stems traktor Pro 2.10.1
mark Settle·
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Traktor Pro 2.10.1: Stems for all… well more DJs anyway

stems traktor Pro 2.10.1

Today, Native Instruments announces Traktor Pro 2.10.1, a Stems focussed version that unlocks the Kontrol S4 for Stems, and in turn adds Stems decks to the Traktor GUI, as well as making them all mappable to third party controllers. Now we just need the other software companies to get on the Stems train, for classic tracks to get the Stems treatment, and the DJ world will be a better place for every DJ.

[responsive_youtube HzEKk0yGsfg]

The words from NI HQ:

Native Instruments expands Stems support with TRAKTOR PRO 2 update 

Latest TRAKTOR software opens Stems to millions of TRAKTOR DJs with Stem View, and brings Stems control to the best-selling TRAKTOR KONTROL S4 controller

Berlin, February 22, 2016 – Native Instruments today released TRAKTOR PRO 2.10.1 – a free software update that extends control of the Stems format to all TRAKTOR users. The update implements the Stem View directly into TRAKTOR’s Stem Decks, making it possible to control Stems with any TRAKTOR setup or mapped third-party controller. The update also makes the revered TRAKTOR KONTROL S4 officially Stems-ready. And to make it easier to start playing Stems, 65 Stem tracks are now available for free from www.native-instruments.com, while partnering online stores are offering 25% off Stems releases for a limited time.

Adapted from the hardware display version for TRAKTOR KONTROL S8, S5, and D2, the in-app Stem View provides a clear, color-coded overview of a track’s four Stems – granting all TRAKTOR DJs in-depth, multi-channel control over a Stem track’s elements. Owners of the acclaimed TRAKTOR KONTROL S4 can now expand their performance possibilities and experience hands-on control of Stem files. Each stem can be muted and unmuted using   the Remix Slot buttons and pads. And each stem’s volume or filter can be controlled using the loop encoders. TRAKTOR KONTROL F1 also becomes a powerful and portable way to control Stems. DJs who are curious about Stems but not using TRAKTOR can now easily try out the open format – the free TRAKTOR demo also includes Stem View.

Both demo and licensed TRAKTOR software owners can start playing Stems right away with 1.5 GB worth of free Stems tracks available from www.native- instruments.com. The package includes 65 high-quality Stem files of varying tempos and genres derived from selected MASCHINE Expansions. Additionally, online retailers Beatport, Bleep, Juno, Traxsource, Wasabeat, and whatpeopleplay are each offering 25% off their repertoire of Stems releases for one week only. Until February 29, 2016, shop customers can enter a voucher code at checkout to receive the discount.

Since Native Instruments announced Stems in May 2015, the industry response has gathered considerable momentum in the wider music community. The legendary Carl Cox says: “When I play Stems, my creativity as a DJ goes up through the roof”, and radio icon Pete Tong confirms “Whether it’s remixing a classic on the fly, adding a personal stamp to a new tune, or being able to re-interpret your own music in a live environment really means the possibilities are endless. Stems are the next level.”

Showcasing the power of Stems now open to all TRAKTOR DJs, a video featuring TRAKTOR specialist Eric Goldstein demonstrates the creative possibilities with Stems using TRAKTOR KONTROL S4.

Further product information and press material

The free TRAKTOR PRO 2.10.1 update is now available for download from the NI Service Center.

More information about the update, a free TRAKTOR demo, and voucher codes for Stems offers are available at:

www.native-instruments.com/stemsforall

A video featuring TRAKTOR specialist Eric Goldstein showcasing the expanded Stems support using TRAKTOR KONTROL S4 is available at: https://youtu.be/HzEKk0yGsfg

See also

A walkthrough video of the performance showcasing Stems control on the TRAKTOR KONTROL S4 is available at: https://youtu.be/sTx6V5X8j-Q

[responsive_youtube sTx6V5X8j-Q]

STEMS DEMOCRATISED — SORT OF

Bulletin pointing this:

  • Traktor Pro 2.10.1 makes the Kontrol S4 Stems ready (probably just the latest one)
  • Traktor Pro 2.10.1 adds stems view to the software, making the S4 viable for Stems.
  • Traktor Pro 2.10.1 adds Stems mapping, effectively opening up the whole world of controllers to Stems.
  • Everyone gets 65 free Stems tracks to play with.
  • For a limited time, Stems are 25% off.

For me, this is great news. It’s certainly a move in the right direction the get some traction (or should that be traktion?) for the Stems format. But it still needs more official support outside of Traktor. Mixed In Key’s Flow and DJ Player Pro for iOS aren’t enough to make Stems a mainstream thing.

