Koala Sampler - Excellent (mostly) for Audio Tracks!
Well ... not as a replacement for them, but as the best workaround for now.
Koala Sampler just gained AUv3 capability with a low-priced In-App Purchase. It works fabulously as an audio clip launcher for NS2. Much better than Multitrack Recorder IMO.
Koala has 64 pads that can be loaded with audio samples. Each can be triggered by midi note. It has very good realtime audio stretch for adapting to tempo changes. Audio can be set to one-shot, looping, with hold or not. What this means is you can load up your samples, then add patterns to the timeline with a note to trigger patterns. I prefer to make one pattern the length of each for each clip so that I can give them names and have a visual indication of the length.
I far prefer this workaround over Multitrack Recorder for the excellent time-stretch, ability to assign clips to choke groups, and better visual representation in the timeline. There are some fun FX to play around with too, and they assign nicely to the macro knobs and XY by default As with Multitrack, unfortunately you can't record external audio inside NS2, but it isn't too hard to record in the standalone app then import to the AUv3.
I feel like this makes NS2 far more suitable to my needs while waiting for if/when audio tracks arrive.
Comments
Yes, this is quite a sweet combo indeed!
I think there is still a place at the table for MTR but Neon and Koala AUv3 arriving within hours of each other have opened up some great new possibilities inside NS2.
For longer audio clips people may still want to use MTR as it has the advantage of allowing you to drop in at any point during the clip by moving the NS2 timeline around whereas with Koala you need to trigger and listen to the whole clip (like with Slate), unless there is something I am missing there?
The shared audio pool and drag/drop between Neon and MTR are also handy and of course Neon brings an AUv3 audio editor to NS2, though I am yet to dive in deep with that side of it.
I've been having a lot of fun with Koala inside NS2.
Glad to hear about successful work-arounds.
Is the “excellent time-stretch” the main benefit over using Slate?
Good point.
That is a good question. TBH I've never been able to get myself to use Slate for audio track workflow. It's just too far removed from how I've worked with audio tracks in other DAWs. I do know that Koala is intuitive and super easy and fun to get my head around. I really should give Slate more of an effort.
Interesting. I suffer from the opposite. From my experience with TRG, Slate is just my go to option for audio. I really should try other apps to see if there are advantages missing from my Slate workflow.
Triggering samples in Slate is exactly the same workflow as to how I triggered samples in the Akai S950 from an Atari running Cubase a long long long time before the concept of an “audio track” ever existed anywhere except on physical tape.
Ah, running Cubase in sync with the multitrack tape using smpte timecode - awesome days. Pushing the limits of what could be done with analog recording & digital sampling without resorting to printing the digital elements to tape except at the point of mix-down. I’m talking about PWEI, Jesus Jones, “In Gorbachev...” era The Shaman, The Prodigy, The Young Gods, Meat Beat Manifesto, EMF - we were all doing it this way at that point in time (pre ADAT Multitracks anyway)
So for me personally audio tracks in a daw have always felt alien whereas loading samples of all shapes and sizes into Slate pads and triggering them individually from midi tracks feels so natural as it’s how I’ve literally been doing it since those heady, exciting & pioneering days in the late 1980s.
The only thing missing in Slate (and NS2) sampling-wise as far as I have been concerned has been the lack of timestretching the samples in-house, something that was so incredibly easy & quick to do on the Akai. However now that Koala (and Neon - what a week this has been for audio samples in NS2 !) has brought this to the party the missing gap I’ve been yearning for since getting NS2 has been filled.
So, so, so happy 👍😊