bitflipper
Thanks for the review, Dana. It sure sounds good.
The main hurdle I can't mentally get over is the feeling that such tools are cheating, much like building an "original" song out of loops.
I almost never use loops or sequences, even for extremely tedious elements such as shakers and tambourines. It's a small matter of pride that every hit and note in every song was purposefully placed there by me. But then honesty has always been my handicap, which is why I could never go into politics.
this has been an argument raging over at VI Control for ages... 30 billion comments on both sides... I come out fealing it's another tool... just like Albion one string runs, Damage drum riffs, arpeggiated synth lines, multi kontakt program sets, Choirs... I mean, dude... you can't play a violin, you aren't hiring a 20 piece orchestra or set of humans... isn't that cheating?
I love Geddy Lee's bass tone... Found what I feel is close on Greg's Rick bass... is my go to sound now, even though I have two ibanez basses... is that cheating? How many use Ozone??? Definately cheating... by some definitions... I love Fab's Timeless2... use it on every vocal to create a certain "sound"... cheating?BFD has some wicked patterns/drums... I hate programing drums, and I surely can't play real ones... is that cheating? When Skippy and Airwave got together and did a kick butt soundset for Omnisphere I instantly vamped on several amazing "multies" and wrote 5 or 6 songs in a night... it allowed a stream of consciousness on a list of issues I wanted to address... and evoked things from within that would not have ever "erupted" had I not bought "Airwave"...Is an awesome groove from omnisphere which underpins a song cheating?
Is Greg's amazing Guitarz libraries cheating? I have a lovely fan fretted tele and baratone strat but still enjoy bringing up an awesome stratosphere sound, maybe a rhythm, and vamp to stimulate an idea which just unfolds extemporaneously... Indeed, within my cottage studio it is literally a pain and waste of time to try and accurately/cleanly record my real guitars... and my fingers are going arthritic... so is that cheating?
I chuckle at contrived boxes... they all depend on a perspective... Remember all the furor and threats to make it illegal to sample in some quarters? Now I have Albion One at my fingertips!
Finally, in the end... none of the emotive phrases amount to a hill of beans without proper triggering, innovative mixing/modulating among them, adding vocals, other instruments, rhythms, and blah blah blah...
Whereas it's a matter of pride for you to know "every note" was intentionally placed there by you I approach it all very differently. I see music/songwriting as a means of piercing the armor we shroud ourselves in... or opening the heart, mind and spirit to receive uncomfortable information... In the end, no song I've ever written will be replicated by anyone else... it is a synthesis of mind, heart and body wielding the available tools creatively...
Honesty has noting to do with it. Really, Bit... if you're going to be completely honest, you'll have to agree that this could all be an elaborate "phrase" in some simulation...