i have been interesting in making beats for quite a couple years now off and on. i have always kept it strictly inside the machine and use hardware and ONLY hardware when sampling and making beats and only used audacity for its simplicity to render my stuff on mp3. i see a lot of cats making dope stuff on software and want to do the same but i always say to myself that it wouldnt be an "sp beat" and i make sp beats.

id like to know am i being bias with this whole situation? i mean i hear all this talk about not using computers when making beats 'cause its not natural and feels like your just browsing the net instead of making stuff but thing is i dont really know what its like making stuff on computer. i used to think to myself 'hardware is hardcore' but wouldn't that hinder my evolution/progress making music if i dont give software a chance? would i be missing out too much if i dont use software?

well, listen. i'm not some musical genius. i make beats, i make other stuff too.

IMO - yes, you are limiting yrself. but not just by the hardware / software divide, but simply in yr thinking that some things out of bounds in yr artistic or creative process. it's not like 'anyfing goes' or whatevs (tho i don't disagree w/ that), but more that you WANT to experiment w/ software, but don't. you should, cuz you wanna.

at the end of the day, a very VERY few select dudes are gonna care whether yr beats were made entirely on hardware. or just SPs. or only from vinyl. or only from original pressings and not reissues, etc. etc. i mean, learn from what others have done in this tradition, but don't feel handcuffed by it.

i don't find software fun, but that's me. i used to. you should try it out, you may like it. and listen to yr gut rather than what you fink peeps may think if you stray from the Noble Path of Hardware Shaolin.

my thots, cantfind. peace.

"learn from what others have done in this tradition, but don't feel handcuffed by it. "

=Agreed

Don't limit yourself to one or the other. If you find that something works well, use it in any combination that gets the job done. That was the philosophy that created this movement and its the one that keeps it alive. Blind adherance to traditions just results in duplication. explore your instuments and how they interact...synergy is the magic that keeps us in this music to begin with.

right on fauna and lodger. youre right i guess i wouldnt know what id be missing out on if i dont at least give it a try.

i may have misinterpreted all the discussions on hardware vs software debates because cats that switched to hardware came from having past DAW experiences and i dont really have that. i went straight the hardware route without really knowing what the other path is even like.

this shit cracked me up - I pictured some douchebag acting like that would have any bearing but there are plenty of purist douchebags out there. acting you like can't make hip hop unless you been collecting records since '88. I sample only vinyl but some cats can be so corny with shit like that.

in response to the original thread topic, I don't like software b/c I prefer to get away from the comp when making music but recently I been stepping up my output so much that the little limitations that come along with using only boxes are starting to nag ever so slightly...I have been thinking about getting a hacked copy of Ableton if possible to test out using a midi control based set up. if you don't mind playing keys instead of pads I don't really see the diff besides personal preferences. drawing beats out in software now that is wack imo you should be playing something at some point.

also theres something to be said about watching someone perform live using just a laptop and nothing else. for all you know they could just be playing something off itunes and is just up there googling nodding their head to music.

I started out producing music with software and then got my SP after a few years cause I felt that my tunes sounded way too generic and I needed a different approach.

If you think about using software but fear that it's not as solid as your hardware setup, you could always try using the software in your favour. Like using some effects and then sample that stuff back into your SP or sample some (vst)-instruments. Or you could get yourself a MIDI controller like the MPD and involve that into your setup besides your SP. So you could still have your SP dominate the whole thing, everything depends on how you use it and there's a million ways to do so.

Just use what you wanna use.. if you like using hardware, it doesn't matter what the reason is

yea man I think there is a big misconception about making beats "on the SP" many of the o.g. heads around here do that but I have built with several SP heads that basically make their beats in software using MIDI control and then run it thru the SPs to get the sound and to be honest people don't really know the difference. All that matters is if it's hot, right?

a lot of the software companies have demos-just give a bunch of them a try. You will know pretty quickly if you want to work with one of them or not.

if you use software...make sure you have a controller. play the beat with the controller, pads, keys etc.. dont draw that shit in with a mouse and keyboard, you will get fat and unskilled. There's lots of 'demo' software to try out on da interwebzz
Maybe sample what you want out of your computer into your SP.
Feel good about combining your 'limited' box with your 'limited computer box'....

then get old and buy some physical instruments, like a drum kit and UP yourself.

word. i think im gonna check out some demos as suggested and see whats up. ill use them for the features lacking in the sp (pitch timestretch etc.) cause i dont wanna keep reading manuals after manuals after manuals i already dont have enough time at it is i rather just make something already. id probably just try baking my samples though it haha.

Ha! That's some zen bias right there.

It seems like over the past few years software manufactures have clicked on to the whole soft vs hard debate. For instrance- all those dedicated Ableton controllers, Native Instruments dropping the Maschine, Reason 5 including an MPC style 16 pad drum machine...

Roland even made that (shit-house) version of Cakewalk for the SP-606 and those old steam powered Atari computers came with midi ports & free tracker programs, right? This shit's been evolving for years.

I'm no soothsayer or tea leaf reader, but it looks like this debate will be voided by pretty much everything being integrated over time. Even SP-303 users.

Great thread too!

not all the time, but quite often demos will not work period.

anyways, I've been trying out using a computer with a hardware sequencer.

right now I am testing soft-synths with a controller, I may not end up using this setup at all, and I have run into the following problems:
1. sound quality/latency: impossible to get a good balance on one synth, sounds not so good and slow... sound not so good anyways, now trying another softsynth
2. stability: with two usb devices (controller and midi interface) you might need another program to put those two together at the input of the host (if it doesn't have some kind of feature to do this). The host, the vst and other programs have to be stable.

I've had problems with one of the vsts not remembering the midi settings, I hope to overcome those, but I've already spent many hours, of those much more time setting up (the system settings on the computer, the programs, the vsts, and also the midi controller- and I never use more than one vst at a time) then actually playing, and it is not very stable, especially when you plug in/unplug stuff in the usb ports you may have to check all the settings again in all the places mentioned above, and you may have to restart certain programs or the computer, once I had to reinstall a program after trying out some crap sound drivers which didn't work.

As for software sample players, I've only briefly tried the following (and not extensively):
Loopazoid (windows and mac os 9): you can lay out a bunch of samples and set midi and so on. Pretty cool, needs a host (savihost on pc is o.k.)

TsampX (mac os X): lay out 16 samples, assign midi numbers, etc. Pretty cool, not super stable.

Soundplant (windows and mac): I haven't launched it enough times to see what really happens when the trial expires, but the pitching on this is insane! Great for starting samples from the keyboard too. Supposedly can use midi with Bome's Midi Translator (untried).

???