Ever
since I had -I think it was called- a 386
Computer back in the late 1980's, and even
in my MSX days during that same period, I
have been looking into possibilities to make
music, DUB music, with the computer.
Computers have come a long way, and so did
I. What hasn't changed for me is that I am
still using the computer as my main musical
creation tool.
When I
started releasing my musical productions
online, I already had a background of almost
a decade getting myself familiar with the
methodology and thinking processes behind
the software producers and the simple, basic
digital foundation that all computers are
built on: something is true, or it is false.
It's 1, or 0. Computers are very exact,
painfully exact and so they are the ultimate
way for an autodidact like me. Computers
have also opened up the way for us, the
masses, to do what only could be done before
in very expensive buildings with even more
expensive contents.
With
computers being exact and accessible
machines, they are perfect for simulating
situations in a digital environment. Just
think about flight simulators, and how these
computers have taken over many, many hours
of what used to be real flight hours in
pilot's educations. Why? Because they're
just as good. And not "just" for
flight simulation. The possibilities are
endless.
Producing
music, for example.
In a flight
simulator, the computer "pretends to
be" an airplane. It has all the
relative elements for the pilot to learn the
actual flying. It's even so far that
nowadays computers "pretend to be"
the pilot to the airplane. It's called
"automatic pilot" and it's usually
set to "on", even during landings.
Translate
this to DUB and it doesn't take a rocket
scientist to figure out that what can be
done with airplanes can be done for the
devices needed to create (DUB) Reggae Music.
Here they are:
- Multi-Track
Recorder
- Stereo
Recorder (for Master Tape)
- Mixing
Board
- Instruments
- Effects
Yes, the
computer can "pretend to be" or
simulate one or more of these devices. When
I started back in the 1980's, it was clear
that quality is only a matter of processing
power and speed. With just a few megabytes
of RAM, you couldn't do very much but with
the multitude of gigabytes in current (2014)
computers, one machine outdoes a complete
1980's studio.
It doesn't
stop there, though.
The
computer can go further than the device(s)
it simulates. Translated to the studio
situation, this simply means that I can mix
a DUB as if I have 20 hands. Where in a
1980's analog studio every copy or
track-bounce implicated loss of audio, a
digital copy is an exact duplicate. The
music you download from me are exact
duplicates of the original Master
Recordings.
I make
heavy use of this extra possibility in all
my musical works, but I do limit myself and
the main reason for that is that I create
music for people and people are no
simulators. People want to listen to music
because they want to feel things, not
because they want a tutorial on making DUB.
People also do not want to be
"impressed" by multi-orchestral
dual compositions layered on top of each
other or something like that. Yes, it would
be music but it would be completely
"unreal" music. Perhaps this can
be done in particular styles and genres, but
for (DUB) Reggae this is a no-go.
When you
want to make (DUB) Reggae, always realize
that this is a music for the people and from
the people and therefore the connect must be
there. (DUB) Reggae is a form of
communicating much more than many other
musical directions, and therefore you can
absolutely go beyond let's say the physical
boundaries in your digital environment, but
you should never go so far that it is only
you who understands.
Of course,
it's not just the computer alone. It's the
software that tells the computer it now has
to "pretend to be" a Dub studio.
When I started on my digital journey, all I
had was a computer with MS-DOS (pre-Windows)
and a little sequencer program called
"Voyetra". I now work with several
DAW's and VST audio effects but in essence
nothing really has changed. I've just traded more and more of my
hardware devices in because the software
equivalents outrange anything these devices
would let me do with them.
Looking
back at the little flight simulator analogy,
you could say that I started my education as
a pilot with a flight simulator and now I am
flying in an airplane flown by the automatic
pilot. Technically spoken, that is. Not
creatively, of course.
There is
powerful software for powerful computers
that can easily replace a hardware DUB
studio. But remember: it replaces the
studio, it places you in a studio and now it
depends on you and your creativity.
For this
tutorial, it does not really matter which
piece of software or DAW you use. I try to
keep things general even though I am an avid
user and supporter of Propellerhead's
excellent Reason software. When you have
that software you will find extra niceness
throughout the chapters that follow.
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