Reasonfreaks

Posts Tagged ‘review’

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Bass has always been such an important instrument in music that is often overlooked in amateur music production. Some people tend to think that just because it isn’t always as prominent or ‘in your face’ as a 6 string guitar for example, then it wouldn’t matter if its not 100% right. This is a huge misassumption as the bass guitar is as equally important as any other instrument (in some genres maybe more important). Most people tend to assume that because they cant hear the bass as much, probably die to poor speaker quality or production skills, then it doesn’t matter if it gets hidden in the mix, But this is the downfall of many producers.

The thing with Bass people need to keep in mind about bass guitars is that its one of the most soulful instruments out there, it requires a lot of human feeling, style and rhythm. These Factors get lost when using samples in most cases, as MIDI keyboards don’t usually offer this kind of versatility and control. However, this sample pack isn’t like any other bass pack out there.

Not only does it give you a number of different bass guitars (See bottom for list), but also its attention to detail will have producers kneeling before the guys at propellerhead. Each bass guitar sound provides the user with so just as much versatility as having an actual bass player in the room. The combinator patches provided allow you to not only choose the Bass guitar, but also gives you a choice of fingers or plectrum picked Bass guitars in some cases, a small but effective detail as both give a different sound. Each bass refill also has the same frequency controls you will find on the actual bass guitar dials, not to mention each refill contains individual finger slides or fret scratches that give the pack almost human characteristics. With these tiny but powerful differences from other packs, the samples here allow producers so much control you wont know what hit you. Read the rest of this entry »

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There is no question about it, Drums always sound better when recorded live by an actual player for that specific track. This however, is not always an option for most people as this would put a flashing red light on your bank account in most cases. This is why most people turn to Samples.

There are hundreds of drum refills out there, and don’t get me wrong, most of them are nothing short of impressive! Propellerhead however, take it to a whole new level, Giving you the next best thing to an actual drummer packed into one box!

Being a student of music technology I have had to deal with my fair share of frustration, trial and error, and in most cases, disappointment. All factors I have yet to experience with this pack. There has been nothing left to chance, the drums themselves work well in any genre and require very little EQ or alterations to adapt to your sound. With the impressive 58 unique drum kits you get in this pack it’s going to be virtually impossible to hit a production block. Read the rest of this entry »

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When the folks at Propellerhead Launched Record, Reason Users all over the world were blown away! Reason – With audio capabilities. Some may ask how do you expect to top that?

The answer with the release of Record 1.5 and Reason 5!

The addition of audio recording functions to Reason was a massive breakthrough in the way we use previously MIDI based program that we all love, so obviously the release of these upgrades was going to bring a lot of new features to the table. Now, lets have a look at what’s new in the way of Propellerheads music creation vision.

KONG Drum Designer.

Now if you’re a Propellerhead fan (no doubt, if your reading this then you are), You will know that Reason has always given us great ways to create and manipulate our drums, no matter if it’s a loop your slicing in the Rex player, or if it’s a custom beat your twisting in the ReDrum. Now, we have a new weapon to our beat arsenal. The KONG Drum designer.

Essentially, The KONG Drum designer is a virtual Drum machine and modulator, Making it not only a much more effective way of controlling drums, but a much more fun way of getting what you want out of them. The Pads them selves are completely customizable from the type of drum you assign to the pad, right down to what kind of sound you want them to give off. Now I know that Reason presented these kind of functions in both the Rex player and the Redrum, but this is just one of the features the KONG has to offer. Each pad come complete with a selection of built in effects and various modulation, such as compression, overdrive, tape echo and ring modulator to name a few. Having them built in and ready to go mean not only does it save you time having them pre loaded, but also it saves both the CPU power usage and hassle of not having so many Effect units chained to every different part of the kit. These are just some of the functions we have to play with, Reasons fantastic way of linking Synths and modulators mean that as a user you have full control over what unique kits you can construct. Read the rest of this entry »

Nucleus Soundlab’s release, ReCombination, takes Reason’s Combinator to a new height in a big way. Sound designers Adam Fielding, Ronald Hajewski, Shaun Wallace, Bill Chrapcynski, Nick Hutton, Ed Bauman, and Jeremy Janzen, each craft masterpiece after masterpiece in every patch they designed with extreme professional detail.

The release is available for purchase in 2 downloadable formats – ReFill, and Multi-Format (suitable for loading in a variety of non-Reason software and hardware samplers.), you can also purchase this release in a Multi-Format DVD as third option.

From the technical aspect of this release, ReCombination comes loaded with 200 Combinator patches, 183 NN-XT patches, 25 Malstrom patches, and 8 Subtractor patches. In addition each Combinator patch uses all 8 virtual controls giving you outstanding control over each patch, great for live and studio settings.

The Combinator breaks down into 11 folders: Atmo Sequences, Melodic Sequences, Percussive Sequences, Modulation Sequences, Bass, FX Atmo, Guitar and Plucked, Keyboard Splits, Keyboards and Polys, Leads, and Pads. The NN-XT breaks down into an jaw dropping 17 folders. The Malstrom and Subtractor each come with 1 folder a piece respectively.

This release is so massive in the sheer number of patches alone that I found myself picking and choosing my personal favorites from each device of the entire product down to the very folder. It’s a bit of a cliche to hear sometimes, but there really were so many great patches that it was hard to pick just one! Since there were so many great patches I’ve decided to list my top 2 favorite patches from each folder in the Combinator as this is the powerhouse of this release. Read the rest of this entry »

Luscious Grooves is a sample collection containing only beats. But what a beat! You will find beats going from 80 to 135 Bpm. The grooves are of a very high quality, with everything being in 24 Bit/ 44.1 Khz. The grooves themselves are very musical and smooth sounding. You can really hear that much care has been spend to make them sound as good as possible, with high quality gear used to produce the sounds. The package of the collection deserves a note. This must be the best looking package i have seen for a sample CD ever. Nifty 3D design with a booklet explaining the sounds and how to use the collection, all has been taken care of so that’s a 10 for presentation.

The collection comes as a 3 CD set where each CD is in a different format. You’ll find a CD containing Wav files, a CD containing a Reason ReFill and an audio CD. So whatever sampler you are using, the collection will be accessable.

The only issue i have with the collection is that i would have liked to have more of it. But that’s more a complement than it is an issue because there are a lot of grooves in there. Many genre’s have been included going from HipHop to TripHop, House, Disco and Electro. All grooves sound very authentic and no fillers have been added. £59.99 isn’t cheap for a sample CD but i do think this collection is worth the money. High quality beats being very musical and usable.

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Homepage: http://www.samplelab.com