A second post from me, hope that's ok...
I'm going to be honest with you guys, I'm kinda worried / troubled, also due to new personal discoveries. I don't want to sound gloomy, but... hope you guys will hear me out.
Ever since ReWire got discontinued I've been somewhat struggleing. See, I've been using my "power combo" of Ableton Live + Reason pretty much from the moment I started with Live 8 back in 2009. I remember it like yesterday: I picked up on Live Suite and also decided to buy into Max for Live (this was new & separate back then). But I wanted more diversity in my setup. I tried Reason 4 but got upset with the copyright protection because I couldn't demo anything (cut off after 5 minutes). So I used "alternative channels", spend most of the night trying and the next day I spend the last of my savings on Reason 4. It didn't take long before I got to appreciate having 2 totally different sequencers vs. only one. I read
so many complaints about the Reason sequencer over the years (both on the Reason forums back then and here) and just kept quiet because... honestly: I loved it. Yah, it had its quirks, but whatever Reason couldn't do for me Live could, and vice versa.
When Reason launched the rack plugin I started looking for other alternatives for my 2nd sequencer and initially turned to Native Instruments, Maschine in particular. Playing Kong using the Maschine pads (routed through Live)? I'm honestly somewhat hooked on that, being the nut who actually compared the Maschine 808 kit with Kong 808 and I can tell you that while they are different in some ways there's also plenty of overlap. Both are solidly awesome
I definitely became a bit of a Maschine fanboy but at the same time I also had to admit that the Maschine sequencer didn't fully weigh up to that of Reason. Some bias is in effect here because there's quite a difference between using Maschine stand alone or as a VST inside Live, one which didn't apply when I was using Reason as a ReWired client.
And then someone on Reddit reminded me of FL Studio. Which I demo'd last Thursday, no need for "alternative solutions" and I am going to be fully honest with you guys right now: I was
shocked.
For starters... Reason gives us the rack when you use the VST plugin. FL on the other hand launches the full DAW, sequencer and all. One which also allows me to record MIDI coming in from Live, just like Reason used to do. And it gets 'worse'; I was a die-hard fan of blocks mode because you could do some serious fun stuff with that. That pattern based approach is standard for FL.
Now, don't get me wrong here. I'm
not trying to make it sound as if FL is the perfect Reason substitute because it most definitely is not. Their mixer panel is laughable when compared to the Reason mixer but... then we're also coming to the issue at hand for me that I couldn't use that with Live anymore anyway. Reasons routing through the back panel is also absolutely superior within this comparison; while FL can do some of the same routing you'll have to 'dig' pretty deep sometimes (one possible keyword being 'Patcher'). Not to mention that those awesome Reason players are fully non-existent here, and don't get me started on things like Alligator.
But then it's also fair to state that this sequencer is pretty on-par and in some ways even way
beyond both Reason
and Live (MIDI data on top of an audio waveform so you can sync your stuff?). Reason players are very impressive. And then I discover the "formula controller" which I can use to insert mathmetical formulas which can then generate MIDI data to be used to control instruments and effects. Sure: the learning curve is almost vertical in comparison to the Reason players, but at the same time the potential pretty much goes into space, way beyond the players.
Ok, enough rambling.
My point: there are some
serious competitors out there which, from my point of view, can easily compete in both feature amount
and price. Reason Studios has a mobile app for Apple only. FL on the other hand has one for all platforms. Not just that: the desktop platform provides full support for the mobile platform and I can actually load my "mobile presets" directly into my desktop environment. Even when I'm using said environment as a plugin within another DAW like, say, Live.
As I said before: I was shocked when I discovered all this. That weird "one buy, all future updates are free" FL environment which somewhat combines Live's session view with Reason's block mode and Melodyne's vocal processing plus Kontakts sampling options together with a barrage of effects and other instruments? Providing free updates for over 20 years now?
And they're catching up, I can tell you that!
Anyway, I can't help but start wondering how this is all going to work out for Reason Studios. People who are using it stand alone complain that hardly any new features are finding their way into the sequencer, and I know this has been an ongoing issue for quite some time now. And if you're using the rack plugin... there's also not that much new and exciting stuff over there either; though bassline generator is
definitely an awesome development. But at the same time I can also argue that I can somewhat achieve the same thing with beatmap if I "abuse" the whole thing, the concept as-is isn't that new, not even for Reason Studios.
Long story summed up: I bought into FL Studio this week and I didn't just got my 2nd sequencer again, I got one which can even do
more stuff than the Reason and Maschine sequencers
combined (from my pov the Reason sequencer was always superior to the Live sequencer, hence me not mentioning it here). And if I then look at the recent past... Reason introduces an HD interface with 12. FL Studio pushes their mobile platform, a frequency shifter usable for multiple approaches and more where most of this stuff was provided free of charge.
I can't help think that Reason is losing its edge in comparison to some of its competitors. That's not saying that Reason is no good anymore or any of such nonsense,
heck no, but like I said before: I was honestly shocked when I discovered some of the stuff FL Studio provides right now (like a whole sequencer through a VST plugin).
Alas, felt the need to vent a bit. Because for me synths are a passion and while I am pretty much in awe with all the features I now have at my disposal I also can't help stop thinking back at my time with Live + Reason. Been using that combo through most of the last decade so yah, it has its effect on me.
But I cannot help wonder if things aren't going to run out soon eventually. Though I honestly hope that I'm dead wrong here.