WHAT’S ON YOUR HARD DRIVE?

Purple Disco Machine

German funk pioneer Tino Piontek – aka PDM – tells of his love affair with Cubase and vinyl crackles STEINBERG CUBASE

“For more than 15 years now, I’ve been working with Cubase and, for me, it’s still the best DAW that’s out there. When you work with one piece of software for so long, you get to know all of its little secrets and it becomes a part of who you are. I’m so much quicker on Cubase than any other platform; it’s the centre of my studio. Great bundled VSTs, too… such as the vintage compressor and HALion SE3.”

ARTURIA OBERHEIM SEM V

“The SEM synth is brilliant at both analogue bass and lead sounds, and it gets used in most of my songs. The Italo bassline from

Bodyfunk was made with this. It’s also the perfect plugin for arpeggios and acid lines. Easy to use, too – a nice, simple interface, with useful presets.”

NATIVE INSTRUMENTS SCARBEE BASS COLLECTION

“Anyone who’s listened to my music will be aware that I love acoustic bass guitars. Unfortunately, I can’t play the bass very well, so I mostly end up using this plugin instead. This was the bass for both the Jamiroquai and Hercules and Love Affair remixes that I did. It’s definitely one of the best plugins around for slap and fingerbass; nice and warm, but also a bit rough at the same time. In less than ten minutes, you can get a killer bassline out of it!”

IZOTOPE NECTAR 2

“This FX plugin is just amazing. A true handyman for vocals. In the past two years, I’ve done all my vocal editing with Nectar. You have presets for every genre, and the effects give the finished product real impact. It brings a vocal to life.”

WAVES ABBEY ROAD VINYL

“This is true plugin magic! It adds instant vintage vinyl warmth to the master bus, or you can use it for basslines and drum groups in order to make them sound a bit more vintage and ‘pumpy’. And why not finish the whole thing off with some vinyl noise and crackles?”

“In less than ten minutes, you can get a killer bassline out of it!”