NI Stems

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quest
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NI Stems

Post by quest »

Curious what everyone's thoughts are on this new format:

http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2015/ ... r-karaoke/

I was trying out the Traktor S8 at the NI booth at the Hawting CNTRL Tour and it actually made me want to get back into DJing, but to try and play exclusively using stems.

Not sure how well that would work out, I plan to make all the tracks I release compatible for the format but not sure how many other producers will get on board.

When I found out about it, I immediately thought "this is 1000 times more useful for techno than every other genre combined". I DJed for about 5 years over 10 years ago, but started to lose interest when the digital medium was taking off. Switching from vinyl to CDs was somehow really unsatisfying, for me I'd say stems are what could bring back the fun to DJing, finding unique combinations of layers of tracks every set and maybe never again.

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Re: NI Stems

Post by helloitsmeagain »

edit: never mind. I have nothing good to say so rather i'll say nothing. very un-subsekt of me, i know... :lol:
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Re: NI Stems

Post by Thumper »

As with a lot of the NI stuff, I suspect we'll hear a lot of wuffle about how awesome it all is, and yet only a very small percentage will do anything more than drop an a capella over some crap beats.

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Re: NI Stems

Post by Thumper »

To be honest, I'm suspicious of where it is NI want to go. I think they see themselves as the Apple of DJing. I suspect you'll see a NI store soon enough that sells music in their stems format, and at some point afterwards the Stems will become an entirely proprietary format which will need NI software/hardware for playback thus locking people in to only using their gear. I know they've said that they intend Stems files to playback like normal MP3s on Pio gear etc but they sure as hell dragged their heals over certification for various mixers and CDJs over the last couple of years. I wouldn't hold my breath.

Of course, this only matters if you get invested into their dream. Still plenty of us out there who aren't.

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Re: NI Stems

Post by msl »

As a producer I like it as a concept generally. Might be an easy way of playing simplified live sets for example. As a DJ I don't think I could be bothered... but you never know it would be handy to have any acapella you wanted.

As far as I know they don't want it to be proprietary rather to become a standard like mp3 etc.

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Re: NI Stems

Post by Thumper »

msl wrote: As far as I know they don't want it to be proprietary rather to become a standard like mp3 etc.

.
I know that's the plan at the moment. I just wonder whether that'll change somewhere down the road based on their success, cost, and NI's evil plans for world domination. :D

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Lost to the Void
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Re: NI Stems

Post by Lost to the Void »

If you are going to play live, do it properly or fuck off home.
I will certainly not give DJ's parts to my music so they can pretend to be live, and I can't see many other artists doing so either, apart from desperate beatport "producers" who already fill their own shit with premade loops anyway.
In which case, let the blind lead the blind.

As a side note, we already have the technology to do this, for over 10 years already.

It's called.
Hmmm
I forgot.

Oh wait.

Ableton.
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Re: NI Stems

Post by Wiu »

Fuck Native Instruments. Hate them as a company. They sent me a survey to fill out about them and Soundcloud 'research collaboration project'.

"Dear Native Instruments User,
Thank you for supporting Native Instruments over the last years.
We would like to invite you to a research project that we are carrying out with our friends from Soundcloud, another Berlin based music company.

This online survey will only take about 10 minutes to complete. Your answers will be analyzed anonymously and confidential. The results will be used to improve your experience with our products and help us to deliver new products that suit your needs."

Go fuck yourself with one of your over priced controllers NI. Cunts. Those Soundcloud cunts can go fist themselves too.
Thank you for the laughs, debate, new music found, production tips etc etc over the years. I wish Subsekt and everyone all the best for the future. Wiu.

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Re: NI Stems

Post by Lost to the Void »

Haha, excellent.
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Re: NI Stems

Post by quest »

It's funny because I do agree completely. They did promise to keep the standard open, but I actually was on track to develop an Ableton-based equivalent before I ever heard about Stems.

I want to simplify my live PA to just controlling groups to have an experience halfway between DJing and Live. I suppose for DJing I could just cue up 2 track masters for playback from Ableton, I definitely agree that everything I'd want to do from an NI controller I can do just fine with an APC40.

I should have named the discussion differently as I am more interested in peoples thoughts about stem mixing as a way of playing live.

Maybe if a fully open standard develops under the radar of NI then their hardware a pushing effort would go to naught.

I mean, they develop some indispensable products like Kontakt, but if I can do what I want with what I have, I'd be hard pressed to justify spending so much on one of their DJ controllers.

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Re: NI Stems

Post by msl »

Yeah I'm no fan of NI either, only a have a few of their plugins. Seems interesting enough as an idea and format though, if you could only use it with NI hardware then of course its less interesting.

I'll be sure to bring my harmonica and banjo next time I play live Steve.


