Wanting to begin Music Production, how/what to get to start?

[mostapha]

Yeah…if you think better with a keyboard than a mouse, anything is better than nothing. I just wish the crap cost less.

[squidot]

definitely check craigslist for gear everyday. i ended up getting a pristine mpk49, with the box and everything for $120. i was considering that or an axiom for my price point at the time but that deal was just too good to pass up.

mostapha: i just picked up maschine last weekend myself and am really liking it so far. it's a bit tricky for me to learn but i've been following the NI tutorials which are helping and for the first time i feel like i've actually made a decent beat that i can groove to. once i get past all the beginner stuff i would love to be able to ask you some questions if i can't figure things out...that is if you don't mind. you always seem to have some great input and ideas on most things around here.

[mostapha]

Yeah…just PM me or start a thread. I'm loving Maschine, despite it's shortcomings.

NI's videos are okay, but really…the manual is decent.

[squidot]

awesome thanks man! i have been following the 30 part tutorial series since it gets you hands on pretty quickly, then i fall back on the manual if i need something specific i can think of to add in. it seems to be working for me so far.

do you mind if i ask how you use your maschine in combo with pro tools? do you think that a song could be made completely within maschine and not need any other work for it to sound professional? i also have ableton so i could use that in combo as well.

[Luuk]

You should learn the program to see if you enjoy producing music before you go and dish out money on something that you may hate and not be very good at.

[botstein]

awesome thanks man! i have been following the 30 part tutorial series since it gets you hands on pretty quickly, then i fall back on the manual if i need something specific i can think of to add in. it seems to be working for me so far.

do you mind if i ask how you use your maschine in combo with pro tools? do you think that a song could be made completely within maschine and not need any other work for it to sound professional? i also have ableton so i could use that in combo as well.

I use Maschine in combination with Ableton all the time. I posted about my favourite way to do so here: http://forum.djtechtools.com/showthread.php?t=48092

Remember that you can drag audio / MIDI out of the standalone application or use the Maschine VST in Ableton or Pro Tools.

[Johnv]

@ OP: do you have any knowledge of music theory?. If you don't you'll want to start there. Otherwise you'll be trying to build a bridge without any prior knowledge in engineering.

[botstein]

@ OP: do you have any knowledge of music theory?. If you don't you'll want to start there. Otherwise you'll be trying to build a bridge without any prior knowledge in engineering.

Yes! Music theory all the way.

[mostapha]

awesome thanks man! i have been following the 30 part tutorial series since it gets you hands on pretty quickly, then i fall back on the manual if i need something specific i can think of to add in. it seems to be working for me so far.

30 part what now?

do you mind if i ask how you use your maschine in combo with pro tools? do you think that a song could be made completely within maschine and not need any other work for it to sound professional? i also have ableton so i could use that in combo as well.

Yeah. I just prefer mixing in pro tools.

I've done scratch mixes with Maschine, and I keep things sorts pre-mixed while I'm adding parts anyway. It is possible to finish a track and mix it in Maschine. Depending on how you think and how you (eventually) like to work, it's not ideal. There are serious limitations, mostly due to how weird routing is, how limited group mixes are, how there are only 4 effects slots per sound/group/master, and how it does (or rather doesn't do) song-level automation.

It has serious shortcomings that make it a lot harder to get a good mix, mostly the complete lack of level meters. But if you wanted to, you could get a lot closer with Maschine than with anything else that works like a groove box.

How I usually work is to do the "tracking" through maschine. I use its sequencer (for patterns and full songs) for basically everything including most automation and some basic effects. Then, I just bounce stems from Maschine to audio files on disk…import them to Pro Tools and do the editing and mixing.

I find that works the best. A few effects (things integral to the sounds and some basic EQing and some preamp/eq emulation stuff) get printed onto the audio. PT has a nifty feature to normalize sounds to specific peak or RMS levels……plus clip based gain.

There are a lot of ways to work, and I think that works best for me……it separates the mixing and writing processes. Mine is neither the only nor necessarily the best. But I'd be happy to answer questions if you have them.

@ OP: do you have any knowledge of music theory?. If you don't you'll want to start there. Otherwise you'll be trying to build a bridge without any prior knowledge in engineering.

There are a lot of things to learn. I say jump in head first and get to the point where you're having fun……then start focusing on your shortcomings.

[Ugadeee]

Johnv, yes I know about music theory,
I have taken piano for about 6 years, and I have taken two levels of music theory with RCM