Hit the tab key and the rack ﬂipped around to reveal the back panels of all the modules, complete with audio inputs and outputs for each device plus CV control connections. The user interface mimicked a rack full of equipment, allowing instruments, effects and mixers to be linked together in order to create a complete production setup. Released in November 2000, Reason's approach was broadly similar to the likes of Logic and Cubase, but took the virtual studio concept even more literally. Propellerhead spotted a gap in the market and had ended ReBirth development in 1999 to focus on a new product that would mount a serious challenge to the big boys: Reason. The maturation of home computer technology meant that it was now realistic for home users to create complete virtual studios from software. Reasonableīy the turn of the millennium, the DAW revolution was well under way. Although similar protocols had already been released, ReWire was the ﬁrst to live up to expectations and has since evolved into a de facto industry standard. The ReWire protocol, another joint project with Steinberg introduced to ReBirth in 1998, allowed MIDI and audio data to be transferred between applications with ease.

ReBirth sparked a wave of interest in virtual instruments and showed just how effective real-time software synthesis could be. ReBirth's highly sophisticated synthesis engine offered realistic emulations of Roland's TB-303 synth and TR-808 and TR-909 drum machines. In its short lifetime, Propellerhead has created revolutionary music softwareĪt the time, software synthesis was most deﬁnitely in its infancy. ReCycle was revolutionary in its own right, but dance music producers really sat up and took notice of Propellerhead in 1996, with the announcement of ReBirth RB-338, one of the most important virtual instruments in the history of electronic music. The application's REX and REX2 ﬁle formats remain popular to this day. Samples could be sliced up in ReCycle and then transferred to a hardware sampler for playback.

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