vst(i), midi out, audio;
dat gaat NOOIT in Reason komen !
Amongst the smaller items on various wish-lists, there are three major recurring requests common to many users: audio recording; MIDI output, so that Reason's sequencers could control external instruments; and VST plug-in compatibility. At the risk of being immensely boring to Propellerhead personnel, who are well aware of what users ask for, we felt we had to ask what the official position on these issues was! First, on
audio recording, Niels Larsen: "I think it's out of the question if we just said 'a little bit of audio'. That's the sort of thing that we just don't do. We have a lot of people saying: 'You could just put in a couple of tracks' or 'Why don't you do an ADAT-like device and call it Recorder?' A nice idea, but it's the wrong way to approach an issue like that. If you put an ADAT into the rack, it's like having a little 16-channel Mackie mixer and an ADAT connected to it. At what point do you become more frustrated and begin to say 'I want to do more than that, I want to do editing. Why don't I have editing?' That instantly becomes an issue. Then it becomes 'Oh, I need more mixing facilities...' And then Reason as a concept, as a product to make music, might change too much. That's why audio tracks at this time is really a no-no, because we feel we'd be ruining what we created rather than enhancing it."
Ernst adds his thoughts. "People ask us 'What is your hang-up with audio, what is your hang-up with VST plug-ins? Why don't you just do it?' And I don't think there is a hang-up. We'd like to think that Reason is not a 'me too' product. There were certainly soft synthesizers before it, but something that we did — we're not exactly sure what it was — took it to another level. If we ever do hard disk recording, I'd like to try to pull off the same trick again! I don't want to just do a 'me too' thing for adding hard disk tracks to Reason; even though it would probably be practical, it's not what we are about. It's not right for us. We'd just be an inferior Cubase, and why would we want to be that?"
Now at V2, the Reason electronic music studio boasts a growing user base.
Perhaps, rather than incorporating the feature into Reason, a Propellerhead application could be purpose-developed to run in tandem with Reason? Niels doesn't rule out the possibility: "I think that's an interesting option, particularly with ReWire. I could see us having products that were the best for each recording task, rather than having one product that tries to do everything. Another thing about audio recording is that we have to be realistic about what we are capable of. If your expertise is synthesis and you have to start writing an audio editor, it would probably take several years, and then you have to question whether it would really be, after all that, so much better than anybody else's. But maybe we will."
MIDI output is next on our list of annoying questions — as Niels observes: "Ah... another one of those questions that are asked a lot. The thing with MIDI Out is that people say 'Oh, it's really easy', but it's not, actually. If you include MIDI Out, you have a host of other things you need to take into account. For example, do you need SysEx handling? We don't have that because we only need to control our own devices. The other thing is all the other tools you'll need if you are going outside to an environment that is uncontrollable and unpredictable. It would be a key strategic change for us, but also it involves a host of complications other than just making an output. For example, you'd probably need to have transpose on every track, certain other playback controls, probably a MIDI mixer as well..."
Finally, there's the issue of
VST plug-ins, which certain users would like, perhaps principally to provide access to different effects. "Of course, a lot of people would love us to do it," says Niels. "But one reason is that we don't want to become a product that is a VST host, and particularly for VST plug-ins that might not be as efficient as Reason. We take pride in making reliable products, and in making them efficient, so that the user can do a lot on just one computer. One single plug-in could bring the whole thing down! And we don't want to do that. What we'd rather do is keep making instruments that can satisfy our users' appetite. We favour ReWire [for accessing VST plug-ins], not because it's our technology, but because it has become what we wanted an interface to be. Now we have Sonar on board [with ReWire support], and Cakewalk have done a great implementation, I have to say. Also Emagic, Ableton Live, Cubase, Nuendo... So it's getting there, bit by bit."
