Slow_Hand (u/Slow_Hand)

Slow_Hand commented on Native Instruments enters into insolvency proceedings engadget.com/audio/native... · Posted by u/elevaet

alsetmusic · 13 days ago

Holy shit. I've been on the NI Komplete train for over a decade. They make some very important plugins that I've long thought of as stable and existing forever. Forever-plugins, if you will.

Related, I suppose this is why they needed a third-party to revamp Absynth.

This is a dark day for plugin junkies. It really makes me nervous about the rest of the industry because NI had all the appearances of a successful company. I mean, they weren't updating Battery for a really long time, but I always assumed something would eventually happen with it. Maybe the Absynth reveal was a much grimmer peak into their operation than I'd like it to be.

Slow_Hand · 13 days ago

> I suppose this is why they needed a third-party to revamp Absynth.

What third party? Do you mean Brian Clevinger, Absynth's original designer?

Slow_Hand commented on Linux DAW: Help Linux musicians to quickly and easily find the tools they need linuxdaw.org/... · Posted by u/prmoustache

mjr00 · a month ago

> For example, the EQ on any SSL channel strip is a nightmare because they slavishly stick with a skeumorphic design of the original hardware.

True though I would put this very much in the "feature, not a bug" bucket. These tools are for people who have worked with the original hardware and want a very faithful emulation, including the look and feel. In the digital world with a modern PC there's not much purpose of a channel strip plugin in the first place, so the only people using one are doing so with intention.

It's a bit like saying that manual transmission cars could be controlled more easily if they were automatic transmission; it's completely true, but if you're buying a manual you want that experience.

Pro-Q is a great example of a digital-first tool (the automatic transmission equivalent), with lots of great visual feedback and a lot of thought put into a mouse+kb workflow. All of Fabfilter's stuff is like this actually, though sometimes to its detriment; the Fabfilter automation and LFO system feels very different from basically every other plugin. It's actually a more efficient workflow when you get used to it, but due to how different it is from everything else most people I talk to dislike it unless they've really bought into the Fabfilter suite.

Which kind of goes back to the original point: VSTs use knobs because it's what people are used to, and using something different might be a negative even if it's better!

Slow_Hand · a month ago

I agree that the SSL channel strip GUI is deliberate because users want something that operates like the hardware. However, I would love the option to grab the freq knob and have it work like an x/y slider for freq/gain.

Sure it mismatches the GUI, but it gives users the option when they don't want to do a click/drag for freq, then gain, then freq, then gain, then Q. You know?

That tediousness is what keeps me from using the SSL channel strip altogether.

Re: channel strip plugins: The advantage to using them in DAWs is speed and economy. Having everything in one window (ala the Scheps Omni Channel) saves me a lot of clicks vs. when I have multiple plugins in different slots.

I do absolutely everything in the box with a laptop keyboard and track pad. My primary motive is being quick and precise, and the less plugin window management I have to do the better. The channel strip keeps the tools compact and my movements minimal.

Slow_Hand commented on Linux DAW: Help Linux musicians to quickly and easily find the tools they need linuxdaw.org/... · Posted by u/prmoustache

cpuguy83 · a month ago

Just an fyi to anyone making or thinking of making one of these:

Turning a knob with a mouse is the worst interface I can think of. I don't know why audio apps/DAWs fall so hard on skeuomorphism here when the interface just doesn't make sense in the context.

Slow_Hand · a month ago

I use knobs everyday in my audio tools (with my track pad) and they're perfectly fine as long as they have three features:

1. Drag up/down to change value. 2. A modifier key to slow the drag for finer resolution changes when dragging. 3. The ability to double-click the knob and type in precise values when I know exactly what I want.

The problem with knobs on a GUI is when designers stay with them when there is a faster option. Like an opportunity to combine three knobs.

For example, the EQ on any SSL channel strip is a nightmare because they slavishly stick with a skeumorphic design of the original hardware. The hardware required mixers to use two hands to adjust gain and frequency at the same time, and then dial in Q on a third knob. Very tedious when you have a mouse.

When this is done right, you get something like FabFilter's Pro-Q graphic EQ. The gain and frequency controls are instead an X/Y slider that you can easily drag across a representation of the frequency spectrum. In addition you can use a modifier key to narrow/widen your Q. All with a single click and drag of your band.

Slow_Hand commented on Programming languages used for music timthompson.com/plum/cgi/... · Posted by u/ofalkaed

dr-smooth · 2 months ago

you can use Javascript with Max. It's a bit unwielding in its handling of multi-JS-file projects, but it can be done.

Not everything in Max is exposed to your code, but you really can do a lot from the JS side of things.

Slow_Hand · 2 months ago

I had no idea! And I'm learning Javascript, so that's a nice coincidence.

I was deep into Max/MSP around 2010 and made a personal vow to leave it alone. The potential to reinvent the wheel and build tools instead of completing records was too much.

