In this Studio Nerds Podcast episode, I’m reacting to my brother Bolo (multi‑platinum, real OG) saying something I’ve been seeing all over the timeline: if you’re a studio owner or an engineer, you should learn FL Studio—like, now. He breaks down a real session where a younger artist pulled up with his laptop and interface, made the beat in FL, and recorded six songs in FL… and the big takeaway was simple: a lot of the newer generation isn’t thinking “Pro Tools first” at all. They’re building whole ecosystems with their friends—same DAW, same plugins, sending projects back and forth—and FL fits that workflow and budget. I also get into the “does FL sound better?” conversation. I’ve personally done null tests bouncing the same song out of different DAWs and had them null, so I’m not here to claim DAWs magically change audio with nothing on them. But I do think DAWs have signature sounds through their native tools (soft clippers, limiters, glue-style comps, etc.), and FL’s culture + ease of use + pricing model (buy once, updates) is a huge reason it’s cutting through harder than people want to admit. My opinion: Pro Tools still has a hard lock on a lot of pro mixing/mastering workflows, but the next five years of DAWs are going to look very different—and having real proficiency in FL is starting to feel “key.”