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Re: NI Stems

Post by Lost to the Void »

I`ll bring my washboard and knee cymbals, let`s start a band!!!
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Re: NI Stems

Post by msl »

Don't tempt me! Bluegrass techno is the next big thing.
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Re: NI Stems

Post by surface »

msl wrote:Don't tempt me! Bluegrass techno is the next big thing.
ha, that made me think of The Grid from back in the nineties!! ..

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Re: NI Stems

Post by msl »

surface wrote:
msl wrote:Don't tempt me! Bluegrass techno is the next big thing.
ha, that made me think of The Grid from back in the nineties!! ..
Oh god what an annoying song! Its up there with the Scat Man :lol:



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Re: NI Stems

Post by Lag »

Seems to me like some new thing which will never catch on. In order for us to be mixing in stems producers need to export stuff in stems first. Not sure if this is gonna happen. It complicates the process a lot.
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Re: NI Stems

Post by Planar »

Lag wrote:producers need to export stuff in stems first. Not sure if this is gonna happen. It complicates the process a lot.

How would mastering work for a start? Will stems be raw, unmastered channels? How is that going to work in all our EDM sets?

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Re: NI Stems

Post by quest »

Planar wrote:
Lag wrote:producers need to export stuff in stems first. Not sure if this is gonna happen. It complicates the process a lot.

How would mastering work for a start? Will stems be raw, unmastered channels? How is that going to work in all our EDM sets?
That's what I wanted to know. You'd think it'd be a fair question for a thread on mastering, but apparently not.

Anyways, two things.

One - a stems marketplace startup (I worked with them, may work with them again in the future): https://skiomusic.com/
Unlike the Soundcloud devs, these guys actually know how to code properly and will make a good platform that works for stems (and anything that works for stems will work fine for 2-track masters, obviously).

Two - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kqx_oHMWUNY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtw2-kL32YM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THgeFErZI_4

Now, Jeff Mills is one of the better DJs out there, but even he is often struggling to keep the records in sync. But the idea is interesting - use complete tracks as tools and make music from the mixes.

Problem is, you don't have a lot of control with just a 3-band EQ for each record.

Modern tools solve both problems - sync is easy nowadays and with Stems you get 4 individual faders per track.

I am excited about this because for any good material I can get stems for, I can go deeper with the tracks to build mixes that are layers of different tracks that click together perfectly, every live and/or DJ set can be a really creative and one-of-a-kind experience (you'll never produce anything like the same set twice in a row, even if you wanted to).

This is the sort of thing that makes me feel excited about the scene again (this and all the interactive stuff I'm working on).

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Re: NI Stems

Post by Planar »

quest wrote: That's what I wanted to know. You'd think it'd be a fair question for a thread on mastering, but apparently not.
Ha, weird coincidence. I've been away for the past week and just saw that discussion after posting this. Not wanting to butt in, but mastering involves dynamics processing a collective of channels (amongst other processes). Those dynamics processes won't react in the same way on individual channels and then sum to what they would have done in a full mix as it's program dependant. So I don't think it's actually possible to "master" these stems, you'd have to have another process at the end acting as a mastering stage. I wonder if Ni are adding a limiter stage to their software that will support stems? Yuck.

I did think your question warranted it's own thread btw, Quest, I don't think anyone was being mean to you.
quest wrote: Two - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kqx_oHMWUNY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtw2-kL32YM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THgeFErZI_4

Now, Jeff Mills is one of the better DJs out there, but even he is often struggling to keep the records in sync. But the idea is interesting - use complete tracks as tools and make music from the mixes.
I knew what these links would be before opening them. This is an awful example of 3 deck DJing. There are a few guys who can do it well, but I've yet to hear a Mills example I thought sounded good. Full disclosure: I've never seen him live, never been much of a fan tbh, but lots of people love him so it's probably bad examples I've heard.
quest wrote: I am excited about this because for any good material I can get stems for, I can go deeper with the tracks to build mixes that are layers of different tracks that click together perfectly, every live and/or DJ set can be a really creative and one-of-a-kind experience (you'll never produce anything like the same set twice in a row, even if you wanted to).

This is the sort of thing that makes me feel excited about the scene again (this and all the interactive stuff I'm working on).
Don't mean to echo Steve here, but he was right in the other thread, Ableton has given artists this option for years. Closer to the edit (by he who shall not be named) is an excellent example of it. I actually tried to DJ like this for a while, cutting up tracks, trying to be intricate and clever. It never worked out when I played live, it always came out dull. I was putting together layers of percussion and the odd melodic element, it was self indulgent and boring. It took a few listens to my recorded sets to realise it and then I went back to vinyl (via Serato). To do it well needs a lot of time and practice to make everything flow well, and to do that would take away spontaneity- which is the hallmark of a good dj set. What I mean by that is it was almost impossible for me to not play lots of drum loops layered, which was great fun for me. But to make it sound good as a set is something it would take weeks at a time to prepare and, importantly, get the play order right so it would work.

