MBC 14 Theme poll

Renoise Songs
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That’s right, we’re “painters”. But we’re not paint manufacturers. It’s about composing, not about sound design. Is a guitarist using a guitar he didn’t build himself a cheater? No. Does he feel like a cheater? Surely not. There’s a reason why there are sound designers and musicians. It’s something completely different. Are you cheating because you’re using a DAW you didn’t made yourself? I assume that you know what I’m about. Personally I want to compose music and not to design sounds. Of course I change sounds depending on what I need, but I don’t design them from scratch myself. Most musicians don’t design their own sounds, neither professionals nor amateurs. Only sound designers and a couple of Renoise nerds do. :wink:

It’s extra work without any benefit and it would kill the overview, that’s why I wouldn’t do it. Besides of that it could happen that the result is different. If this competition is just about showing others the personal Renoise abilities, rendering tracks isn’t the right way to do it. But if this competition is about creating great music with Renoise, the way how you did it shouldn’t matter. In this case a wave file or MP3 should be enough, and to prove that you did it in Renoise you can deliver the xrns file, too. At least this is my opinion. :slightly_smiling_face:

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22

The benefit is that you get an XRNS that plays as is intended whether you have the plugins or not. And if you leave the plugins in the XRNS after rendering, you won’t kill the overview. So you really can have your cake and eat it too.

And I really don’t think those are exclusive goals: the compo could be about creating the coolest track you can AND about showing your Renoise skills. And hence you could get separate points for both, like has been done in a lot of compos here. :blush:

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23

Ok cool, I got it. MBC is about creating a xrns file everyone can play showing the best song you can create matching a given theme, extra points for crazy classic tracker skills and/or limitations. It’s about learning Renoise stuff, the side effect is a compilation of cool songs. :slightly_smiling_face:

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24

A lot of people who make electronic music are deeply into sound design, and the history of electronic composition is intimately bound to the creation of new techniques for manipulating sound. I’d argue that a lot of the innovation in various styles of electronic music isn’t melodic, or rhythmic, but aesthetic - and a big part of that - is in the innovation of new sound worlds. If that’s not what you’re into, that’s all good, but let’s not pretend that sound design and electronic music composition aren’t intimately intertwined. You select the sounds you want to use for a good reason, because they convey the aesthetic you’re after. Someone created them. I create the sounds that convey the aesthetic that I’m after, which might be something new that I haven’t heard before. One approach isn’t better than another, but I am enough of a sound design nerd (or as one of my kids calls it, a “noise geek”) to take some pride in having rarely if ever used a preset made by someone else in the nearly 30 (jesus) years I’ve been making electronic music… I don’t care how anyone else works, but I know I’m definitely not the only composer who cares deeply about custom sound design :upside_down_face: If I was a guitarist and a luthier, I might feel similarly about playing custom instruments I had built, and yeah, it would be totally badass to have written the DAW code, too. If I was a coder, I’d probably try, lol. But we all have our own unique interests, abilities, and limitations… again, to each their own!

The limitations around sample based production in the various options in the OP are only reflective of renoise being a big modular sampler, and to showcase those possibilities. There are options so people can choose :slight_smile: I don’t really care how it goes, I’m not planning on voting, just going with the group will.

@sokoban I really like your idea for vocals, and would include it if I could, but the poll can’t be changed after 5 minutes of posting. If people agitate for that option, then we can go that direction.

Honestly, I just appreciate that people care enough to share their opinions about our little mutant music playzone here. Long live renoise :metal:

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25

Long live Kraftwerk! :slightly_smiling_face:

