Renoise VS other DAWs
category: music [glöplog]
application development
For me Renoise is just the cream of trackers and I am happy that it exists.
psenough: since some versions there is a "autoseek" feature. It play samples that were entered in a pattern, at any later point in the song from the adequate sample position (without being necessarily re-triggered by notes). A fantastic feature, I don't know from any other tracker.
yzi: you could try to export XMs using the external plug-in Xrns2XMod (available on the Renoise pages). It works pretty well if you stick to the format limits.
psenough: since some versions there is a "autoseek" feature. It play samples that were entered in a pattern, at any later point in the song from the adequate sample position (without being necessarily re-triggered by notes). A fantastic feature, I don't know from any other tracker.
yzi: you could try to export XMs using the external plug-in Xrns2XMod (available on the Renoise pages). It works pretty well if you stick to the format limits.
I'll surely try Renoise. But yet I'll give myself a chance on some other classic DAWs mentioned here. I'll try some more tutorials instead of mostly reverse engineering the features.
What worries me is that there's very few artists using Renoise and trackers generally. Yeah I know that trackers are niche for the scene and old school hardware, but the bigger guys here like, say, Irvin, amusic, guys from MFX/Kewlers, who I respect very much, don't seem to use Renoise or trackers in general? I know that a tool doesn't make an artist, but still, da Vinci wouldn't be da Vinci if he used mop instead of a brush...
Would you generally agree with Preacher that not being a very good instrumentalist is a show stopper for using classic DAWs efficiently?
What worries me is that there's very few artists using Renoise and trackers generally. Yeah I know that trackers are niche for the scene and old school hardware, but the bigger guys here like, say, Irvin, amusic, guys from MFX/Kewlers, who I respect very much, don't seem to use Renoise or trackers in general? I know that a tool doesn't make an artist, but still, da Vinci wouldn't be da Vinci if he used mop instead of a brush...
Would you generally agree with Preacher that not being a very good instrumentalist is a show stopper for using classic DAWs efficiently?
As far as I know, a lot of so-called producers use DAW programs with good results, so it must be doable. And if you think it matters what mainstream artists use, then you're in the wrong place anyway. ;) But if you're used to entering notes tracker style on the computer keyboard, and you want to use modern VST plugins and all that stuff, then what options do you have, it's Renoise or nothing.
Try things for a couple of weeks and then report back what kind of results you got.
Try things for a couple of weeks and then report back what kind of results you got.
Make use of one DAW or another it's just a matter of taste.
Modern trackers like Renoise, Psycle or OpenMPT are good enough to compose, mix and master any musical project in general. Of any genre. Including orchestral if you wish, yes.
Especially Renoise. It doesn't have anything to envy of others DAWs.
I use Renoise to make the music of my demos and it fits my workflow very well. For intros, I stick to classic trackers like Protracker or Milkytracker. I tried the Xrns2Mod plugin that fiveofive mentioned but I found it a bit cumbersome and unpractical so I prefer to stick to classic trackers when I do a MOD or XM.
And it does not matter if any "big guy" don't use Renoise and prefer Ableton or another famous DAW. All those famous DAWs are famous just for the big marketing campaign that Renoise's authors will never do.
But, dammit, just try everything and then use whatever works for you.
Modern trackers like Renoise, Psycle or OpenMPT are good enough to compose, mix and master any musical project in general. Of any genre. Including orchestral if you wish, yes.
Especially Renoise. It doesn't have anything to envy of others DAWs.
I use Renoise to make the music of my demos and it fits my workflow very well. For intros, I stick to classic trackers like Protracker or Milkytracker. I tried the Xrns2Mod plugin that fiveofive mentioned but I found it a bit cumbersome and unpractical so I prefer to stick to classic trackers when I do a MOD or XM.
And it does not matter if any "big guy" don't use Renoise and prefer Ableton or another famous DAW. All those famous DAWs are famous just for the big marketing campaign that Renoise's authors will never do.
But, dammit, just try everything and then use whatever works for you.
rudi: cheaper versions of Ableton are often bundled with MIDI hardware. I got one with Alesis Q49 keyboard.
rutra80, the best music editing software will always be the one you are the most comfortable working with. Pick one, and get yourself deep into it (master it) and then you'll be satisfied with your music. The point you must reach is the point at which the editing software becomes largely irrelevant to your output (i.e. your music does not sound like the software's default soft spot)
There are prominent artists using almost __any__ of the software mentioned before. Don't fall into the trap of selecting according to that criteria..
There are prominent artists using almost __any__ of the software mentioned before. Don't fall into the trap of selecting according to that criteria..
renoise had and still has some "big" guys using it, if you regard "big" as a term for being popular or commercially successful at least.
