Assuming the piece of shit dongle would register.
Pretty sure I've still got an SM124 and a Naksha mouse knocking about somewhere! (as well as a 4096k STe)
Have you seen what Falcons and TTs go for on eBay these days? Crazy money.
[Edited on 18-12-2014 by evilrob]
|
Brett
Premium Member
Registered: 16th Dec 02
Location: Manchester
User status: Offline
|
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eU5Dn-WaElI 
|
kz
Member
Registered: 9th Aug 02
Location: Southend, Essex Drives: Mini Cooper S
User status: Offline
|
quote:
Originally posted by Dom
quote:
Originally posted by kz
....but it seems you have to pay top dollar for anything decent... wondered if anyone had any recommendations?
What are "top dollar for anything decent"?
Sample packs are relatively cheap, £0-100 or so; plugins (compressors, effects or virtual instruments, synths etc)/sound libraries on the other hand can be anything from free to thousands, really depends what you're after.
Ableton does include a load of plugins and instruments that are reasonable, so i'd just grab your midi controller and start playing around with them.
It might be worth looking at buying Future Music or Computer Music (Sound on Sound as well but it's aimed more at engineering rather than virtual synths and sample packs) mags; personally they're a bit mickey-mouse (except SoS) as they're aimed at the "Copy'n'Paste" generation of music production but they do monthly Ableton tutorials that might be worth looking at.
Otherwise there's thousands of Ableton tutorials on Youtube.
Edit - If it's EDM you're looking at then i'd recommend you look up sidechaining, particularly sidechained compression and sidechained reverb, and using gates for gating. And don't just look at Ableton tutorials on sidechaining or gating, look at analogue equivalent tutorials/guides as you'll get a better understanding of how it works in the real-world outside of your computer.
Similarly it's worth looking at bus'ing and routing within Ableton.
And it might be worth investing in a decent audio interface (with pre-amps ideally for using mics/external instruments/DI'ing guitars etc) as you'll reduce buffer size and in-turn latency.
[Edited on 17-12-2014 by Dom]
Thanks. Struggling to understand most of what you said atm lol. I've got the Suite so shit loads of samples etc. to install yet. Haven't got a MIDI controller unfortunately, maybe in the future.
After running through a few quick tutorials I thought I'd have a go but only half the beats I put over to play actually played... and when I told them to stop, they carried on forever a lot to learn yet obviously.
|