Respect for creating your own sounds from scratch in Renoise and without using any VST. It must be very time consuming, unless you’re a master in sound design. It’s kind of scientific and it takes some time and effort to get into this. It shows that you really love sound design. Of course you can be proud of these skills. You could use any synth that way if you want to. And I think you should. Different synths, different sounds. That’s why I like using different synths. And yes, I’ve got thousands of presets for different synths “someone” has created. I’m busy, my love for sound design is limited, buying presets is like buying time and there are presets for anything you can imagine (you just have to find them :sweat_smile:). You even don’t need to change them because there is such a large selection of sounds, but nevertheless you can easily get a completely different sound out of a preset simply by switching the waveform, the frequency, the resonance and so on, by using effects or whatever. I’m sure it’s faster to change a sound similar to what you’re looking for into the sound you’re looking for than starting from scratch. That’s why I’m the type of guy that likes to buy presets. You can leave them as they are or you can change them into your own sound. That’s what I do and I’m pretty sure most composers do it this way. But of course you’re right, there are also a lot of composers who design their own sounds from scratch and sound design and music composition are intertwined (thanks for the new word btw). But you cannot deny that there’s a reason why “sound designer” is a job. And that’s a different job than a “musician”. :upside_down_face:

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26

Rather interesting perspectives here, it’s really nice to hear views from people with somewhat opposing workflows.

Electronic music and the sounds that technology makes possible have always been deeply intertwined, but I think this goes way deeper than just electronic music. Yeah, Stockhausen would not have created some of his most influential pieces if tape machines would not have been invented, and we probably wouldn’t know Kraftwerk if sequencers weren’t a thing and so on. But the same principle of deep linking between technology and musical expression goes far far beyond just music made with anything that requires electricity. You think Chopin would’ve made the kind of music he made if he was born couple hundreds years earlier when the grand pianos didn’t yet have sustain pedals? No he wouldn’t have, simply because it would not have been possible. Tech sometimes revolutionises music, and music in turn makes certain paths of technological advanced more desirable than others, and hence guides where the tech heads next. Kind of a vaguely symbiotic relationship. And I really think we’ve just began to take the very first small baby steps in what computers will really mean for musical expression. What you can do to sound with computers now vs 10 years ago is already astounding. What about 500 years from now? Simply unimaginable IMO :exploding_head:

Regarding the “do it all by yourself” vs “just use presets” thing, I’m sort of in the middle ground here. I used to do a lot of theater sound design, and having a large collection of sounds ready to go was not only convenient, but almost a necessity there. The director might suddenly want a completely different kind of a sound for a scene during a rehearsal and you can’t really start to synthesize or layer something from scratch in that kind of situation. You just quickly dig into your sample collection and pull something up, and then maybe refine it more later when you have the time.

Doing that kind of work has made me appreciate a large sample collection in multiple ways. Firstly it gives me access to sounds from unbelievably talented people who might approach sound design from a totally different angle, with totally different equipment, and hence make sounds I would never ever come up with. Secondly it makes life way more easier sometimes: if I want a sound of, say a train passing by, I can just dig in and get a that (vs taking my field recorder and going out to spend a day just recording trains). And thirdly I view it as raw materials for all kinds of resampling and de-/re-constructing. When I get my granular Reaktor arsenal out, I really want to have some cool samples also ready to go, easily and without any fuzz. I just want to push the record button, turn some knobs and get lost in cool sounds. Editing comes only after all that fun stuff. :sunglasses:

But that being said, I also have a small collection of circuit bent toys I took apart and bent myself. I have self-made piezo-noise boxes, lots of self-made Reaktor stuff, SunVox metamodules, binaural recordings and so on. I completely get the satisfaction and pride one gets from using just self-made instruments/samples. It feels really good when you can say “I made everything in this from the scratch”. And that way you can really taylor your sounds to fit your aesthetic preferences from the get go. My best friend always says I usually make “crunchy” and “wet” sounds, and I totally agree! :grin: And when I make the kind of sounds that inspire me even as just sounds without any context, they are super easy to fit into any project I make, since they already have an aesthetic flavour I like. That’s why making your own presets is also so useful (although I don’t do that too much myself).

So I think both styles of working have their advantages and one is certainly not better than the other. It’s a preference thing in the end. I also think it’s an important point @TNT has about painters vs paint manufacturers. I’d put it this way: I’d rather not have Steinway pianos be made by pianists themselves, but rather have one group of people focus solely on the art of making the best possible pianos, and another group of people focus solely on playing those pianos as beautifully as humanly possible. That way everyone collectively can have best of both worlds, and not a bunch of “jack of all trades, master of none” -situations. And yes, I know this is a huge simplification, but I bet you get my jist. And I think same logic could be applied to virtual instruments. I could never even dream of putting something like Renoise or Vital together by myself, but I can use them and try to master them to the best of my ability when making sounds and music.