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Re: NI Stems

Post by quest »

Planar wrote: Ha, weird coincidence. I've been away for the past week and just saw that discussion after posting this. Not wanting to butt in, but mastering involves dynamics processing a collective of channels (amongst other processes). Those dynamics processes won't react in the same way on individual channels and then sum to what they would have done in a full mix as it's program dependant. So I don't think it's actually possible to "master" these stems, you'd have to have another process at the end acting as a mastering stage. I wonder if Ni are adding a limiter stage to their software that will support stems? Yuck.
I hope not either. They probably have some kind of plan, I hope its a good one. Yes, sure, it's been *possible* in Ableton for years. But without it becoming standard, you don't have the content available to do really interesting things.
Planar wrote: I did think your question warranted it's own thread btw, Quest, I don't think anyone was being mean to you.
Fair enough, I do find the whole need to differentiate amusing though. People taking things too seriously IMHO, the scene is not strong enough anymore to justify it IMHO. We need to think creatively about keeping vitality in the real electronic music scene or it's all going to be consumed by the modern pretentious EDM styles. Maybe this is a N.America-Europe difference, in N.America I think we have to deal with EDM in our faces a lot more than you.

We need to change things like they were changing things in the 80s in Detroit.
Planar wrote: I knew what these links would be before opening them. This is an awful example of 3 deck DJing. There are a few guys who can do it well, but I've yet to hear a Mills example I thought sounded good. Full disclosure: I've never seen him live, never been much of a fan tbh, but lots of people love him so it's probably bad examples I've heard.
Agreed. I think it was a decent enough idea but the reality is that no one is good enough to pull it off particularly well. 2 tracks is enough to deal with, and it's better to intentfully mix in a linear direction without dealing with the aimlessness that can be a result of mixing 3 tracks. 3 tracks is just kind of showing off, but my point here was to illustrate. This kind of idea was foreshadowing the future IMHO.
Planar wrote: Don't mean to echo Steve here, but he was right in the other thread, Ableton has given artists this option for years. Closer to the edit (by he who shall not be named) is an excellent example of it. I actually tried to DJ like this for a while, cutting up tracks, trying to be intricate and clever. It never worked out when I played live, it always came out dull. I was putting together layers of percussion and the odd melodic element, it was self indulgent and boring. It took a few listens to my recorded sets to realise it and then I went back to vinyl (via Serato). To do it well needs a lot of time and practice to make everything flow well, and to do that would take away spontaneity- which is the hallmark of a good dj set. What I mean by that is it was almost impossible for me to not play lots of drum loops layered, which was great fun for me. But to make it sound good as a set is something it would take weeks at a time to prepare and, importantly, get the play order right so it would work.
I disagree on both counts (for the same reason). I don't find Ableton to be particularly good for DJ-like sets at all. The feeling of the controls on an APC40 is less good than a Pioneer or NI mixer. You can't visualize what you are doing as easily.

I think what you're saying about your experience is that you never learned to do it well enough to do it well, so you stopped. I would think it would be much harder than regular DJing, so it would have a steeper learning curve (especially without any reference point). I'm willing to try because I realized that it wasn't the vinyl-CD transition that turned me off DJing, it was the lack of control in the mix.

I think it will be possible to play very compelling stems-based sets and the results will sound as good as either a DJ set or live PA (if done properly, and no one knows what "properly" is for this medium, yet). But I am sure there is a proper way to do it, and if folks here are too close-minded to even speculate on how the new standard might work well, then I guess we can agree to disagree.

I want to be in a scene that has as much vitality as it did in the 90s, and I'm willing to help build it to be that way if I can.

But debates that don't move forward might not really help in that regard.

Does everyone here absolutely believe there's no way something like this could work in a way that breathes fresh air into the scene?

Am I the only one that enjoys the mix parts of DJ sets way way more than the parts where individual tracks are playing? (For techno specifically).

How did those great moments get created? Did the DJs always plan out the mix ahead of time in each and every case? I don't think so.

All DJs need to spontaneously mix stems and have it sound fantastic are two things - a good technical standard on how to prepare the stems, and a way to visualize patterns in the music for each stem.

In case NI doesn't do it right, I'm trying to build a better stems DJing system with Max/MSP, for Ableton.

Hopefully with it the APC will be adequate. I'll aim to DJ this way and play live with stems as separate sets until hopefully its possible to buy good stems or have four faders of stems up sound equivalent to a stereo track.

I'll remain stubbornly optimistic until it's proven I'm better off pessimistic. Not about NI's implementation specifically, but the idea.


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