Sonar's included loops

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gl_keyboard_kid
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2014/10/19 19:39:02 (permalink)
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Sonar's included loops

So I use Sonar X2 software, and overall I am happy with it. But why must every single included loop and sample be impractical? Would it have killed them to include a simple "boots and cats" type drumbeat, or a clean, 12-bar rock'n'roll bassline? Instead, everything sounds like an audio representation of one of those inflatable hot-dog men with large arms that flail about in front of car dealerships. NOBODY in any mainstream genre of music plays like these loops.
Does Cakewalk realize that not all people play the style that the people in Roland demo videos play (90's electric piano, funk, R&B hipster groove type stuff)? It would seem not.
 
My suggestion is include samples that are simple, elegant, and sound like they could be a part of something that was on the top 40 at one time in history. Using loops should save me time; if they don't, why bother with them in the first place? I don't want to have to create my own instrument loops, because I want to play and record keyboard sounds exclusively.
 
I want to create music like I hear on the radio. It's what people pay to hear! Am I alone in this?
#1

6 Replies Related Threads

    panup
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    Re: Sonar's included loops 2014/10/20 10:27:02 (permalink)
    +2 (2)
    I agree with every word you wrote.
    I have found practically no use for the bundled loops because they are too "genre specific".
    #2
    AT
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    Re: Sonar's included loops 2014/10/20 13:06:03 (permalink)
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    Good stuff in beatscape - you can load the library.
     
    Part of the problem is (that except for beatscape) many of the loops and sounds are from 2005 and came w/ all Cake DAWs.  I think there might have been some P5 only loops, but that was only a few years later.
     
    Here's another vote for some updated loops.  Maybe we should volunteer to make some.
     
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    #3
    Soundblend
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    Re: Sonar's included loops 2014/10/20 14:13:06 (permalink)
    +4 (4)
    Who need loops, i would manage quite well without
    and the bonus is a less size Sonar to download

    Drop all loops and demo content
    make it as an additional download if anyone need it. 
    #4
    gl_keyboard_kid
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    Re: Sonar's included loops 2014/10/20 15:58:22 (permalink)
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    I'm not sure if you all are familiar with Yamaha keyboards, but their more basic models usually have preset beats that are ridiculously easy to use, they can be assigned chords, and they really liven up a performance. "Styles" they call them; I'd really like to see something like that in Cakewalk (and Roland keyboards too, instead of their "session partner", but that's another forum entirely.)
     
    The way I see it working is that you could select a beat from a category, specify the tempo, specify chords (if you want them), select a bassline/rhythm guitar/whatever sort of loop, and then drag and drop fills and frills where you like, using recommended ones for that particular beat/chord progression/category, or inserting your own. A button to make it loop "x" amount of times would be great also, as many of the included loops are 4-16 bars long, and copy-pasting them takes a while.
    #5
    TomHelvey
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    Re: Sonar's included loops 2014/10/22 02:33:59 (permalink)
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    Loops in general have a lifetime of a couple years at best. Usually by the time they get distributed in a DAW release they're already out of date. It doesn't make a lot of sense for a DAW vendor to distribute a bunch of EDM loops unless they intend to keep up with the state of the art. For songwriters, it's nice to have some basic beats to cover a few broad ranges of genres without a lot of complexity for styles like country, rock, blues, jazz, funk, etc as mentioned by the OP. Most of the time, people will go to third party vendors when they need something more than that. Vengeance pretty much has the EDM thing covered. That being said, the one shot stuff is pretty tweakable by slicing, combining, and filtering. I would love to see more one shots and samples that sound good when imported into wavetables.
    Avid dropped their loop distro with 11 but Ableton is still going strong. I think it depends on where the DAW vendors focus is. If loops are a single drop and don't get updated for every release, it's probably better to do the basics well.
    All of that being said, I would still prefer to see the loop distro in Sonar survive. The true value of loops is not what you get when you play them back in the browser, it's what you get when you split them up then combine and mangle them in weird ways. Who knows? The thing you think sounded like carp 3 months ago might be perfect when hacked to bits and stuttered into another part.
    Amen Brother!

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    #6
    panup
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    Re: Sonar's included loops 2014/10/22 05:57:09 (permalink)
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    I vote for simple, under processed loops and single hits that stand time.
    Optionally Cakewalk could drop loops and encourage people composing their own loops from scratch.
    #7
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