Aight, imma give you guys some tips/knowledge that ive accumulated, trust me this is some professional quality stuff
IDK if you guys already know this, but native instruments is one of the best companies for anything production related. Battery is a famous drum VST, i dont like it personally but its reallly good (i have a maschine so i dont need that shyt). I think every producer should have the full Kontakt library, kontakt is a beautiful vst that has a shytload of expansions, the factory content pack that i have has a lot of very high quality instruments, horns, bass, strings, choir, cinematic drums, all PROFESSIONAL quality (people use this for making movie scores). NI also has reaktor, which is a complicated synth VST that can make pretty much any sound ever if you use it right, thats the type of thing that top notch sound designers use, if you can use it you can be as good of a producer as your imagination allows. Theres also Absynth which is really good as well. Keep in mind these are for making synth sounds, if your more into just using instruments then kontakt is for you.
Trillian is the best vst ive found for any bass sounds. Theres some SICK sounding leads on there, most are low frequency, it emulates most classic synths, mainly moogs, idk where else to go with this but if you want to make good ass music GET TRILLIAN!
Sylenth is a must have, professional producers use this mainly for the preset sounds
My favorite synth right now is Alchemy, by camel. Camel makes a lot of good products too. Alchemy is one for real synth users, some complicated stuff, but the possiblities are endless with it, just like with reaktor and absynth. Those are all professional quality synths.
Then theres massive, also by NI, if you dont know what massive is, you probably arent deep enough into production culture. Massive is the synth i recommend to anyone (along with sylenth) who is trying to get into making synth sounds. Its very straight forward and intuitive, yet powerful. A lot of professional musicians (skrillex) use it.
Nexus, gladiator, and omnisphere, are three of the best vst's for built-in preset sounds. I have the nexus expansion library, which has an incredible amount of sounds of all types. Omnisphere ive never used cuz its annoying to set up and takes a lot of HD space, but from what i know its a total must have for any serious producer (i only dont use it because im more into programming synths than using presets). I dont use gladiator, it has good ass hip hop sounds, if you want to make trap/commercial beats gladiator is a must have, most of the dudes like mike will, metro, lex, use gladiator.
Right now i use Trillian for bass/cool ass leads, sylenth for presets/making subbass sounds, alchemy for making synths (trust me this shyt will up your game x1000), kontakt for instruments (strings, horns, orchestral, choir), Maschine for drums/misc. sounds, nexus for presets, and operator for different kinds of synths (ableton built in synth).
READ THIS!!!!: Instrument VST's are great for upping your game, but i cannot emphasize enough the importance of knowing what your doing. Most if not all popular DAW's come with quality vsts, enough to the point where if you know what your doing you dont need additional vsts. If you spend all your time collecting vsts but not learning simple programming, mixing, layering, etc., your wasting time. ALSO, id say learning how to use effects and learning how to mix, is just as important as learning how to make/use sounds. If you dont know how exactly to use a compressor, ASDR, gate, limiter, eq, filter, envelope, etc., you dont know what your doing. If you dont know how to use effects like reverb, distortion, delay, chorus, etc., you dont know what your doing. Knowing how to mix and use effects is the difference between amateur and professional producers.
I highly recommend three of my favorite mixing suites, Izotope, Sonalksis, and Waves plugins. These are all very professional quality mixing and effects suites, you shouldnt need more than these ever for mixing (rly you only need waves, that has a ton of mixing/effects vst's). Most DAW's come with more than adequate mixing/effects plugins, i use these though because theyre more powerful than the ones that come with ableton.
BTW OP, any professional producer would tell you that the type of music those dudes make could be made with most basic vst's. The shyt i use could make some ridiculous trap beats, i dont really go for that but sometimes i mess with it an get good results in like 10 minutes. If your lazy though just pick up gladiator, nexus, omnisphere, or/and sylenth, those will give you enough presets to do the job. But your never gonna make those quality of beats if you cant mix/use effects right.