Now I'm in a more mature place, so I could see myself diving back into it eventually.

Slow_Hand commented on Programming languages used for music timthompson.com/plum/cgi/... · Posted by u/ofalkaed

fnordlord · 2 months ago

I really hope that Max becomes fully accessible in a text based format one day. It's so cool and I've spent a few months randomly through the years building neat plugins for Ableton but, for me, it would be so much stickier if it was code. Especially now with AI assistance, Claude can still be helpful but it hallucinates a lot harder when trying to describe visual code.

Slow_Hand · 2 months ago

Would love to see this, as someone who has been heavily using Live since 2006 and is finally getting into proper coding in middle-age. Having a way to augment Live in a text-based coding format would be greatly welcome.

While I'm not holding my breath, Ableton the company are transitioning into a steward-ownership model in which the stewards will have decision rights over the company. So I have hope that it will continue to grow in ways that are less affected by market considerations and that are a little more opinionated and specialized. Not to mention that Ableton own Cycling 74 (creators of Max/MSP).

So it's not out of the realm of possibility.

Slow_Hand commented on Backing up Spotify annas-archive.li/blog/bac... · Posted by u/vitplister

Slow_Hand · 2 months ago

While I wouldn't call this scummy I do agree with your sentiment. It is technically stealing and those copyrights should be respected.

Full disclosure, I am a career musician AND have been known to pirate material. That said, I think this is a valuable archive to build. There are a lot of recordings that will not endure without some kind of archiving. So while it's not a perfect solution, I do think it has an important role to play in preservation for future generations.

Perhaps it's best to have a light barrier to entry. Something like "Yes, you can listen to these records, but it should be in the spirit of requesting the material for review, and not just as a no-pay alternative to listening on Spotify." Give it just enough friction where people would rather pay the $12/month to use a streaming service.

Also, it's not like streaming services are a lucrative source of income for most artists. I expect the small amount of revenue lost to listeners of Anna's Archive are just (fractions of) a penny in the bucket of any income that a serious artist would stand to make.

Slow_Hand commented on How to Synthesize a House Loop loopmaster.xyz/tutorials/... · Posted by u/stagas

OisinMoran · 2 months ago

For a great example of some (non-live) coded music, I would recommend The Haywire Frontier by Nathan Ho [0]. The whole album was sequenced and synthesized entirely in SuperCollider with no samples, external hardware, or third-party plugins. It's really interesting and a crazy achievement, definitely worth a listen.

For live coding, Switch Angel is definitely someone I would actually go to see live, check out this video of hers [1].

[0] https://nathanho.bandcamp.com/album/haywire-frontier [1] https://youtu.be/iu5rnQkfO6M

Slow_Hand · 2 months ago

This Nathan Ho album is a good example. Thanks for sharing.

Slow_Hand commented on How to Synthesize a House Loop loopmaster.xyz/tutorials/... · Posted by u/stagas

rbn3 · 2 months ago

> So it definitely isn't leveraging GHC's typechecker for your compositions. Is the TidalCycles runtime doing some kind of runtime typechecking on whatever it parses from these strings?

the runtime is GHC (well GHCi actually). tidal's type system (and thus GHC's typechecker) ensures that only computationally valid pattern transformations can be composed together. if you're interested in the type system here's a good overview from a programmer's perspective https://www.imn.htwk-leipzig.de/~waldmann/etc/untutorial/tc/...

these strings are a special case, they're formatted in "mini-notation" which is parsed into composed functions at runtime. a very expressive kind of syntactic sugar you could say. while they're the most immediately obvious feature of Tidal (and have since been adapted in numerous other livecoding languages), mini-notation is really just the tip of the iceberg.

>The whole paradigm is going to encourage a very specific style of composition where repeating structures and their variations are the primary organizational principle.

but that applies to virtually all music, from bach to coltrane to the beatles! my point is that despite what the average livecoder might stream/perform online, live coding languages are certainly not restricted to or even particularly geared towards repetitive dance music - it just happens that that's a common denominator of the kind of demographic who's interested in livecoding music in the first place.

i'd argue that (assuming sufficient knowledge of the underlying theory) composing a fugue in the style of bach is much easier in tidal than in a DAW or other music software. on the more experimental end, a composition in which no measure ever repeats fully is trivial to realize in tidalcycles - it takes only a handful of lines of code to build up a stochastic composition based on markov chains, perlin noise and conditional pattern transformations. via the latter you can actually sculpt these generative processes into something that sounds intentional and follows some inner logic rather than just being random.

the text-based interface makes it much easier to use than anything GUI-based. it's all just pure functions that you can compose together, you could almost say that Tidal is like a musical equivalent of shell programs and pipes. equally useful and expressive both for a 10 year old and a CS professor.

>I think Pandoc or Shellcheck would win on this metric.

touché!