Sorry for rambling a bit, I just really find this an interesting subject. :blush:

2 Likes
27

I would say one defined VSTi (cross platform, opensource) plus a defined sample pack. Those Audio Tournament compos were very nice. One sample or smallest size imho is boring, since there is not even a replayer for Renoise so you can’t put the result onto a bootblock… On the other hand, an EFI cracktro / virus would be very funny.

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28

so far, mutant cats and one sample challenge are tied for first. two weeks to keep voting :slight_smile:

@SimulatedZen I think we should community curate a sample pack for MBC 15 in 2023. That way there will be time to pull together some really high-quality source material for next year’s MBC. sound good?

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29

I agree. I’ll get it started after MBC14 is done. :+1:

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30

Awesome. Maybe the winner of MBC 14 can choose the theme for the sample pack (if they want there to be a theme), and everyone who wants to contribute samples, xrnis, fx chains etc. can use that as inspiration

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31

easy: let’s try something with a “one mutant cat sample” challenge :rofl:

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32

There’s a nascent culture here, maybe deserving a true R&D branch :wink:

I will simply say that, all preferences for means aside, the practice of sharing a standard and resilient format (in that all of our old xrns are still compatible) has allowed the renoise forums to have a specific pedagogical nature that I don’t know about elsewhere.

I’ve been able to learn a lot about sound design and signal processing by simply rocking out to people’s xrns and scrolling around the mix tab. Since all of the building blocks are so basic (with native fx only), you have a very easy to follow signal path at any point (although I’m biased of course).

I think it’s tremendous that people use VSTs and other tools outside of renoise – it really is such a powerful tool in this case. Whenever something is a forum-centric event (say, a song compo), though, I think it generally has great value to keep things native – for that very reason, however, I could see an argument for a VST only (or heavy) competition, since there’s less incentive for it to arise otherwise.

Anyways, appreciate you all

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33

It is! And even though I don’t want to “waste my time” with sound design from scratch, I appreciate every contribution to that topic. I also like the tutorial videos by @slujr, even though I know exactly that I won’t work that way. It’s just interesting to see some other ways to do things. Every method has the right to exist. Even chopping loops. I wonder what a sound designer guy who’s also composing now and then would say to a composer who’s using loops all the time, just like all those DNB and Breakbeat creators do. Are those guys “cheaters”? I know that there are guys in this forum who think that composers who are using loops actually are not composing. I also refuse to use any loops and I prefer creating my own stuff, but I wouldn’t go that far to say they are not even composing.

I consider myself to be in the middle, too. :slightly_smiling_face:
Yes, I use presets as described, but mostly I change them by adjusting them to my desires. And in fact that is sound design, but not from scratch. What you’re saying about your sample collection is exactly what I’m saying about my preset collection. From my point of view a preset is the base for another sound, no more and no less. It rarely happens that I leave a preset exactly as it is. Usually I create my own sound out of a preset or at least change it a little bit. Most presets are using too much effects in my opinion. I’m that type of guy that likes to have a clean sound, and effects are producing “dirt” as a side effect, which worsen the mix.

I would suggest Synth1 to be the chosen VST. It’s free, it’s cool and it runs both on Win and Mac. I guess it will run even on Linux. Synth1 probably has got the largest preset collection in VST history, which is nice, too.

Fun fact, I mostly use native fx devices like compressor, eq, filter, delay, maximizer, send and so on, but when it comes to instruments plugins are stringently required because of the reasons I’ve already mentioned. Yes, another competition without limitations would be nice. The winner gets a shirt OR ELSE (insider). :wink:

@slujr
Damn, man! Did I just write “didn’t made”? And you quoted it. :upside_down_face:

@sokoban
I like your idea. 3 words, one song, one competition, multiple styles. Let’s go.

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34

:rofl: Love it!

