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Which YT "Reviewers" Do You Trust?

The mention of the annual update video brings up a good point. Different reviewer styles are valuable for different reasons based on how long a product has been in market.

If something is new and still on an introductory sale, I of course like Daniel James's 'Avin a Look style as well as Pete Checkley's content. Just to get a sense of what it offers and try to cover enough patches in enough different uses to see if there are any major warts.

For products that have been in market longer, AKD's are great. I also like super deep project walkthroughs (especially, when the file is made available) like Ben Botkin or Jdiggity's "Aunt Marge's Waltz" walkthrough on the synthestration channel, going so deep as to cover needing to change the envelope in certain patches in certain use cases. It can really help get over the wall when some products are a bit more complicated to use (see: OPUS, due to its wild variety of patches and naming convention...though not as odd as the old version was).
 
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MartinH. said:
You can't trust them. Most are paid, and even if they aren't if they are primarily a review channel they don't have the time to test things properly to give a thorough review. It's not financially viable to work that long on a video and there is likely a bias to review only popular stuff to get more views over the search function.

There is one guy though whom I trust when he says something is good: Dan Worrall. I think he has enough of a reputation to lose, that he'll think twice about ever hyping something up that doesn't deserve it.
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Well I appreciate what you’re saying, some of us actually enjoy being able to investigate which libraries truly are some of the best ones and put in the time and effort because of the love of the music in order to share our opinions. I agree with you that it’s not financially viable which is why we are paying for running The Sampleist out of our own pockets and do not have any form of advertising or affiliate relationships. This is certainly not a profit operation for us but it’s something we really enjoy doing. Everyone on board is a working Composer and they are also in it for the love of the music.
 
doctoremmet said:
There are reviews and there are what I call presentations that demo a library. There are also composers with a YT channel. Both have their uses. I do NOT typically regard any of the videos as completely objective reviews though, in my humble opinion none of them really are. I consider the videos to be mostly entertainment, like a presentation about a subject I’m interested in. Because of course the presenters put in a lot of time and effort and expect to get something ‘out of it’. That’s completely fine with me, and to be expected.

Some great people on Youtube are:

- Simeon. Lovely guy, fantastic musician. Does a million first looks each year, and I’ve learned a lot from him - just in terms of usually the second video that’s gonna be available other than the vendor’s. Gives an excellent overview of stuff, and mostly is just fun to watch. Bringer of positivity, and that’s how he approaches any new instrument.

- ThomC. That’s right! Composes beautiful folky indierock and has a voice like an angel. And also the best British sounding accent a Belgian bloke has ever developed (but I think he did live in the UK for a while). Unique approach to reviews. I like the fact that Thom is not afraid to occassionally have and express positive opinions on stuff most VI-C members wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole. Do even more singing Thom, I love it.

- Daniel James. Brilliant composer in my eyes. Knows what he’s talking about. Isn’t afraid to express opinions about stuff he dislikes, that most other presenters wouldn’t address or maybe (too) mildly. Maybe that’s what he’s now known for. And although I do get a laugh out of his rants every now and then, it is his music, his approach to composing and his way of rigorous testing that had me mesmerized. Put in some quick runs, see how agile a string library is. Copy and paste this MIDI and let’s compare to Areia or CSS shall we? And his absolute perfect and fast execution of quick tests like that have taught me a LOT. Plus, his noodling - take a pad sound, press down that sustain pedal, load in that native American flute or whatever, and play a bloody brilliant bunch of melodies for the next quarter of an hour. If that’s your thing, you’ll love James. I know I do.

- Dirk Ehlert. Another streamer with skills. Just the other day I was watching his Oceanea II stream (again), for obvious reasons. The man plays Beethoven’s 9th off the top of his head. Nails it. Chuckles and cracks a joke and then goes on to compose some brilliant sounding little cue in an hour, that sounds better than anything I have ever done and will ever do. While chatting and doing give-aways. And planning his next move (literally by the way, the stream gets interrupted when he learns some flight to Spain got canceled). Does he make reviews? Maybe not. Does one get to listen to the use of a new library in context of the very activity one is supposed to undertake with it (composing)? Absolutely. Invaluable. And fun.

