Cakewalk Guitar Tracks 2

Category:  Products / music software / daw software

Added: 08-Dec-02  |  Author: admin

New price: 50 squids!  |   S/H price: Not listed

Company Link:  Cakewalk

Cakewalk Guitar Tracks 2

Cakewalk Guitar Tracks 2 is an 8 track digital recorder designed primarily for guitarists and singer songwriters. It is designed to be as easy to use as a mulitrack cassette recorder or tape deck. It is not aimed at the major studio production market although it does boast some very impressive features including loop facilities ( for practising drop ins ) punch in - outs ( for dropping in ).

It also boasts stereo digital effects including delay chorus flange reverb and a vintage amp simulator (excellent for guitarists) Other features include a drag and drop drummer ( built in drummer who does not argue with you ) a slow blast ( facility to slow down your favorite riffs at correct pitch to learn and practise with>) It even comes with a lead ( shame it was not in the demo version !). With all these features what more could you want - a chromatic tuner yes that would be handy ! Well there it is so the only thing a guitarist needs now is plectrums and a guitar and maybe some talent as everything else appears to be in this programme !

GETTING STARTED

The installation process is easy a couple of simple questions ( your name etc ) which should be easy to remember and then input a two codes to prevent piracy and that is it ! A simple restart and then the programme analysis your pc to check everything is running ok and that is it ! None of the problems you get with vst where you have to change this or that everything is ready! I tried installing on three pc's - my ibm think pad A time 633mhz and my dads old 200mhz pc and in each occasion there was no problems with installation !Within 5 minutes of the package arriving i was starting my first masterpiece!

There are 2 main screens a mix screen looking like a tascam or fostex 8 track and an edit screen more similar to that of audio logic ! - Lets look at the mix screen first off all.

mix screen

In the mix screen you can highlight record on the track that you want to record on press record on the transport controls and that is it !... Oops forgot to plug lead in ! - Next select the track 2 highlight record and press record - that's it, got the vocals done; ( do the effects include auto tune ?)

edit screen



in the edit screen you can move your recorded parts around, cut and copy etc. You can also draw in envelopes for pan & volume etc; so this is the area view for all song-working editing and you flip between the Mix & Edit view as you work.

Within 20 minutes of getting package i was sending my first composition to my uncle in new york and my girlfriend in oz land - This is a great feature enabling you to work on a track and send it to someone else using the package via e mail there is an option for send in the edit menu and all you have to do is add the e mail ! For simple songwriting i would expect to see lists for collaborators using this very soon it is an excellent feature and cakewalk deserve a pat on the back for thinking about this !

DEEPER USE

So now it is time to see how deep this programme is and can it handle the guitarists sound neurosis? - First i tried out the tuner which is chromatic and very accurate; (i compared it to my TU-12 and it was at least as accurate).



It is easy; exactly the same as any other chromatic tuner on the market so even my dad could work it out ! The next step was to set up a click which proved slightly more tricky ( the f1 help key is very helpful ) but i worked it out in a couple of minutes . The best way to use this program is to click everything and see what it does ( there is unlimited undo :)))) (good thinking cakewalk we are guitarists after all !) The next thing was to get some drums .....

DRAG AND DROP DRUMMER



This was a feature that i was looking forward to and was very pleasantly surprised . Instead of the casio preset rythms as in the old keyboards there were some extremely good samples here ( did you get clearance for billie jean ) By opening up the DRAG AND DROP DRUMMER menu you can select one of 3 kit directories which comes with Guitar-Tracks:



'Dry studio kits' - 'Percussion kits' and 'R&B Hip-Hop kits' . In addition to this there are loads of fills as well as individual sounds.

This however is where this programme differs from a porta studio . You have to go into the edit screen an pick up the picture of the drums and drop it in the edit screen . This is a facility like cubase and logic offer but a new pc user might need to get used to this. Trust me though it is well worth fiddling around with as the drums are very good and the fact is you can build drum tracks up really quickly with fills and percussion and layer all the different sounds eq them and pan them before bouncing down ! So even the most complicated drum part may only take up one track !!

Another thing which i really liked about this feature was that you dont have to worry about stretching the loop it automatically does this which saves a load of time and with the increasing amount we are hearing about soundfonts i imagine that soon there will be loads more loops available !You can even load in your own drummers loops in so no more jealous drummer syndrome ! One point here is that it is best to choose the tempo first then work on drums as altering the speed when the drums are loaded di cause a noticeable drop in quality of sound .

ADDING FX

I found the mixing facilities to be good it was easy to lay down my acoustic guitar and then add the bass followed by my strat so i thought i would check out the fx ! This was interesting as the amp simulator had some very good sounds in it ( certainly enough for any guitarist anyway ).



The reverbs were great as indeed all the fx were you can even use direct x plugins so my hope is i can get auto tune quickly ! There was just one thing here which really annoyed me - and that was when i had decided which cabinet i wanted and the amount of drive i suddenly discovered that the sound had to be processed first. Sometimes there was an audition button and sometimes not which i guess must be a bug in the system . Maybe there will be a gt v2.1 soon ! This was the only thing i found annoying about this section and whilst the amp simulator i think was not as good as the pod or amp farm it certainly gives some very good sounds and considering the price i think the simulator is excellent value for money !

DROPINS

Well these were easy really set the loop start and stop times set the punch in and out star and stop times and that is it press record (just get it right this time OK ! ) The other thing you can do is cut and paste in the edit screen so if the second bridge was a little shakey then cut it out and paste the first bridge in ! This is maybe new to guitarists but a little exploration of the edit screen and That maddona tune is easily recreated !

FURTHER PRODUCTION



In the edit window you can draw in volume or pan fades and again this is a new feature for portastudio users but it is a very useful feature for production things and is very similar to logic in this sense . The best thing to do is try things out as if you do anything you dont like you hit undo ! It is easy to start producing and finding new things to do with this as it is half way situated between a porta studio and logic And as the sound quality is VERY VERY VERY good for all songwriters this programme has a lot to offer !

CONCLUSION

There is a lot to be said for this program it has a ll the tools required on board to write and produce very good quality demos certainly better than on any portastudio and with all the effects on board it is simple to use - if my dad can understand it then anyone can !

The quality of sound and ease of use with others over the internet is superb and for these facilities alone Cakewalk have really done themselves proud . The help is very easy to use and informative . There is always going to be some wizz kid who says yeah well vst does this and on logic you can do that - well tell them to shut up ! This programme is designed for songwriting and working with other people and is designed for guitarists ! If you want top range production then go and spend 14000 on pro tools ! If you want to get your ideas down quickly and get them to sound good maybe to work with other writers in a different country over the net then all i ask is ... DO YOU NEED ANOTHER PROGRAMME ?

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