Audio Science

Most people who use Reason are very excited about it, and often look forward to updates more than software users… usually do. Thus, since Propellerhead made that one thrilling breach in their SuperGlued Lips Policy by showing the new semi-modular synthesizer to be introduced in the *next* version of Reason (Reason 4, it’s supposed), 5 months have elapsed, and that may as well be another 2 years on the Propellerhead User Forums, where anticipation, zeal, and impatience are mounting exponentially.
To quote one staff member’s tight-lipped quote of Stephen Hawking in their blog:

“Eternity is a very long time, especially towards the end.” - Stephen Hawking

One of the most amusing recent forum posts:

Let’s make this easier for you call my stuff predictions about what has happened and what is going to happen.

1) Few things what Propellerheads has done at NAMM and with promoting next version of Reason has expected from their normal policies.
* The original idea of showing Thor at NAMM was not invented at Propellerheads. It came from outside at late 2006. No leakings involved.

2) Next version of Reason interacts differently with rack stuff. Navigating in rack has been made easier with at least TWO new technicues.

3) The policy “need to be run on slower machines” has loosen noticeably. There are new devices in addition to Thor. And in fact Thor is not the biggest invention. After announcement and release forum speculation will show that the REAL INVENTIONS were not shown at NAMM and are greatly related to UI-side.

4) It has support for multicore processors. Propellerheads have prepared for more than 2 cores and that is the main reason for next version to “get punch out of multicore processors.” This is the final touch of finally being up to date (or tomorrow) with flagship production.

5) After NAMM Propellerheads decides to add one feature that was never intended to be included in next Reason version.

6) Tempo automation.

7) These are correct.

If my “predictions” are proven to be even partially false I will personally eat one kilogram of meatballs in Propellerheads office downstairs (säkert med lingonsylt).

Response from Tage (Propellerhead staff member):

Hehe. I hope you like meatballs.

It would seem that just because they gave a great product glimpse, they don’t feel pushed to put Reason 4 on the market until they’re good and ready.

Propellerhead founders have been quoted as saying that they don’t intend to remain the “3-product company”. That was just before they discontinued Rebirth, taking that number down to 2 products.

Obviously, being a 2-product company isn’t quite what they have in mind, so we can expect that they must be working on at least one new product besides Reason. A couple of people have expressed concern as to whether or not Propellerhead is turning enough profit to stay afloat, as sales must have declined in the 2 years that Reason 3.0 has been out (resulting in more humorous threads and a statement to the contrary by the staff), but the fact is that they are hiring more people all the time, especially product engineers and programmers.

Amidst a lot of waiting, we can be sure of one thing: whatever they release, it’s going to be good.

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