Native Instruments Introduces New, Open-Source File Format

This is no joke! The other day, music gear and software maker Native Instruments announced they have developed a new, open-source file format for music that will help DJs have more control over the music than ever. Appropriately calling it “Stems,” the file format is essentially allows producers to export a song as four separate parts which are then contained in a single .mp4 file that can be played by any modern media player. This allows DJs to have control over the volume of those separate parts, finally making on-the-fly acapellas and instrument soloing available to the DJ for the first time.

At first glance this looks like an AMAZING tool that will give mixing abilities to DJs that were once only available to “live producers” using multitracks or Ableton Live but one has to wonder how willing producers will be to accept and adapt to this new file format. After all, the format naturally lends itself to the “bootleg remix” (which gets very polar, mixed reactions across the indsutry) and would naturally change the way in which tracks are finished and mastered– producers would no longer be able to apply master compression to glue separate “stems” together, those signals must now be compressed separately and added together during actual playback (Native Instruments will be providing a free “Stems compiler” upon release in June). The process of separating and mastering 4 individual “stems” will undoubtedly be a frustratingly tedious task… one that few producers will have the time or funds to complete (though I’m sure mastering engineers would LOVE to charge 4 times the usual price to master a single track).

But who knows! This could be the next big thing in musical performance in this digital age of playback… only time will tell. We’re definitely stoked to see NI making moves like this which elevate the music industry as a whole, good on you NI. Check out DJ Tech Tools’ intro video below and tweet us if you think “Stems” is going to take off.

Onward technology, to the future!