Give your musical creativity a boost. - Soundation.

Not everyone (especially these days) can afford the new Reason, Ableton or other excellent music software. So when I encounter something that is free, quality drenched, with options for more. It gives my musical creativity a boost. -  Soundation.

I always loved creating music. Not a talent by far but passionate nonetheless. Another  thing we are a sucker for here at WorldOfDeepHouse is software that is free to use. 

PowerFX, one of the premier producers of samples and loops, decided to make a stable and intuitive music  program that is fairly easy to use.  No need to break your head over the installation nor the required updates. Just go online, log in and do your thing... for free.

So what do you have to choose from? Well for starters a grand selection of samples in high quality. You can acces them trough an integrated store or you can use a desktop application under the name AudioLocker. Where you can store your purchased loops or you can decide to import your own. Whatever makes you tick.

The Interface

It's quite slick and very responsive. It has all the standard features you would expect in music studio software like this. Of course the volume for each track, pan, create loops and zoom in for more detail. And other nice edit tools you can use.

The browser section of loops on the right hand side is clear and easy to use. It also comes with a pre-loaded set of free samples. Additionally you can purchase more samples from their audio store and add it to your AudioLocker. This is the desktop application I referred to earlier. It is cloud based so you are sure to keep your little gems stored.

How to Use it?

Well there are a few things that are tremendously useful when it comes to the different reasons why you should use it in the first place. For instance the automatic time stretching feature. This is extremely handy when you import loops from a different tempo for instance. The easiest way to get going is to simply drag the loop into the track. Where you can edit it to your needs. Cut, slice, stretch, pull drag, add and edit away!

It's worth mentioning that the options are not endless of course. And some more in depth features might be lacking for those winter hardened producers out there.
Of course you have the effects that come with the program. the tradional delay, reverb, phaser and others. Which in this case have additional effects to bolster your sounds. 
Such as 'Fakie' which is an emulator or 'Degrader' which will roughly mash it up.

Instruments? Why yes of course.

You have a programmable drum machine to make the drums beat to your hearts desire. The SAM-1 that is basically a virtual instrument filled with piano and organ patches.
It is good at this point to remember this is a FREE audio software package that is offered to us music hungry folk. So don't expect instrumental heaven to open it's doors.

Like with all new things it may take some time to fully master all the features and editable sound options. But overall this is a user friendly program that offers a lot for a great 'price.'
You also have loads of automation options, so you can easily manage your parameters for each musical creation.

The simplified interface makes swift changes to your creation possible, while maintaining  a good overview over what the hell you are doing in the process.

The loops and sounds.

You have a fairly good build out sound base to begin with. Even though it is not like for instance the Reason soundbank you get with the initial purchase  You do have quite some choice. And for those who (this might be the case fairly quickly) want more. You have the possibility to upload your own loops and samples

The integrated Soundshop has an impressive number of choices from their vast collections of sounds in different genres. If you are not sure, just listen to the demo songs before purchase to get a feel of the sample loop.


You have the purchase option trough Paypall, which is pretty standard for most of us.

Once you purchased your selection of loops you can access them in your 'Bought Sounds' folder. Not only does this give you a back up of the loops purchased, it also gives you the quick and easy drag-and-drop option to start using them immediately.

Maybe you would like to import your own? Then AudioLocker, which you can purchase from the store will be the tool of use. This Adobe Air application will allow you to integrate your loops with the Soundation browser easy and fast. You can use up to 5GB storage for your uploads. 

You can import entire sample libraries to your AudioLocker simply by drag-and -dropping it. And also vice versa, maybe you are looking for an easy way to get your purchased loops onto your desktop.

So what happens once you made a song?

Well you might be surprised in this case. The songs will be written down in an .sng file that is saved & loaded by Soundation application. But of course you have options. Such as saving the file to your AudioLocker for instance.

But once your track is completely finished it can be written/mixed down into a WAV file or uploaded to the Soundation server so you can stream it online. They have a very nice widget that will do just that. And can be embedded on your website or shared on Facebook.
You can try out Soundation for free over at www.soundation.com . 

To wrap it up:

All by all it's a great intuitive tool you can use in your browser to get started with some musical ideas. Even though it's all done quite well. For the pro's it might lack a thing or two. Not to say that it's not a great starter tool that can deliver some nice results.
There is an extensive guideline online that will support you in most if not all of your questions. And the fact its a free to use and easy to access trough your browser, just makes it all more impressive. 

And another good piece of news for the Soundation users is the fact that you can use an external MIDI controller to handle your instruments within the application.

This can be done in the three following steps:

"Step One: Connect your midi keyboard to your computer.
Step Two: Launch Soundation Studio and click the button in the right corner that says MIDI. The browser will ask you for permission to run the java applet. Press accept. The button will display a spinner to indicate that it’s loading the java applet. Wait for the spinner to disappear.
Step 3: Select the channel you want to play with your keyboard (only instrument channels works with midi, i.e the blue ones). Press a key on your midi keyboard and you should hear the selected instrument play the note.

If you experience a delay between the time your press a key and the sound being played back please lower your buffer size by clicking Settings -> Edit Settings
Please note that lowering your buffer size can result in maxing out your computers CPU faster than on a higher buffer size."
Source: Soundation gets midi- Audiosilverlining

So there you have it. Another creative free musical outlet that will keep you busy for a while. If I wasn't at the office right now I would give it a go.
But it will be difficult to convince my co workers this has to do with our work package . 
Even though I can't imagine any one disliking a nice deep beat :P I better keep it to the sound of typing while im drewling over the things I talk about.

Let us know if you used Soundation or know of any other browser based free music program so we can share it with the rest of the world. And keep on creating!!

Cheers,
Tommy