And there are many others. Chris Siu. Of course Cory Pelizarri. Blakus.

For plugins: Michael White (mixing with Mike). For synths: Starsky Carr, Alex Ball.

And there are a lot of excellent videos done by fellow forum members. Geniuses like Luke @jononotbono - Nathan @Soundbed - Dave @dcoscina - Nico @Akarin and many others who put in a lot of work to share their experiences and opinions. Edit: not forgetting @Alex Niedt - maker of the best demo in ‘22 so far
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Doc, give us a spin @ The Sampleist. We really are trying to make a difference and show off what we feel are the best libraries that we ourselves are using not only with an overview of the library or plug-in but also with a compositional exercise and breakdown. The only thing we’re looking to get out of it is to grow the channel so that we get a little bit better visibility. Have a peek let me know what you think.
 
bbrylow said:
Doc, give us a spin @ The Sampleist. We really are trying to make a difference and show off what we feel are the best libraries that we ourselves are using not only with an overview of the library or plug-in but also with a compositional exercise and breakdown. The only thing we’re looking to get out of it is to grow the channel so that we get a little bit better visibility. Have a peek let me know what you think.
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Hiya. Back when I typed that bit you’re quoting I may not have acknowledged your existence hehe, but I have been ‘in touch’ with your colleague Pete Checkley off and on, even before The Sampleist - and rest assured that I am well aware of your work and have even actively posted some of your videos here already. I can sense you’re taking your ‘job’ seriously and are enjoying what you’re doing. Keep it up!
 
Mike Greene said:
Seems pretty obvious to me:

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I get your theory that I should act on reviewers' mistakes, and in many cases, that makes sense. But my theory is that reviewers don't use a library like Blue in the same way an actual customer would. (Or Hip Hop Creator, where for starters, a customer won't be at 120BPM.)

Customers spend the necessary time to actually use a complex library and especially with Blue, feedback has been great, while the reviewers in question (not all reviewers, just the ones I'm referring to) simply loaded the library for the first time, hit record on their screen record app, and started poking around, seeing what words they could make. With mixed results, since Realivox Blue, like any complex library, is not a "Get great results in your first 20 seconds!" library.

Ultimately, I don't think the reviewers in this case (not you, by the way) really care that much about how useful the "review" actually is. They wanted to make a review, and they did. In under a half hour, no editing, no muss, no fuss. Done. Another video for their page. Or in some cases, a justification for the ad dollars they're charging me.

To be clear, I'm not slamming reviewers in general. There are lots of good ones, including you and the many others people have listed here. But there are also a bunch who are in this game for their own benefit (YT revenue, fame, or whatever) and not really for the sincere benefit of their viewers. They're a totally different animal than my customers, so I don't spend that much time catering to them.
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Amen Mike!
 
doctoremmet said:
Hiya. Back when I typed that bit you’re quoting I may not have acknowledged your existence hehe, but I have been ‘in touch’ with your colleague Pete Checkley off and on, even before The Sampleist - and rest assured that I am well aware of your work and have even actively posted some of your videos here already. I can sense you’re taking your ‘job’ seriously and are enjoying what you’re doing. Keep it up!
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Thanks Doc. Pete and I partnered to start the channel because we had the same frustrations that many of you had. After so many years in the music business and quite a number of years at one of the larger site that was doing reviews, we both got tired of the way the game was being played and decided that even if we were going to pay for this out of our own pockets we were going to do this in such a way that we could do legitimate reviews for things that we felt were worth telling our viewers about. You’re absolutely right that I didn’t read that date and we’ve only been around for just over a year now. Thanks for the support the only thing we’re looking to get out of this is to be able to grow and get the ability to tell the story to more people because we’re certainly not getting rich on this deal. And that’s the way it’s going to stay.
 
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