"b-complex" for instance comes to mind. his track "beautiful lies" charted no.1 in the overall beatport charts for several weeks and its VIP mix has more than 4 mio. plays on YT.
he released (and probably still does) on hospital records and his tunes get played by nearly every major dj/producer known to drum&bass-mankind.
i could also mention christian vogel who released on tresor records and other famous labels and there certainly are more established artists we just don't know enough about, to mention them as a renoise user, because they don't promote it.
but what does that prove after all? that renoise is a software enabling your to write high quality music? we already knew that, because it outputs the same auidio quality as any other DAW of the modern world and supports the same industry standards like VST or rewire or whatever.
you could of course still argue that renoise doesn't feature modular DSP routing (like most DAW), sucks for multi-track recording or has no proper internal midi routing capabilities. it also sucks for working with long audio tracks (even though we have the auto-seek feature since quite a while, which helps, but still lacks the visualisation).
but seriously.. even though the "sucks" list could be continued for a while longer, i can promise you whatever has been written by the guys you mentioned, couild've been done in renoise with the same quality as well.
if you're looking for maximum quality just don't use most of the internal DSP FX.. then the only remaining limit is YOU!
"b-complex" for instance comes to mind. his track "beautiful lies" charted no.1 in the overall beatport charts for several weeks and its VIP mix has more than 4 mio. plays on YT.
he released (and probably still does) on hospital records and his tunes get played by nearly every major dj/producer known to drum&bass-mankind.
i could also mention christian vogel who released on tresor records and other famous labels and there certainly are more established artists we just don't know enough about, to mention them as a renoise user, because they don't promote it.
but what does that prove after all? that renoise is a software enabling your to write high quality music? we already knew that, because it outputs the same auidio quality as any other DAW of the modern world and supports the same industry standards like VST or rewire or whatever.
you could of course still argue that renoise doesn't feature modular DSP routing (like most DAW), sucks for multi-track recording or has no proper internal midi routing capabilities. it also sucks for working with long audio tracks (even though we have the auto-seek feature since quite a while, which helps, but still lacks the visualisation).
but seriously.. even though the "sucks" list could be continued for a while longer, i can promise you whatever has been written by the guys you mentioned, couild've been done in renoise with the same quality as well.
if you're looking for maximum quality just don't use most of the internal DSP FX.. then the only remaining limit is YOU!
As others said already, your best choice, being used to make music with a tracker, is Renoise for sure.
Get the Demoversion, watch/read some tutorials and start having fun!
There are plenty of Video-Tutorials on the official renoise.com-page aswell as inofficial ones on youtube.
The Tracker-part is straight-forward to what you are used to from Pro-/FastTracker.
The DAW-part works as good as in any other software.
I like posting this video to show people some actual workflow...you should be able to do stuff like this in a matter of a few days yourself, once you had a look into the tutorials! :)
How to make a Dubstep Wobble Bass in Renoise
Once you "mastered" Renoise you can ask yourself again, if this is how you want to make your music. I guess it will...and if not you can check other software, atleast you´ll have learned some general concepts already then.
If, you should consider buying Renoise, as its pretty cheap and the developers rule and deserve it!
You´ll get a whole Version-Number by doing so...meaning if you buy at version 3.4 for example, you paid for all versions up to 4.4. (Should be some 5-10 years until then)
Also you get access to Beta-Builds and your (ONLY!) restriction from the Demo-Version will be removed: Rendering to .wav! (Altho you can make the demoversion render to .wav easily by using some VST, just google it!)
Someone mentioned Renoise being the only way to go with 4klang...that´s not completely true ofcourse...pOWL and me started using it with MadTracker f.e. (so there ARE other DAW-Trackers!)
Get the Demoversion, watch/read some tutorials and start having fun!
There are plenty of Video-Tutorials on the official renoise.com-page aswell as inofficial ones on youtube.
The Tracker-part is straight-forward to what you are used to from Pro-/FastTracker.
The DAW-part works as good as in any other software.
I like posting this video to show people some actual workflow...you should be able to do stuff like this in a matter of a few days yourself, once you had a look into the tutorials! :)
How to make a Dubstep Wobble Bass in Renoise
Once you "mastered" Renoise you can ask yourself again, if this is how you want to make your music. I guess it will...and if not you can check other software, atleast you´ll have learned some general concepts already then.
If, you should consider buying Renoise, as its pretty cheap and the developers rule and deserve it!
You´ll get a whole Version-Number by doing so...meaning if you buy at version 3.4 for example, you paid for all versions up to 4.4. (Should be some 5-10 years until then)
Also you get access to Beta-Builds and your (ONLY!) restriction from the Demo-Version will be removed: Rendering to .wav! (Altho you can make the demoversion render to .wav easily by using some VST, just google it!)
Someone mentioned Renoise being the only way to go with 4klang...that´s not completely true ofcourse...pOWL and me started using it with MadTracker f.e. (so there ARE other DAW-Trackers!)
you may find inspiration from the recent Linux Audio Conference:
http://lac.linuxaudio.org/2014/program
"Radium: A Music Editor Inspired by the Music Tracker" might be worth pursuing. http://lac.linuxaudio.org/2014/video.php?id=16
http://lac.linuxaudio.org/2014/program
"Radium: A Music Editor Inspired by the Music Tracker" might be worth pursuing. http://lac.linuxaudio.org/2014/video.php?id=16
_-_-__: its broken for me, see bitwig (or cubase in some form) how it should be done (for me). But alas, I do tunes faster anyway without any clip stuff.