It’s available today as a free download through the NI Service Centre. Actually it was available this morning, hence me having screen grabs already.

44 Comments

  1. I would love to see stems for current top 40 hits. I am an open format DJ that does mostly mobile gigs. On occasion I do play house music and this is amazing for house.

    1. Given the digital nature of music these days, putting out DJ specific Stems files really can’t be that much trouble for studios. They’re of no use for the general public, but as a DJ specific format, it’s certainly one way to encourage DJs to play the track, especially as it’s just a standard MP4 in the same file if you don’t want to Stems.

      Personally, I want the 80s and 90s to be dipped into, but given that more analogue nature of recordings back then, getting stems for those may well be harder.

      1. I think the big boys are just nervous about the potential ease with which their copyrighted material could be used for bootlegs/mashups/remixes without their consent.

        When there’s only a stereo master available, their work is relatively safe – but start providing tracks with separate vocals/bass/drums etc and it opens the floodgates for plagiarism and the like.

          1. Because way too many record labels are afraid of any form of change. One of my favourite distribution labels (Metropolis Records) ~still~ refuses to sell a high quality digital version, even though they’re usually charging the same rate as one would pay for the album itself in physical form, and if you ask about FLAC/AIFF/WAV versions all you get back is “our digital versions are VBR”… Okay, but what is the base and target bitrate, why are you only selling a run down lossy MP3 version when a lossless version would sell even better, and then they don’t have to deal with the hassles of actually shipping out a physical product….

            Why can’t they just embrace the changes that have come with the market and then actually reap the benefits instead of trying to stick to a sales format and platform that hasn’t exactly been the most relevant for ten years (traditional brick and mortar combined with mail order).

            1. Just a note, metropolis records sells a lot of their collection on bandcamp, which can be downloaded as FLAC. I don’t buy much from them, but what I have is flac. :)

              1. Definitely good to know, thanks for the tip as it will save me shipping costs! ^_^ One of my favourite artists from the industrial world (Aesthetic Perfection) is pretty much only through them in North America.

                1. Yeah. There’s good stuff out there, though. I’m kind of “over” aesthetic perfection, but neck deep in the industrial music scene. If you start using bandcamp there are TONS of awesome industrial artists on there. :)

                  1. I’m definitely going to have to check it out then. Haven’t had much exposure to newer industrial music since, well… LIFE closed down, and New City moved (then died), so discovering new artists is always a good thing. Thanks for the tips/info!

              1. I have a distinct feeling not many are going to touch the “don’t/never buy mp3’s” and “music should be free” thoughts even with a ten foot pole, mainly because too many people use that to justify NEVER giving money to an artist for their work. I personally don’t mind paying $2 USD per track (even if it’s actually costing me $2.85 CAD or so these days) if I can at least get it in a high quality lossless format (preferably FLAC as of late), and of course discounts (aka “standard” pricing of $18-22 CAD or so) for the full album in one go.

                1. im an artist too but i don’t charge for mp3 because mp3s are worth 0 pennies, like back in the days ppl used to record music for free to cassette. And if they really loved it they could buy on vinyl/CD.

                  so anyone who buys mp3 is wasting their money on zero value

                    1. i never charge anything for mp3, also they often come for free when buying something tangible like an actual vinyl disc

      2. I remember when The Shamen released all the stems of Move Any Mountain, the quality of them was unbelievably poor. I don’t know if that’s indicative of a general problem with separating analogue recordings, but they sounded shite.

        1. Listening to some classic dance tracks shows just how home made really poorly mastered some of this stuff was. But spending the time to clean them up and remaster them probably doesn’t make the process to attractive to labels, especially as the sales are likely to be in the realms of thousands to DJs.

      3. Unfortunately the only way to obtain those 80s, 90s stems is not really legal. I will not point any further, but there are some pretty massive stem packs floating around the interwebs…

  5. Let’s not be so celebratory: I want to know how they did this. When STEMS first launched, the statement was to the effect that Traktor doesn’t farm processing to the GPU, so 16 waveforms would add too much CPU processing to make audio reliable. So either:
    a) they’ve re-coded the entire programme to utilise the GPUs
    b) the rendering of waveforms is done on CPU, which they said didn’t work
    c) they could do it all along and just didn’t include it for audience delayed gratification.

    Forgive my skepticism, but I won’t be touching this upgrade with a barge-pole.

  7. It’s really funny that everyone seems to completely “disregard” the problem of un-mastered stems. Do you really believe that if you take a set of stems to a big room PA system, it will sound OK? 99,9% it will sound like shit, just because everyone will be slamming all stems up to the very reds to make them sound “OK”, as the un-mastered version will be by definition -10dB from everything else in that playlist. Unless you play all night long from stems. Good luck finding enough of them, lol.

