Native InstrumentsUniqueSquared Pro Audio Blog

PRO AUDIO

Taylor
March 14, 2013

Native Instruments Komplete 9: Is It Worth Upgrading?

Forums, news feeds, social media networks, and email in boxes lit up Monday with the announcement from Native Instruments that their immensely popular Komplete software instrument suite will be getting an update from version 8 to the new version 9. This comes nearly two years after the Komplete 8 update which came out in the late summer of 2011. The official release of Komplete 9 is March 27th but we now know what instruments and effects will be included in the update which you can read in detail here.

The big question for most of us is: Should we bother upgrading? Are we going to be getting anything worthwhile out of this update? While reading these forums, blogs, and social media posts, I began to notice that there was a lot of disdain mixed with “yeah whatever” when it comes to this release, and rightfully so. Many of the instruments and effects that are …

PRO AUDIO

Paul
February 26, 2013

The Traktor DJ App for iPad And Whether It’s Right For You

So I bought Traktor DJ for iPad Thursday.

Before I go any further I want to say again that I bought it Thursday. At the time of writing, it is Monday the following week. When I bought the product, I was thinking “I’ll just bang around with it, test out the sync functionality, set a few loops and cue points, and bang out a quick review for the blog.” That didn’t happen for two reasons:

1) I really dragged my feet on the whole “leaving Snow Leopard” thing. Snow Leopard was fine. I wanted to stay there. Over recent months, this or that driver update excluded me and I realized the day was coming when someone would force my hand. NI were the someone, and 2.6.1 was the update to do it. Mac users will want to note that full use of the app’s functionality with Traktor Pro 2.6.1 requires …

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UniqueSquared
December 20, 2012

Bitwig Studio Controlled By Maschine

While Native Instruments leads the way with innovative MIDI controllers such as the Kontrol F1, they’ve also moved passed the realm of add-on controllers and pure software based solutions altogether. Their introduction of the Maschine might have thrown people off in the beginning, but it’s clear now that it was the proper step to take if they were ever going to release a two channel mixer that didn’t need a computer attached to it. For what it’s worth, the Maschine lives in two distinct worlds with the capability to be added to a third.

As far as its use alongside a DVS, it seems like overkill. Its large footprint and velocity sensitive buttons are something most digital DJs will see as intrusive. When loading up samples or cues, pressure sensitivity is a nice add-on, but useless in terms of performance. Producers will find it advantageous to have sensitive buttons, …

PRO AUDIO

MOBILE STUDIO

Taylor
December 3, 2012

Drumcell Interview: Thoughts on Traktor

With the release of Traktor Pro 2.6 earlier this year, many DJ’s are beginning to take advantage of the new remix deck functionality, better BPM detection, and the new flux mode and macro FX selections. In addition the new hardware from Native Instruments like the Traktor Kontrol F1 and their first forray into mixers with the Traktor Kontrol Z2, help to make these new features in the Traktor update even more useful. The techno DJ and Traktor specialist Drumcell is not just a former spokesman for the DJ software, but he is an active user of the software and uses it at every gig.

When we interviewed Drumcell he was performing with two laptops: one to use with Traktor and utilizing 4 decks, and the other with Ableton where he was launching clips with Native Instruments Maschine. He noted that in the very near future he will be integrating …

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UniqueSquared
November 21, 2012

Will Commercially Available Remix Sets Take Off?

If you were spinning vinyl records before Serato was taken seriously by DJs, you have a few options for remixing songs at your disposal. A lot of times, a “single” would contain the explicit, edited, and radio edits of a song on one side, and if you were lucky – the other side would contain just the instrumental and acapella versions. The ability to remix vocals on one track with the instrumental from another is what made the hiphop DJ so versatile, and it was something that really couldn’t be done with electronic music at the time. DJ tools were also being produced: edited versions of songs with long intros for easy mixing.

With most of our music being sourced digitally, it’s easy to come by remixed versions of song nowadays, in fact, too easy. Sometimes the only version of a song you can find is the remixed version, with …