I wonder if this should be it’s own compo? “Renoise sings” or some such. Would be really interesting to hear what ppl come up with

I think it all depends on what you’re doing with the loops. Even if someone it just taking dry loops and playing them together as is with other loops in a really straighforward, uncreative manner, I’d say they’re still composing. It’s just fairly wack, imo. But “a good artist borrows, a great artist steals” so it all depends on the end result in a certain sense. I just know I have such appreciation for the process of creation that how it’s made is an important part of my creative work, and to a much lesser extent of my appreciation of the creations of others. But if it bangs/slaps & gets your mind or body moving in an interesting direction, then that kinda beats all

35

I mean I have bespoke “VST Instruments” and the newest “Construction Kits” but them being used in a competition is akin to “Pay to win” in a video game …imho.

36

Interesting opinion. So tell me, what’s the difference of using VSTs and samples in terms of “authenticity”? It’s obvious that the majority of all MBC participants doesn’t create their own presets or samples. Therefore the results of the past competitions are wrong, right? Are the winners actually “cheaters”, too? You’re a cheater if you’re using a 808 drum sample or if you’re using a 303 emulation VST, right? You’re even a cheater if you buy hardware, let’s say a 606 for example. Right? And of course you’re a cheater if you record instruments or any other sounds to create samples. The only way you’re not cheating is being a sound designer pretending to be a musician or a sound designer who also composes now and then, right? You “pay to win” if you buy hardware, VSTs, presets or samples, right? And what “construction kits” are you talking about? Are you talking about loops? Are you talking about the Playstation Music Maker? I honestly don’t get it.

The best instruments or samples are absolutely worthless without the capability of a good musician. The musician is the only one who lets the sound shine. A master armorer is far from being a great warrior, my friend. Only a great warrior knows how to use the armorer’s weapons to cut artistically. It’s obvious, right?

I thought this is a music competition, but seemingly it’s primarily about sound design. :thinking:
I can understand if a xrns file is desired for the sake of learning Renoise, but I really don’t get all the sound designer stuff you’re talking about in connection with this competition or any music competition in general.

I wouldn’t sing, I would cheat by using a vocoder or a talk box. :wink:

37

I never said a word about cheating :upside_down_face:

The first rule of music: there are no rules

People can (and should) do what they like! That’s all I’m doing :slight_smile: Personally, I see much value in various forms of creative constraint, and that’s why I offered some forms of constraint in the OP. That’s also why I primarily work with stock renoise for my sound design, because I like doing things the hard way… it helps me understand sound and synthesis more deeply to work up from fundamentals. Don’t get me wrong. I love VSTs and use them occasionally. I just love being able to wrestle a comparable result from native devices and methods. Guess I’m weird like that

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38

Yes, you said “it would feel like cheating”, which is something else. :wink:
I was referring to Jek’s recent post. “Pay to win” and stuff like that. What kind of argumentation is this? Everybody pays for something for music creation. You pay for a specific DAW (which possibly can do more than others), you pay for synths (whether hardware or software), you pay for samples (at least for every well known drum you can imagine), you pay for presets, you pay for headphones, computer and other gear, you simply pay for everything. Where’s the connection of all that stuff and “cheating” or let’s say “pay to win”? I really don’t know. Having better equipment and stuff doesn’t mean you’re cheating. That’s all I can say.

39

Construction kits are put out by labels and producer aimed sample/loop websites;
buyers get the midi, long sample loops, basically all the stems of a pre-made song.

All this just gets so so far away from the spirit of a tracker compo imo.

40

Yes, I fully agree. Using long sample loops, stems you didn’t create yourself or similar has nothing to do with composing. Of course not. It’s playing around, no more and no less. That’s what my little 8 year old nephew is doing. But you were talking about cheating respectively “pay to win” in connection with using “VST instruments”. Not to mention using presets or sounds in general which you didn’t create yourself from scratch. That’s something else and of course I cannot agree with that. And I don’t think VSTs shouldn’t be used in a “tracker compo”. Renoise is not an ordinary tracker like FastTracker and all the other classic trackers.

So it seems “cats” will win. If I would like to participate I probably will have to cheat by using cat samples I didn’t create myself. I don’t have any cats anymore and I don’t own a portable recorder. But I probably won’t participate simply because I don’t have any more good samples except drum samples, so my options creating melodies with samples are very limited. And there’s a lack of time and pleasure for creating sounds from scratch or rendering VSTs. Anyway, we’ll see… :slightly_smiling_face: