It's difficult to shop for a digital audio workstation, or audio editing software in general, without coming across Propellerhead Reason.
Born out of an expanded version of Rebirth, itself one of the first comprehensive virtual synthesizers for PCs in the late 1990s, Reason delivered a full-fledged software studio, complete with a virtual representation of rack-mounted instruments and effects boxes and a complete mixer.
Now in version 10, Reason still has plenty to offer—including a nice bundle of new synthesizers.
If you were put off by Reason before, know that not much has changed; its user interface idiom has aged considerably in an era of brilliantly usable software workstations.
But existing fans—or anyone intrigued by a software portrayal of a room stocked with hardware synthesizers and samplers— should take a close look.
System Requirements and User Interface
Propellerhead recommends either a Windows 7, 8, or 10 multicore machine, or a Mac running OS X 10.7 or later, both with 8GB RAM and 12GB of free hard disk space.
The company also recommends an audio interface with an ASIO driver for PCs (Macs' built-in sound hardware works fine), along with some type of MIDI controller keyboard.
For this review, I tested Reason 10.4 on a quad-core MacBook Pro 15-inch (2017) laptop with 16GB RAM, a 256GB SSD, a Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 second-generation audio interface, KRK Rokit 6 G3 powered studio monitors, and an M-Audio Axion 61 mk2 MIDI controller keyboard.
The Reason interface has matured over the years, but the basic format hasn't changed much.
The Browser on the left lets you choose instruments to add to your Rack, which sits on the top right by default.
The bottom right usually contains the Sequencer window, for adding, recording, and editing tracks.
It's still possible to flip the rack around and virtually re-cable the instruments, a charming if now almost-archaic concept—especially since populating the mixer in Reason is much more automated these days, compared with the Mackie 1202-like, rack-mount original that was found in the program.
Reason lets you customize the heck out of this; you can put the rack on a second monitor, for example.
A dual-screen Reason setup across a pair of 1440p monitors would be amazing.
New Blue and Dark themes give the program a more contemporary look, though the mixer and all the dialog boxes remain unaffected, and you have to quit and restart to see each one.
More importantly, zooming, scrolling, and otherwise navigating a track while editing it remains obtuse.
It's too heavily mouse-based and disorganized, and as a result, it's tricky to find exactly the region you want to work on.
The UI idiom is clearly geared toward sound designers, or synthesizer enthusiasts that are thrilled to have a virtual, unlimited, free rack of modules that would have cost prohibitive amounts of money not many years ago.
That makes it less well suited to someone coming over from, say, Reaper or Apple Logic Pro X, or moving up from GarageBand.
I realize some Reason fans may take issue with me calling the UI a con, but I've always found it rather fiddly.
And I was making electronic music in the late 1980s and 1990s, back when rack-mount modules were omnipresent.
I'm glad to get away from that in modern DAWs!
Instruments New and Old
Since we last looked at Reason with version 10.1, Propellerhead has gone and released several new point updates with significant features.
The sequencer side of the program is bolstered, with new multilane MIDI editing, adaptive snap-to-grid, the ability to move multiple faders, and clearer solo and mute buttons.
For 10.4, Propellerhead added a new Monotone Bass Synthesizer and Rytmik drum machine, both of which are geared toward the mobile Compact edition of the program but are welcome additions nonetheless.
Several other instruments remain standouts.
Europa, which Propellerhead bills as a "shapeshifting synthesizer," excels at massive synth stabs, aggressive leads, and textured pads to which you can apply various filters.
You can use any sample as a wavetable, and you can also load samples into its Spectral Filter to use as a multiplier when filtering sounds.
The other module is Grain, which lets you take samples and use them as the basis for granular synthesis.
Both modules are stocked with presets that sit nicely in a mix and also continue to evolve and change over time.
Klang delivers a variety of tuned percussion, including a glockenspiel and a wine-glasses instrument.
Pangea adds a bevy of plucked, blown, strummed, and other instruments from around the world.
And Humana finally brings decent voice samples to Reason, with multiple choirs and solo singers to choose from.
All three of these sound nice, though it would have been better if each one contained more sounds.
For composing quickly, Reason gets new Loop Supply and Drum Supply libraries that work with the program's Kong drum machine and Dr.
Octo Rex player.
The formerly extra-cost Radical Piano blend samples with synthesis in a nod to mid-to-late 1980s early digital instruments, but in a much more realistic fashion than before.
The Synchronous modulator lets you run just about anything through it and modify its delay, reverb, distortion, and other characteristics over time in a way that would be difficult to achieve with straight automation.
Old favorite modules, like the ubiquitous Subtractor and Thor synth modules and the NN-XT sampler, are still present.
The biggest recent news is that for version 9.5, Propellerhead finally opened up Reason to support third-party VST instruments, which was a huge leap for the program, albeit imperfect in its execution.
Version 10.3 included a performance update to boost the speed of these plug-ins so that they worked as well as they do in other DAWs.
Perhaps the greatest thing about Reason remains its inspiring sound set.
Within about an hour of opening a blank project, I had a nice post-industrial groove going with appropriately grungy drums, ethereal textures from Europa, and an aggressive, overdriven bassline—all just by calling up sounds and playing them on the keyboard.
I didn't even touch the loop libraries.
(If you're focused on bundled instruments, it's also worth looking at Cubase Pro or Logic Pro X, both of which offer a lot of value in this department.)
Recording and Mixing in Propellerhead Reason
Ever since Propellerhead developed the standalone Record application, it's been possible to add recorded 24-bit audio tracks to your Reason compositions.
Some time ago, Propellerhead blended the two apps together, and Reason has become quite a capable standard-issue DAW as a result.
And over the years, Propellerhead has added real production facilities to the program, including Bounce In Place for rendering audio and Bounce Audio Clips to MIDI, and Pitch Edit for tuning vocals (albeit in a limited forum, as you can't drag a singer's individual notes to new ones).
While a DAW like PreSonus Studio One or Pro Tools offers much more robust audio editing tools, such as for comping vocal or guitar tracks from multiple takes, Reason can at least get the job done.
The program's mixing desk, in particular, remains flexible and sounds good, thanks to its SSL 9000k analog modeling, sweet-sounding EQ and compression by channel, that console's famous master bus compressor, and send and insert effects.
I love the sound of the channel compression, although I would appreciate more granular metering than the five LED dots (only one of which I could ever get to light up in my testing, even with a low threshold and high ratio).
If you're more focused on realizing your musical ideas quickly, and less so on recording live instruments or producing finished masters, Reason has plenty of built-in tools.
And if you're a budding sound designer who's looking to get under the hood of different types of synthesizers and samplers, it's tough to go wrong with Reason.
The same goes for anyone who has an electronic music bent and wants to compose music quickly.
But if what you're looking for is to record podcasts, you should look at an audio-only-focused app like Adobe Audition.
A Favorite for a Reason
It's worth comparing Reason, FL Studio, and Ableton Live before making your purchase; all three programs let you create electronic music quickly, albeit with different approaches.
(Also worthy of note: FL Studio is finally available for the Mac, so you have all three options now regardless of your computer platform.) If you're looking for a mainstream-style DAW to record a band or score for film, Reason is less compelling.
But even then, it serves as an excellent bundle of virtual instruments to work with as part of the process thanks to the ubiquitous ReWire setup, which lets you hook up and sync Reason with another DAW and control it all from one transport.
Our Editors' Choice audio editors remain Logic Pro X on the Mac and Avid Pro Tools on the PC (though the latter is, of course, also available for the Mac).
Pros
Versatile array of bundled instruments.
Useful sound set serves as instant inspiration for new electronic tracks.
Fast composition workflow.
SSL-style mix compression and EQ.
View More
Cons
Aging rack-mount-and-patch-cable UI idiom.
No surround or scoring features.
Track editing still lags the competition.
The Bottom Line
Despite its flaws, it's tough to knock Reason as an all-in-one recording, mixing, and mastering tool, particularly if you're into electronic or hip-hop music and want a tremendous array of sounds and beats right out of the gate.
It's still as much fun to use as it has always been.
It's difficult to shop for a digital audio workstation, or audio editing software in general, without coming across Propellerhead Reason.
Born out of an expanded version of Rebirth, itself one of the first comprehensive virtual synthesizers for PCs in the late 1990s, Reason delivered a full-fledged software studio, complete with a virtual representation of rack-mounted instruments and effects boxes and a complete mixer.
Now in version 10, Reason still has plenty to offer—including a nice bundle of new synthesizers.
If you were put off by Reason before, know that not much has changed; its user interface idiom has aged considerably in an era of brilliantly usable software workstations.
But existing fans—or anyone intrigued by a software portrayal of a room stocked with hardware synthesizers and samplers— should take a close look.
System Requirements and User Interface
Propellerhead recommends either a Windows 7, 8, or 10 multicore machine, or a Mac running OS X 10.7 or later, both with 8GB RAM and 12GB of free hard disk space.
The company also recommends an audio interface with an ASIO driver for PCs (Macs' built-in sound hardware works fine), along with some type of MIDI controller keyboard.
For this review, I tested Reason 10.4 on a quad-core MacBook Pro 15-inch (2017) laptop with 16GB RAM, a 256GB SSD, a Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 second-generation audio interface, KRK Rokit 6 G3 powered studio monitors, and an M-Audio Axion 61 mk2 MIDI controller keyboard.
The Reason interface has matured over the years, but the basic format hasn't changed much.
The Browser on the left lets you choose instruments to add to your Rack, which sits on the top right by default.
The bottom right usually contains the Sequencer window, for adding, recording, and editing tracks.
It's still possible to flip the rack around and virtually re-cable the instruments, a charming if now almost-archaic concept—especially since populating the mixer in Reason is much more automated these days, compared with the Mackie 1202-like, rack-mount original that was found in the program.
Reason lets you customize the heck out of this; you can put the rack on a second monitor, for example.
A dual-screen Reason setup across a pair of 1440p monitors would be amazing.
New Blue and Dark themes give the program a more contemporary look, though the mixer and all the dialog boxes remain unaffected, and you have to quit and restart to see each one.
More importantly, zooming, scrolling, and otherwise navigating a track while editing it remains obtuse.
It's too heavily mouse-based and disorganized, and as a result, it's tricky to find exactly the region you want to work on.
The UI idiom is clearly geared toward sound designers, or synthesizer enthusiasts that are thrilled to have a virtual, unlimited, free rack of modules that would have cost prohibitive amounts of money not many years ago.
That makes it less well suited to someone coming over from, say, Reaper or Apple Logic Pro X, or moving up from GarageBand.
I realize some Reason fans may take issue with me calling the UI a con, but I've always found it rather fiddly.
And I was making electronic music in the late 1980s and 1990s, back when rack-mount modules were omnipresent.
I'm glad to get away from that in modern DAWs!
Instruments New and Old
Since we last looked at Reason with version 10.1, Propellerhead has gone and released several new point updates with significant features.
The sequencer side of the program is bolstered, with new multilane MIDI editing, adaptive snap-to-grid, the ability to move multiple faders, and clearer solo and mute buttons.
For 10.4, Propellerhead added a new Monotone Bass Synthesizer and Rytmik drum machine, both of which are geared toward the mobile Compact edition of the program but are welcome additions nonetheless.
Several other instruments remain standouts.
Europa, which Propellerhead bills as a "shapeshifting synthesizer," excels at massive synth stabs, aggressive leads, and textured pads to which you can apply various filters.
You can use any sample as a wavetable, and you can also load samples into its Spectral Filter to use as a multiplier when filtering sounds.
The other module is Grain, which lets you take samples and use them as the basis for granular synthesis.
Both modules are stocked with presets that sit nicely in a mix and also continue to evolve and change over time.
Klang delivers a variety of tuned percussion, including a glockenspiel and a wine-glasses instrument.
Pangea adds a bevy of plucked, blown, strummed, and other instruments from around the world.
And Humana finally brings decent voice samples to Reason, with multiple choirs and solo singers to choose from.
All three of these sound nice, though it would have been better if each one contained more sounds.
For composing quickly, Reason gets new Loop Supply and Drum Supply libraries that work with the program's Kong drum machine and Dr.
Octo Rex player.
The formerly extra-cost Radical Piano blend samples with synthesis in a nod to mid-to-late 1980s early digital instruments, but in a much more realistic fashion than before.
The Synchronous modulator lets you run just about anything through it and modify its delay, reverb, distortion, and other characteristics over time in a way that would be difficult to achieve with straight automation.
Old favorite modules, like the ubiquitous Subtractor and Thor synth modules and the NN-XT sampler, are still present.
The biggest recent news is that for version 9.5, Propellerhead finally opened up Reason to support third-party VST instruments, which was a huge leap for the program, albeit imperfect in its execution.
Version 10.3 included a performance update to boost the speed of these plug-ins so that they worked as well as they do in other DAWs.
Perhaps the greatest thing about Reason remains its inspiring sound set.
Within about an hour of opening a blank project, I had a nice post-industrial groove going with appropriately grungy drums, ethereal textures from Europa, and an aggressive, overdriven bassline—all just by calling up sounds and playing them on the keyboard.
I didn't even touch the loop libraries.
(If you're focused on bundled instruments, it's also worth looking at Cubase Pro or Logic Pro X, both of which offer a lot of value in this department.)
Recording and Mixing in Propellerhead Reason
Ever since Propellerhead developed the standalone Record application, it's been possible to add recorded 24-bit audio tracks to your Reason compositions.
Some time ago, Propellerhead blended the two apps together, and Reason has become quite a capable standard-issue DAW as a result.
And over the years, Propellerhead has added real production facilities to the program, including Bounce In Place for rendering audio and Bounce Audio Clips to MIDI, and Pitch Edit for tuning vocals (albeit in a limited forum, as you can't drag a singer's individual notes to new ones).
While a DAW like PreSonus Studio One or Pro Tools offers much more robust audio editing tools, such as for comping vocal or guitar tracks from multiple takes, Reason can at least get the job done.
The program's mixing desk, in particular, remains flexible and sounds good, thanks to its SSL 9000k analog modeling, sweet-sounding EQ and compression by channel, that console's famous master bus compressor, and send and insert effects.
I love the sound of the channel compression, although I would appreciate more granular metering than the five LED dots (only one of which I could ever get to light up in my testing, even with a low threshold and high ratio).
If you're more focused on realizing your musical ideas quickly, and less so on recording live instruments or producing finished masters, Reason has plenty of built-in tools.
And if you're a budding sound designer who's looking to get under the hood of different types of synthesizers and samplers, it's tough to go wrong with Reason.
The same goes for anyone who has an electronic music bent and wants to compose music quickly.
But if what you're looking for is to record podcasts, you should look at an audio-only-focused app like Adobe Audition.
A Favorite for a Reason
It's worth comparing Reason, FL Studio, and Ableton Live before making your purchase; all three programs let you create electronic music quickly, albeit with different approaches.
(Also worthy of note: FL Studio is finally available for the Mac, so you have all three options now regardless of your computer platform.) If you're looking for a mainstream-style DAW to record a band or score for film, Reason is less compelling.
But even then, it serves as an excellent bundle of virtual instruments to work with as part of the process thanks to the ubiquitous ReWire setup, which lets you hook up and sync Reason with another DAW and control it all from one transport.
Our Editors' Choice audio editors remain Logic Pro X on the Mac and Avid Pro Tools on the PC (though the latter is, of course, also available for the Mac).
Pros
Versatile array of bundled instruments.
Useful sound set serves as instant inspiration for new electronic tracks.
Fast composition workflow.
SSL-style mix compression and EQ.
View More
Cons
Aging rack-mount-and-patch-cable UI idiom.
No surround or scoring features.
Track editing still lags the competition.
The Bottom Line
Despite its flaws, it's tough to knock Reason as an all-in-one recording, mixing, and mastering tool, particularly if you're into electronic or hip-hop music and want a tremendous array of sounds and beats right out of the gate.
It's still as much fun to use as it has always been.