Looks like Buzé. Since OP worked with Psycle, he might be interested to check this one out as it is one of the few audio applications to support Psycle plugins (and Buzz ones too).
I use Reaper as main mixing/vst/midi daw (it's cheap and portable, so i just can have it on stick and use whenever i want to; generally it just rocks and have SO much important software features that marketing simply doesn't care about that you can't really compare anything else to it; if i had to chose one and only program that i can use i would choose it) and MPT for tracking.
I tried Renoise and despite it's a really good software to compose, what i didn't like about it is that it's too much tied to FT2 paradygm where i don't want that at all, and in the same time it tries to extend tracker abilities in the way i wouldn't really need.
OpenMPT suits my needs much better in that regard.
Plus, OpenMPT outputs surprisingly good and expected midi data, while Renoise exporting script apparently doesn't.
I don't compose much nowadays, mostly for my own multimedia projects and synth experiments. I've been using Cubase, Logic and Live in the past when i was composing more, but now i don't want to go back to that at all (Cubase/Logic are simply being fucked up by MBA and marketing guys, and Live is just too expensive, although I like its new features and built-in instruments).
I tried Renoise and despite it's a really good software to compose, what i didn't like about it is that it's too much tied to FT2 paradygm where i don't want that at all, and in the same time it tries to extend tracker abilities in the way i wouldn't really need.
OpenMPT suits my needs much better in that regard.
Plus, OpenMPT outputs surprisingly good and expected midi data, while Renoise exporting script apparently doesn't.
I don't compose much nowadays, mostly for my own multimedia projects and synth experiments. I've been using Cubase, Logic and Live in the past when i was composing more, but now i don't want to go back to that at all (Cubase/Logic are simply being fucked up by MBA and marketing guys, and Live is just too expensive, although I like its new features and built-in instruments).
As an ex-Renoise commercial and marketing dept. member (though they never really admitted I was working for them), I don't understand any of the critics I'm reading about Renoise. All I read it: It's great, but I dislike it.
Ok, here, we have it.
No really, this is full of shit; You should invest into a bunch of hardware gears before starting to make music… because if you want to follow some guys from Kewlers, that's what you have to do.
Man, you need help, but in an other department.
You want to make music? Use “something"; There's no best tool, it would probably take years before you get the level of some renoisers and maybe you'll give up before; That's just ridiculous to think that the best tool will ease your way; There's only one way to make great things: Work a lot; at nights, don't sleep.
Rest is wankery for people who are just afraid of starting something.
Quote:
Irvin, amusic, guys from MFX/Kewlers
Ok, here, we have it.
No really, this is full of shit; You should invest into a bunch of hardware gears before starting to make music… because if you want to follow some guys from Kewlers, that's what you have to do.
Man, you need help, but in an other department.
You want to make music? Use “something"; There's no best tool, it would probably take years before you get the level of some renoisers and maybe you'll give up before; That's just ridiculous to think that the best tool will ease your way; There's only one way to make great things: Work a lot; at nights, don't sleep.
Rest is wankery for people who are just afraid of starting something.
My opinion is the best.
word
Do you have to do it all in one single application. Try making a song in some really crappy sounding square wave chip thing, and think of the result as the essence of the composition. It's a song. Then you take that song and implement it with better sounds in a bigger DAW. Renoise or whatever.
Arkos Tracker is one of the best trackers for quickly making tunes. MilkyTracker is good as well, but you'll be tempted to mess around with samples, which will distract your focus from the song.
Arkos Tracker is one of the best trackers for quickly making tunes. MilkyTracker is good as well, but you'll be tempted to mess around with samples, which will distract your focus from the song.
TL;DR this thread: go top-down + "don't obsess over tools" + "just do it" (works for gfx/code too :)
Nah, use protracker, you'll do well.
What klaus303 said. Personally i find that different DAWs do different things well. But the output is the same. And most of all, nothing (besides alcohol and boobies) is more fun than tracking.
Fisk.
Fisk.
@xrs: hmmmm, you wouldn't say no to a big modular synths either, right?
I like big synths and I cannot lie.
@saga: for you https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AL0DVUN8iB4
Yes well… ahem, the thing with owning a modular synths is that you own a modular synth.
A modular synth owner is not necesarily a musician; And vice-versa.
I know a lot of synthesizer owners who just suck at making music but they are having fun trying to make music.
I own some hardware synths and I bet some people must think that it's useless because I'm not really much of a good musician but hey, it's my life.
But that's why I use renoise you see, because I don't want people to say I have modular synths AND I use complex DAW in order to achieve such low-end music.
A modular synth owner is not necesarily a musician; And vice-versa.
I know a lot of synthesizer owners who just suck at making music but they are having fun trying to make music.
I own some hardware synths and I bet some people must think that it's useless because I'm not really much of a good musician but hey, it's my life.
But that's why I use renoise you see, because I don't want people to say I have modular synths AND I use complex DAW in order to achieve such low-end music.