Slow_Hand · 2 months ago

> i'd argue that ... composing a fugue in the style of bach is much easier in tidal than in a DAW or other music software. on the more experimental end, a composition in which no measure ever repeats fully is trivial to realize in tidalcycles - it takes only a handful of lines of code to build up a stochastic composition based on markov chains, perlin noise and conditional pattern transformations. via the latter you can actually sculpt these generative processes into something that sounds intentional and follows some inner logic rather than just being random.

I agree that it's easier to build a composition in a coding environment that uses stochastic models, markov chains, noise, conditions, etc. But I don't think that actually makes for compelling music. It can render a rough facsimile of the structure, but the result is uncanny. The magic is still in the tiny choices and long arc of the composition. Leaving it to randomness is not sufficient.

Bach's style of composition _is_ broadly algorithmic. So much so that his style is taught in conservatories as the foundational rules of Western multi-voice writing, but it's still not a perfect machine. Taste and judgment have to be exercised at key moments in the composition on a micro level. You can intellectually understand florid counterpoint on a rules-based level, but you still have to listen to what's being written to decide if it's musically compelling or if it needs to be revised.

The proof is in the pudding. If coded music were that good, we would be able to list composers who work in this manner. We might even have charting music. But we don't, and the best work is still being done with instruments in hand, or written on a staff, or sequenced in a DAW.

I want this paradigm to work - and perhaps it can - but I've yet to hear work that lives up to the promise.

Slow_Hand commented on How to Synthesize a House Loop loopmaster.xyz/tutorials/... · Posted by u/stagas

bitwize · 2 months ago

My wife's (and many other music-lovers') test for whether something counts as "real music" is whether they can perform it live (and sound as good as the recording). Music which is programmed doesn't count, as there's a lot of nuance that a skilled musician with an actual instrument can put into a performance in a split-second as they play.

Slow_Hand · 2 months ago

The nuance of a skilled player in the moment is a beautiful thing to behold, but saying programmed music isn't "real music" is like saying that film acting isn't real acting, but theater acting is.

It's like saying a novel isn't real speaking, but a speech is.

Like animating an image isn't real, but recording a video is.

If that's your preference, then that's alright. But it's a silly distinction to make.

Slow_Hand commented on How to Synthesize a House Loop loopmaster.xyz/tutorials/... · Posted by u/stagas

fasterik · 2 months ago

Procedural generation can be useful for finding new musical ideas. It's also essential in specific genres like ambient and experimental music, where the whole point is to break out of the traditional structures of rhythm and melody. Imagine using cellular automata or physics simulations to trigger notes, key changes, etc. Turing completeness means there are no limits on what you can generate. Some DAWs and VSTs give you a Turing complete environment, e.g. Bitwig's grid or Max/MSP. But for someone with a programming background those kinds of visual editors are less intuitive and less productive than writing code.

Of course, often creativity comes from limitations. I would agree that it's usually not desirable to go full procedural generation, especially when you want to wrangle something into the structure of a song. I think the best approach is a hybrid one, where procedural generation is used to generate certain ideas and sounds, and then those are brought into a more traditional DAW-like environment.

Slow_Hand · 2 months ago

I've actually tried all of the approaches that you've mentioned over the years, and - for my needs - they're not that compelling at the end of the day.

Sure it might be cool to use cellular automata to generate rhythms, or pick notes from a diatonic scale, or modulate signals, but without a rhyme or reason or _very_ tight constraints the music - more often than not - ends up feeling unfocused and meandering.

These methods may be able to generate a bar or two of compelling material, but it's hard to write long musical "sentences" or "paragraphs" that have an arc and intention to them. Or where the individual voices are complementing and supporting one another as they drive towards a common effect.

A great deal of compelling music comes from riding the tightrope between repetition and surprising deviations from that scheme. This quality is (for now) very hard to formalize with rules or algorithms. It's a largely intuitive process and is a big part of being a compelling writer.

I think the most effective music comes from the composer having a clear idea of where they are going musically and then using the tools to supplement that vision. Not allowing them to generate and steer for you.

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As an aside, I watch a lot of Youtube tutorials in which electronic music producers create elaborate modulation sources or Max patches that generate rhythms and melodies for them. A recurring theme in many of these videos is an approach of "let's throw everything at the wall, generate a lot of unfocused material, and then winnow it down and edit it into something cool!" This feels fundamentally backwards to me. I understand why it's exciting and cool when you're starting out, but I think the best music still comes from having a strong grasp of the musical fundamentals, a big imagination, and the technical ability to render it with your tools and instruments.

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To your final point, I think the best example of this hybrid generative approach you're describing are Autechre. They're really out on the cutting edge and carving their own path. Their music is probably quite alienating because it largely forsakes melody and harmony. Instead it's all rhythm and timbre. I think they're a positive example of what generative music could be. They're controlling parameters on the macro level. They're not dictating every note. Instead they appear to be wrangling and modulating probabilities in a very active way. It's exciting stuff.