Propellerhead Reason 5 review

Ben Pitt Read more August 16, 2010

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£268

Price when reviewed

Propellerhead Reason looks, behaves and sounds unlike any other music production software. Its interface takes the virtual hardware concept to obsessive lengths, complete with virtual rack screws, handwritten labels and jiggling animated cables. Operationally, it’s a closed system with no support for VST plugins, and it can’t even record from an audio input. Thankfully, then, the quality of its virtual rack of synthesizers is without peer at this price.

Those who want to use Reason’s synthesizers and also record live instruments have two options. One is to run it in conjunction with other software such as Cubase using ReWire, which opens multiple lanes of audio and MIDI data between the two. The other is to use it with Propellerhead Record, whereupon the two applications merge seamlessly. It’s still a closed system, but one that has all the key areas – audio and MIDI recording, synthesis, mixing and effects – covered.

As with previous updates, Reason 5 comes with a raft of significant new features. Kong is a drum machine that combines sample playback, analogue-style synthesis and, for the first time in Reason, acoustic modelling. Each of its 16 drum pads can use any of the above techniques and effects are built in too, making this a comprehensive self-contained device for drum tracks.

Kong’s built-in sampler is basic but well equipped for the task, and includes an option to load an individual drum hit from a loop saved in REX format. The analogue-style voices are up to the usual high standards, but the modelled voices are disappointing. They lack vitality at modest settings, while pushing the controls to more extreme settings makes them sound synthetic.

The new loop-playback device, Dr. Octo Rex, replaces Dr. Rex and can load eight REX loops and switch between them. The updated sample library reflects this with banks of loops that work well together. Dr. Octo Rex has other new talents, such as the ability to reverse individual drum hits and to draw pitch, pan and filter envelopes with the mouse.

Various sample-playback modules can now capture audio from a live input, turning them into fully fledged samplers. Capturing, truncating and looping sounds and loading them into a sampler is extremely quick, and it’s even possible to capture samples during playback – perfect for layering up sounds as live performances.

Frustratingly, though, Dr. Octo Rex lacks this live sampling function because it works with REX files, which Reason can’t generate. This is presumably because Propellerhead wants to protect sales of its ReCycle software, which slices WAV files into individual drum hits to turn them into REX loops. However, many audio packages integrate this kind of function at no extra cost, which makes the £132 exc VAT price for ReCycle seem excessive.

There are plenty of smaller improvements, including a large input meter, a tap tempo function, plus various enhancements to how MIDI data is handled. Blocks Mode lets users work on discrete sections of a track – verses, choruses and so on – and arrange them more quickly than by copying and pasting individual objects. This kind of time-saving feature can stifle creativity rather than encourage it, though. Propellerhead also claims better handling of samples and synth presets in the Browser window, but we still found it cumbersome.

Anyone already using Reason and Record only needs to upgrade to Reason 5 to also update Record to 1.5. This brings a smattering of handy little features such as Reverse and Normalise commands, plus a new effect: Neptune. This provides automatic pitch correction in the style of Antares Autotune – a staple ingredient of modern pop music. It’s a little crude, with nothing to match the note-level precision of Cubase 5’s VariAudio. However, Neptune has a few tricks of its own, such as the option to perform the desired tune with a MIDI keyboard, either to correct tuning problems or to generate completely new melodies.

With so many toys to play with, Reason is certainly entertaining to use. However, there are times when its charms wear a little thin. The main culprit is the impenetrable tangle of cables that gathers around the back of the virtual rack. Despite various efforts by Propellerhead to simplify this interface, we’d much prefer text-based labels and lists for signal routing.

Another frustration is that the interface tweaks introduced in Record haven’t made their way to the stand-alone version of Reason. The vertically stacked rack makes little sense on a widescreen display, but those running Reason without Record can’t have two racks side by side.

Reason is so unusual that it’s hard to judge against its peers, but there are a few areas where comparisons can be drawn. Its arsenal of synths and samplers is a cut above the rest, but its effects are merely competent – and neither can be upgraded with VST plugins. The lack of a convolution-based reverb is particularly regrettable. Meanwhile, all those virtual knobs, buttons and cables require an organised mind to keep on top of.

Even so, Reason provides a vast array of music-making devices for an extremely reasonable price, and its inspiring synthesisers beg to be explored. For those producing electronic music on a finite budget, it’s hard to fault.