Native Instruments is one of the few audio production hardware manufacturers to successfully transition into DJ, audio production and digital workstation software. And, to be fair, they have done quite well for themselves. "TopTenREVIEWS Bronze Award" winner KORE, Native Instruments' music production software suite, is further proof of this.
Equally suitable for stage and studio, KORE strikes an incredible balance between ad hoc performance and meticulous production, offering a broad palette of instruments and effects and combining them with powerful-albeit-easy to use tools and features to make the most of any stage or step of production or performance. Filter that through a well-organized, clutter-free interface and you have the makings for one of the few audio production software programs that can truly be considered a digital audio workstation. However, as many have noted, KORE often stretches itself thin by trying to do too much. Why? Well, for one, having distinct suites for various tasks can a.) make for a mountainous learning curve, and b.) while a simple interface can make tasks simpler, a complex, functionality-diverse program is still, well, complex.
It is still a vast improvement from its previous version, which supported KORE soundpacks alone, was limited to 50 instrument sounds and lacked other features now available in the current version such as Mapping Editor, Performance Presets and support for VST and other plugins, which, to be honest, is quite an improvement, albeit a correction that most manufacturers would have avoided in the first place.
Who Uses It?
- Bryan-Michael Cox
- David Isaac
Strengths
- Performance Presets
- Sound Matrix
- Organization
Weaknesses
- Complexity
Get Organized
Despite the shroud that the "cult of the artist" seems to cast over the actual process of creative development, organization is, as with science, paramount to success. Sure, experimentation, again like science, is necessary to discover new methods, sounds and the effects of loops and plugins upon or against a track in the process of a remix. But even experimentation needs--nay, demands--a modicum of organization to see to it that the process can be repeated (yes, like science). In that regard, KORE is ideal.
With a production-ready sound library that makes genre-specific, integrated sound engines available off the bat, a drag-and-drop-enabled sound matrix for serious sound experimentation and sequencing and a mapping tool to make sense of the mess (should there be one) afterward, discovering brilliance and accessing it again and again (and again) is always a few clicks away.
KORE supports a wide variety of plugin effects, including ReWire, VST and others, as well as external controllers and MIDI devices produced by Native Instruments and other manufacturers. As many producers and artists have a variety of sound sources, samples, plugins and effects that are not Native Instruments-designed in origin, this adds a great deal of flexibility, one that translates to improved performance and production.
As for audio file format support, KORE supports standard audio file formats like MP3, WMA, FLAC, AAF, OGG Vorbis and other not-so-standard "lossless" audio file formats like FLAC and others.
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