Drum Machine

[bilug]

Just curious if anyone has any experience or ideas on the best way to track from a drum machine.

I'm running PT6.9.2 with an MBox and use an Alesis SR-16 for my solo work.

It sounds good, but sounds like a drum machine with everything panned straight up the middle.

Any tips or tricks to taking the drums to the next level?

[albee1952]

My tip; dump the box and check out Addictive Drums. Look at some demos on youtube or at xlnaudio.com. GC has it on sale right now for $99 and its a real bargain for great sounding drums and midi loops. Similar to ezdrummer(which I also own) but I think they did a much better job with it. You can filter the grooves so its much easier to audition them and find what you need to build your songs.

[bilug]

Thanks! Sounds like something to check out for sure!!!

[nst7]

If you want more realism, definitely check out software drum programs, like Albee mentioned.

Addictive Drums will be a huge improvement, and it's the cheapest right now.

You might also look at BFD2, which is on sale for March at $149 (however, I'm guessing that's because a new version will be coming out very soon).

There is also EZ Drummer and it's big brother, Superior Drummer 2.

EZ Drummer is on sale for $79.99 this month, and the expansion packs on sale for $39.99.


But, if you want to use your Alesis, your best bet is to run your sequence several times, each time recording individual drums to separate mono tracks (kick to track 1, snare to track 2, etc.).

This way when you're done, you can pan each one where you want, and add eq, compression, and effects as needed to each track.

[bilug]

That was the way I was guessing nst7....with a drum machine I'm pretty limited.

BUT..if I was to do that, would it be better to go MIDI?

I have NEVER used MIDI and am fearful of diving into that aspect of recording!

[filosofem]

I'm going to go against the grain and say that that most drum machines have swing and swing can be added after the fact with Pro Tools Elastic Audio and Quantize.

[bilug]

Filosofem...you know the style of music I play

[ejwells]

You might want to have a peek at Steven Slate SSD4.
I have several drum programs (SD2, Addictive, Strike), but Slate is all I use now.

[nst7]

And SSD4 is on sale for $199 at Guitar Center this month.