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Discussion: Production in Ableton... Why does it sound so bad???
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| KennethThomas |
I wanted to open up a general discussion here.
As head of A&R for Perfecto, I get A LOOOOT of demos, tons from fairly to completely unknown talent. I seem to be getting more and more demos that are made in Ableton and I am finding this common element with these tracks. Its too the point where I can instantly tell its from Ableton and I am always right when I confirm with the producer. They ALL have this similar mild "bitty" sound to them. Its actually quite harsh on the ears and makes them feel very very "cold" (meaning the absolute opposite of nice Warm sounding production)
There are even several somewhat known producers that work on Ableton, that send me at least one track a week and they ALL have this same quality, wether the track is trance, electro or minimal.
The other thing ive noticed is that this subtle bitty, harsh sound is on all the elements. Its not just like the bassline or an instrument or two, its on every aspect of the tracks, kicks, high end perc, instruments, everything. And again, this is universal from every producer who sends me tracks produced on Ableton.
Now, i do most of my radio shows and some track edits on Ableton. I have noticed that the "Beat" BPM setting gives tracks a similar but even harsher "bitty" sound. It actually sounds absolutely TERRIBLE when you get beyond 1 bpm up or down from the original bpm. In those cases, the "re-pitch" setting is obviously the way to go but even then, you loose the crispness of the track, quite noticeably.
So yea, whats your experience with Ableton? Has this issue been discussed before or on other forums? Why do you think there is a very very common thread of having this sound from ableton producers?
Let the discussion begin. |
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| Subtle |
| Im no hardcore Abletoner, but i noticed that if i put a track into Ableton and add an EQ Three the sound of the track changes, at default setting. |
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| Eric J |
I have to agree to an extent on this one. I do my DJ mixes in Ableton and I have noticed this as well. From my experiences, it boils down to two things:
1. Time stretching. If I stretch a track or sample more than +/- 5 BPM, I will start to notice this effect. This is especially true when the algorithm is set to Beats. As you correctly point out, Repitch is basically useless.
2. Transient Setting. I have noticed that if I change the Transients setting from the default 1/16 to 1/8, I can alleviate this problem to a great extent, but it depends on how much the BPM is altered from the original. The farther I get from the original, the worse it gets and the less this trick works.
I don't know exactly why this is, but I have my theories. I think its all related to the beatmapping functions. I remember when I used to do my mixes in Acid Pro 2.0, I got a much warmer sound. When I tried to use Acid Pro 3.0, where they introduced the beatmapping feature, it exhibited the same behavior, which lead me back to using 2.0. Eventually I started using Ableton for mixed CD's, because it's beatmapping and transposition features were superior.
SO, from your standpoint, I think what is probably happening is that inexperienced producers are not paying attention to these tiny details, and after working in Ableton for a while, they probably just get "used" to this sound. I think that if most of them were to start working in another DAW such as Logic or Cubase, they would notice that the effect is no longer present.
I have always thought that the time stretching in Logic and Cubase were superior to Ableton. However, that makes sense if you think about it. Both Logic and Cubase have been around longer, and have had more time to work on their time stretching algorithms. In addition, both of these packages do not rely on the "beatmapping" feature to do timestretching (although it is an option).
Because Ableton was designed with a different purpose in mind, their approach to time stretching is different that these other DAW packages. This is most likely the primary reason why a lot of tracks done in Ableton sound this way, and probably a primary source of the argument that Ableton's summing is somehow "inferior". I don't think that is actually true, but I do think that the problem with Abletons time stretching algorithms contributes to this argument. |
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| Zombie0729 |
i think its simple really, people don't know what they're using. Ableton has become the new introduction DAW(just like fruity was years past) and people aren't diving into the options. In ableton's settings you can set what warp type imported audio will recieve. Mine is set to tones however if i'm importing beats or 1 hits i have to go into the clip and select beats or whatever. people are just dragging and dropping things in, freezing/flattening audio without selecting the right warp type and in effect adding extra 'noise' to the files.
the other thing is the audio engine, like every DAW ableton has its holes and that's very apparent in the 5k+, if someone doesn't hear it then they are missing the boat on a lot of mixing and eq problems |
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| derail |
| I didn't stick with Live as my primary DAW for very long at all. I quickly moved over to Cubase - it just sounded better. |
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
| quote: | Originally posted by Zombie0729
people are just dragging and dropping things in, freezing/flattening audio without selecting the right warp type and in effect adding extra 'noise' to the files. |
That's a possibility. Apart from that, though, I can't see any reason why Live would sound worse than any other DAW. |
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
| Someone who has Live and another DAW should create a simple loop with some drums and a couple synths in Live, then replicate it in the other DAW, then upload them both and see if we can tell the difference. |
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| ClearWater |
| Worked in Live 7 and Cubase 4 and haven't heard much of a difference between the two... Certainly haven't gotten any of this harsh sound Kenneth mentions in Ableton... Cubase 4 definately superior though in being able to develop one's sounds completely |
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| Zombie0729 |
| there is no question engines are going to sound different, after all they're using complex algorithms and mathematics to translate sound into binary language. there's lots of room for things to 'sound' different, to say they should all sound the same is not true. how ableton treats a 4pole filter versus an algorithm in rendering is all relative to the engine built for it. |
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| evo8 |
A lot of these people who are sending the demos must be using a lot of loops in all their tracks thus resulting in possible issues with the warp quality/settings
I cant imagine any difference between tracks using no loops but mainly midi synths, or audio recorded from external gear and those same setups in something like Cubase or Reason- i cant see how there would be a discernable difference between the sound quality of tracks coming out of the 3 different hosts :conf: |
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| Az |
think it all depends on the quality of the producer really, I use ableton but I'm not entirely sure I know what you mean (not for one minute saying I'm amazing).
I have to agree with Palm about EQ 3, there's a definate change on default, but EQ 3 is pretty to be fair. |
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