How powerful is NI’s Maschine for production?
Do any pro’s use it for production? Want to get into producing House and was lookin at Logic and Ableton but I like the hardware/software combo of Maschine but will I eventually “grow out of it” to more professional software, or is Maschine able to stand toe to toe with the the big guys?
I use Maschine together with Ableton and Pro Tools.
Steve lawler uses it and has a sound pack. Most people tend to use it in combo with another daw so you can have the best of both worlds.
I use it in conjunction with Ableton, it’s quite a powerful combo. If you are after the hardware/software integration you might just wait until Ableton 9 and Push are released and we get some reviews on them.
Couldn’t have said it better. I LOVE my Maschine & I use it in conjunction as well with Ableton. I build all the drums, bass’s, and some of the pads too all in Maschine and then export it to Ableton. I highly recommend it, IF you can take the time out to learn it. A lot of people buy it and it just sits on their shelves cause they haven’t taken the time out to learn it and figure out how to use it.
Hands down one of my favorite pieces of kit that I use, if not my favorite.
Ok so forgive my confusion as I’m new to producing, but if Maschine is better in conjunction with another DAW then is it basically useless alone? Is that’s how it’s marketed, as a piece of gear and software that is best when used with another DAW?
So Maschine isn’t a DAW? What’s the difference between something like Logic and Maschine’s software?
Maschine isn’t even close to useless on its own. It’s an amazing hardware and software combo, its just that most people are familiar with other daws and certain things can be done easier in a daw of preference. Arrangement and limitless effects are the two things that come to mind. With that said I still think maschine is the best production purchase I’ve ever made
Not being able to sidechain inside Maschine is it’s biggest drawback for me. I’m talking about sidechaining not only to the kick of a track but more traditional sidechaining such as linking something to an instrument or vocal. The pumping effect can be achieved partially with the filter’s LFO and the right settings.
You could use Maschine alone and there are tons of projects that come with the software/hardware that show how to use it. I think if you are producing house you might find it better with something else.
Things I love about the Maschine 1.8
VST ability, and each VST having most of the knob controls available to tweak with easy, and just pushing the page to scroll through all the options.
This makes things so much more hands on.
I also love the ability to master and slave sounds, this works great for starting out with a layer of kicks and then resampling them or just dragging and dropping the wave into a DAW.
I personally will open up maschine by itself sample stuff, make kits, build drums, and basses especially with Massive, which comes free with 1.8 and is amazing! Add this to say Komplete 8 if you want to fork it out, and you have a powerful groove box, with FM8, Absynth, Massive, Abbey Roads, and tons of other VST’s (Wih I had Komplete 8)
That being said I do find myself using Maschine as a VST in Ableton, though with Ableton it is limited with what you can do with the control template or one you find or create. I tend to do a lot of mouse chopping and stuff with Ableton wish I could do a lot more with Maschine inside Ableton. I know you can route midi, and audio. But at the end of the day I like to see the wave forms all arranged.
I think what works best for me is bringing Maschine in as a VST building my sounds as much as I can in there, with effects and all, then dragging and dropping into ableton to arrange and tweak more.
This being said you can also use Maschine to control ableton in live situations, and bounce back and forth with ableton and Maschine. All in all I think Maschine is one of my favorite tools to use, and I hope it only gets better.
Maschine is incredibly powerful on its own.
I think it falls short on exactly 2 counts from being a full-fledged DAW.
there’s no good way to record vocals (or other long, non-repetitive segments) independent of scenes. Pickup notes, tails, etc. just don’t work well with the way it works.
it’s mixer sucks compared to those in a real DAW (Ableton, Logic, Pro Tools, etc.) or any actual hardware studio console.
Both of those problems are easily solvable by using it in conjunction with other gear.
But if you’re not recording vocals and you’re willing to do things the NI way (and use guitar rig to host your channel strips, which means being limited to NI’s plugins for guitar rig) and not have any half decent level meters, it’s perfectly possible to make a track from start to finish in Maschine, though it would be pretty taxing on your computer.
That being said, NI’s Solid Mix Series and Vintage Compressors, combined with some of the other effects available for Guitar Rig……are pretty good. I don’t use them, because I don’t like working that way……but not because it isn’t possible.
In short, Maschine is an awesome replacement for an MPC and synthesizers. It’s not a replacement for a console and a multitrack tape machine………if that makes any sense to you.
Well said, the volumes especially on Maschine drive me crazy sometimes. I’ve also noticed that vocals have a hard time staying in time for anything longer than a few bars also, even with the time stretch feature.
Which is why people use it with something else. Make the beat in Maschine, record vocals or whatever else in something else. But you don’t need that to start off.
All expansions are 50% off, nice!! Really wanted to buy that Steve Lawler’s, now it’s the time
http://www.native-instruments.com/#/en/products/?category=1773&search=maschineexpansion&page=1773
Yeah…I’m probably going to pick up the ones I’m missing. I’m a bit hesitant for the dubstep one, though.
I’m going to get that dupstep one 
an pop artist I’m working with wants a Dubstep remix of one of his songs I’ve already made a Club(house) version of his song.
And I also use Ableton for all long parts and Maschine for beats, bass and pads, for remixes. using Reason to make whole songs and maschine as a drum pad for that too.
I make mostly house techno and electronica what pack/s would you recommend?
do mostly house and electro house, but the drop squad expansion is bad ass! first one with massive presents, and some pretty good ones too
NI is giving 25€ voucher for the holiday. I’m thinking getting the Raw Voltage expansion. Do anybody have it already? I have the Dark Pressure for the techno tech-house and I think Raw Voltage is suitable for it also
Raw voltage is really good lots of tough analogue sounds
that was fast thank you 