SyncMag.com
Title
Gearlog
Description
Now, everyone can be Phil Spector. No, I don't mean going on trial for murder. What I'm talking about is Phil Spector's career as a music producer of the great girl groups of the 1960s and the mastermind behind the Wall of Sound. With the aid of M-Audio's new PC-based software, Session, which the company demoed last night at DLPP, everyone can use their PC to create audio recordings, MIDI tracks, sound loops and more. To run the software, you'll need M-Audio's Fast Track USB recording interface, which you'll use to plug in your guitar, bass or whatever instrument you want to plugin, although I wish it had a MIDI port as well. But Fast Track USB costs only $129 and the software is bundled with the interface.
M-Audio obviously isn't the first company to market music production software for the masses. The most notable and successful has been Apple's Garageband, which is no where nearly as complex and confusing as other music creation tools like Cakewalk's Sonar 5 or Propellerhead's Reason 3. Of course it doesn't offer all the options those apps do, but many musicians don't want them. They want to get lost in the music, and not in a software application. Session seems to follow Apple's lead. But I'd love to see some free tutorials from M-Audio on using the software, preferably right on their website.
But with GarageBand, you had to buy a Mac. M-Audio's Session is for PC owners. Indeed, Session's clean, uncluttered interface reminds me of GarageBand, which is a very good thing. For example, when you start a new song or track, the program asks you what kind of music you want to make and then guides you from there. Higher-end programs require you to choose the settings yourself (although you can also automate these settings). I really like M-Audio's attempt to keep things simple and not intimidate the user: the layout of tracks, setting up effects, virtual controls and preview functions all appear targeted for the novice.
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