Tracker programs.

jiltloop

Does anyone use these programs? Are they hard to use and are there any free versions to test out online? I know a few artists that use them to make really complex music particularly Venetian Snares. Basically can anyone explain to me how these work and how they differ to regular DAWs?

PaulBrewer

jiltloop wrote: »

Does anyone use these programs? Are they hard to use and are there any free versions to test out online? I know a few artists that use them to make really complex music particularly Venetian Snares. Basically can anyone explain to me how these work and how they differ to regular DAWs?

Huh? What's a tracker program?

seannash

ive actually always wondered how they work too

http://www.renoise.com/

remoise is one i hear about alot.if you figure out what makes it different report back

Anima

Trackers used to be popular ages ago. Don't think they stand up to anything thats around today though. They take ages to program for one thing. I tried Renoise for a while and it was decent but I didn't take to it very well. I guess its for people who like working that way more than anything else.

I know James Holden used one called Buzz for a bit. Thats free as far as I know. FLStudio also comes with an adaptor for it.

I assume the venetian snares track you saw was this? Must of taken for ever to do, you can see it scrolling down at an ultra fast BPM. The detail is incredible. The song, not so much :P

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGK-EzEa45U

PaulBrewer

I still don't understand what it is? Can someone explain?

dasdog

FastTracker II was one I used to use, vertically scrolling and running in DOS but it was fantastic. They stretch back to the 80's AFAIK and some of the best loading soundtracks of pre-486 PC & console computer games were composed using these programs. A little tricky to get used too but you had complete control compared to earlier versions of Cubase for example. FastTracker used HEX representation for sample offsets etc so they weren't the most user friendly but once learned Cubase and other GUI sequencers seemed to me much more unresponsive - although getting external MIDI devices hooked up was never easy so everything went through a soundcard for me. Still have a couple of tunes from using them, FT2 with SB AWE32 -> Cassette -> (later on) -> WAV -> MP3 so the quality suffered along the way a bit. You'd always end up with something completely different than a regular sequencer compositionwise but they were great for drum & bass and complex tunes.

jiltloop

So is a tracker just a sequencer then? Or would one have built in synths? Does it just trigger samples? I will have a look at renoise when I get the time because it definately sounds interesting (but also time consuming).

jiltloop

Anima wrote: »

Trackers used to be popular ages ago. Don't think they stand up to anything thats around today though. They take ages to program for one thing. I tried Renoise for a while and it was decent but I didn't take to it very well. I guess its for people who like working that way more than anything else.

I know James Holden used one called Buzz for a bit. Thats free as far as I know. FLStudio also comes with an adaptor for it.

I assume the venetian snares track you saw was this? Must of taken for ever to do, you can see it scrolling down at an ultra fast BPM. The detail is incredible. The song, not so much :P

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGK-EzEa45U

It wasn't that track in particular, I read somewhere that he uses trackers extensively. But yeah that track looks very complicated and actually I like the sound of it as well, I was always a sucker for that kind of intricate programming

pinksoir

Fairly sweet for electronic music. I used Med Soundstudio for years making House music.

http://www.medsoundstudio.com/

Free 30 day trial I think...