What does Daniel use to make music?

Well, this is one of the most popular questions being asked to pretty much any creative except people who write books for some reason.

Short answer: It doesn’t matter

Long answer, well, let me write down what software and hardware I have…

This keeps changing regularly, so expect this thing to be completely out of date.

Main system is currently a Mac Pro

• 16 core, usually if you make the choice always go with the middle ground that has the highest clock rate.
• 96 gigs of RAM
• Just whatever graphics card it came with. GPU is really not important to audio work
• 8TB SSD

No laptop at the moment

I have a PC for game development as well:

• RTX 3090 (it was impossibly hard to get one)
• i9 10900
• 64 gigs of RAM
• 1TB SSD
• 4TB Hard Drive

My audio interface is

• Apollo X8
• Apollo Twin
• Apollo Satellite (i dunno they gave it to me as a “deal)

My Headphones are

• AKG K271
• AKG K721

May AKG rest in heaven

My synths…

• Moog Voyager, Rack version
• Access Virus TI, Rack version (RIP)
• Dave Smith Prophet-08, Rack Version
• Teenage Engineering OP-1
• Novation Bass Station
• MEGAfm

I use whatever Native Instruments Keyboard is. I uh… komplete kontrol or something?

Additionally I use Softube Console, both of them

OOOOK now here’s where the list goes crazy. I own a bunch of things, but I tell ye, fabfilter is the bomb and get all of their stuff ok?

My DAW of choice is

• Ableton Live

My VST…

• ALL of Fabfilters things
• Audioease Altiverb and Speakerphone
• ALL of D16’s things
• Native Instrument’s Komplete, but not Komplete Ultimate. I’m not a sucker, NI. Get your sh*t together
• ALL of Plogue’s stuff
• ALL of Sonic Charge’s stuff
• u-he Diva and Repro-1
• Omnisphere 2
• Turnado
• Most of Spitfire’s stuff
• ALL of Soniccouture’s stuff
• A little bit of 8DIO but I’m not a big fan
• Imperfect Sample’s Steinway
• Most of Embertone’s stuff
• Output’s stuff, although I’m not a huge fan

Here’s my personal opinion on how to make music.

Get all the free things you can find, just smash them into each other and have fun!

All this stuff that costs money ultimately really doesn’t matter if you’re still learning the ropes of making music. It’s WAY MORE IMPORTANT that you know your stuff rather than how big your library is. There is NO point collecting a big database of stuff. Rather, learn with what you have already.

And again, don’t force yourself. Have fun making music! Ignore what everyone says!

Here’s another view of what my workspace used to look like. One day I’ll be back at that, but currently I’m mostly on a laptop and that’s it.

This is what my life is… constantly.