    And please don’t mention that “NI’s master limiter” thing. That will sound probably even worse than the most slammed mixer output.

        1. There’s mastering done inside the Stems creator tool and it works perfectly. The stems aren’t regular stems once they are packaged up as they all have the required mastering done in the file before distribution as an mp4 as five tracks (one as the master).

          There’s a video halfway down here http://www.stems-music.com/stems-is-for-producers/ that explain it better.

          If you produce, maybe do a few yourself? Would be nice to see more producers sell them and give us more choice. The tool is free.

          Nothing stopping us from repackaging remix stems found online in remix comps or from shady websites… well, apart from the legalities but when has that stopped us playing a mashup?

          1. Stems…individually mastered? Are you sure we’re talking about the same process here?

            Stem creator tool mastering perfectly? Again, are you sure we’re in the same page here???

            1. Yeah.

              The whole mp4 is mastered and all you’re doing is turning up and down the volume on a track. There’s a ceiling to its volume and that’s set in the mastering tool when creating a stem file.

              It’s not like a traditional stem ‘per se’.

              You could always fudge the mastering on the entire mp4 if you don’t know what you’re doing but labels and artists have been.consistently as good as a standard track. There’s the video to show how to do it right. You can’t escape bad mastering on files done by some people at home, just as they could do in Ableton/Logic etc but the quality of tracks available commercially are as good as an original.

              I’ve not heard any that sound bad in the many I’ve bought this last six months.

              Check the video out that NI have included on the stem creator tool. That’s what packages them into the mp4 container file.

              The video explains how they work. They aren’t just in unmastered stems thrown into a file and it’s upto the user to judge. Remember, they have to be dummy proof to have wide adoption with DJs who don’t produce.

              It’s like playing a standard mp3 to the ears

              1. Yeah I accidentally had normalize on when exporting my individual parts(stem tracks) for final use in the a Creator tool.

                The result was bad even though the Creator tool has settings to boost or limit, my hats and percussion(for instance) was too loud as well other parts, I found myself pulling the volume down for the stem parts in Traktor.
                I was used to normalize on for samples. It took me a few minutes to figure it out since all the volumes and other stem tracks I was making were ok.

                I’m no pro by any means but if a person can get a full track made in a Daw and know enough to keep it out of the red. Then the stem parts will all have the limit on them already (assuming normalize isn’t on), The Stem Creator tool won’t even have much to do other than put them together.
                Forgive me I am new at this but that’s my experience so far.

                Even just looking at the waveforms on the screen it’s easy to see the sound levels of each stem part in comparison to another.

              2. I find it very difficult to let things get done automatically. Last time I’ve tried that with Izotope Ozone, it was OK sounding but nowhere close to the character I wanted for that specific track. See, mastering is not just pushing volumes, it also defines the final color & shape of your track. And automated things tend to sound generic by definition.

                But anyway, I guess Stems could be workable for certain cases.

                1. Have a play with the packager and see what results you get. It would be interesting to see how it compares. We all have a different ear and I’m sure you’ll master something different to the next guy. As you have to tweak it manually in the stem creator tool you get a little more control over compression etc than if it was automated.

                  It’s a free download from the link above and also has the 12 minute video guide (which admittedly is an almost beginner guide, but that’s a good thing).

                  There’s all the free content as well to listen to. I bought lots of Toolroom in my collection and they are indistinguishable from the standard mp3 but you may pick up on something I can’t hear (my ears are shot already).

      1. 10.10.5 16 GB Ram 2.2 GHz Intel Core i7 Chip S4 with 2 F1’s Traktor Pro. The problem is when I’m using a remix deck in loop, The loop stop and starts and it drops out which makes it useless. Also all of my fans come on because my CPU is running in overload. I never had any of these issues with the older software. I have been using Traktor for over two years…I may have to switch back to Serato

  10. Where does stems fit into the workflow of a psytrance dj, such as myself?
    Granted, I do mostly just A – B mixing, back and forth, but such is the nature of driving, energetic trance mixing.
    Seems the whole stems concept is much, much more geared towards house/EDM/mashups/trap DJs who wish to blur the dj/producer lines.

  11. Seems like they are trying to force Stems down everyone’s throat.

    “The legendary Carl Cox says: “When I play Stems, my creativity as a DJ goes up through the roof”, and radio icon Pete Tong confirms “Whether it’s remixing a classic on the fly, adding a personal stamp to a new tune, or being able to re-interpret your own music in a live environment really means the possibilities are endless. Stems are the next level.”

    What are non endorsed DJay’s saying? The only folks that I see that’s making a big deal out of stems is NI. if NI is banking their future on stems? Good luck.