Programming midi drums help

[Len911]

[ What I meant when I said I play guitar by feel is that I just didn't think in terms of bars and beats- strange I know.
I am playing my guide tracks to a click at the moment...
Cheers Les[/quote]

What I meant,lol, is that it doesn't seem strange at all, and is probably the true correct way, click, oh dear, lol!

~Len

[mojobone]

I don't think a single set of samples/grooves or a single VI is enough; disc space is cheap, and you want a really broad selection of grooves/styles, unless you want to just go ahead and learn to play the drums. Just know that once you're infected with the beat, there is no cure. It starts with not being satisfied with your homely poked-out-on-a-keyboard rhythm tracks, next thing you know, you own 115 sampled kits, two real ones and you're playing drums three nights a week. At least, that's what happened to me.

I'm enough of a drummer to know I'm not much of a drummer, compared to guys I know who can play a blues shuffle fifty different ways, but the cool thing about 2015 is there's only about five different grooves you'll hear on commercial country radio. I'm exaggerating, maybe a little, but I recommend learning to play a little or a lot. You have to write drum parts, you'll need to learn to think like a drummer, and it can be very freeing to not be concerned with the key signature. I can't emphasize enough that the best way to learn is to play with other musicians, but barring that, try to play along with recordings of musicians, so you don't end up sounding like a machine, cuz you coulda got that from a machine, right?

Most people who can count to four can learn to pound out a simple backbeat in just a few minutes; you see people doing this in music stores, just keep it simple, think Charlie Watts, not Keith Moon, until you can get a little swagger between your kick and snare, then branch out to other time signatures; it can look complicated, but usually you're allowed to keep time with one limb or another, there's eighth notes or quarter notes somewhere on the kit, and everything else is a subdivision of the beat. For example the kick drum plays quarter notes, the snare, half notes (on 2 and 4) and hihat gets eighths. Everything that can be notated can be understood as a duplet or triplet; the intro to the Allman brothers' Whipping Post is in 11/8, but you can count a single measure as three bars of three and one bar of two. 5/4 is really 3+2. Usually, though, the simplest thing you can do with the drums is the most effective thing. Something like 95% of all the music americans danced to for the last couple hundred years is four on the floor; the rest is waltz, 6/8 Ballad, two-step/polka and the ubiquitous train beat. That's about it, barring the three or four most popular Latin rhythms, which are another kettle of fish, and don't get me started on New Orleans, I'll talk your ear off.

I find it helps the feel if I start recording against a sampled groove or MIDI beat extracted from a drum performance; this works better than a metronome, in most situations, and with most guitarists, in my experience. I tend to gravitate toward stuff that sounds like a band, so the next step is to overdub bass and replace the drums, which handily enough, I can record on the electric kit, using the same samples from the original groove; even better if I can record bass and guitar to the original loop, then replace the loop, while the bassist does a second take. Two musicians in a room always sounds more like a band than one and with two complete takes of bass, I can edit and move stuff around, fix any flubbed notes with Melodyne, and if I've planned ahead, I can knock out basic rhythm tracks for six or eight tunes in a single morning or afternoon session.

[jonnybutter]

While we're on the subject....

Can you, Mojo, or anyone else, recommend a reasonably priced drum controller? Or one that at least you have found to work well triggering samples even if not so cheap? It seems like a lot of e drums etc. are very tied to their internal sounds (aka 'brains' ha ha). I never did get my cheapo Kat multipad to trigger samples consistently (and I wasn't the only one) so I'm on the hunt.

I would echo Mojo - I've found that playing the drum parts in live or semi-live and not quantizing too much produces much better results than programming (unless you want that stiff sound of course). I am pretty good at playing drums on a keyboard (after about 30 years of doing it tho!) but playing with sticks is way better. In fact, I have used the cheapo multipad's internal sounds on some tracks just because the much more natural feel makes up for the slightly cheesy internal sounds (sometimes).

Anybody?

[lesmac]

Thanks Mojo for the detailed reply, excellent stuff.

I had Live at Filmore East when I was 17. Wish I had've got into recording then

I will review these posts from time to time as I go. Next track I work on I'll find a groove first. It's all about the feel.

Once again everyone thanks for your time and the help, it is gratefully received.

[mojobone]

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/TD4KPS This is reasonably rugged, portable and will get the job done; just add sticks, a kick pedal and a throne, and you're still probably under a thousand USD. (maybe add a monitor, if you're gonna gig it) It costs less than my first electric kit, an Alesis DM10Pro, and I plan to pick one up for casual gigs, because setup is super quick and simple-you could keep it in a closet when you're not using it, because it folds up, but mine will probably live in the truck with my other gig rigs. The TD4K can be upgraded with a mesh-head snare, which I'd recommend, cuz you can't do rimshots or cross-stick without it, though there are workarounds if you're using VIs.

My home rig is the Alesis DM10Pro, plus this: http://www.alesis.com/controlpad Sadly, it's been discontinued; it has no sounds of its own, but makes for a great and cheap expander, once you figure out a way to mount it. (there's hardware available, but I just used industrial Velcro) Alesis replaced it with this: http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/SamplePadPro which I can't recommend. If you can add a laptop and interface, you can run a VI like Addictive Drums; I probably will, cuz I've never yet heard a hardware electric kit with internal sounds that satisfied me. Speaking of which, if you're already an acoustic drummer, you're never going to be entirely happy with the feel of an electronic kit, better to get triggers for your own tubs if you're particular.

There are a couple of cheaper options, http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/DMLiteKit or http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/DM7XSession but I doubt they'd withstand too many full-on rock gigs as well as the more pro-oriented stuff from Roland, Yamaha and Pearl, but they're adjustable enough to achieve good dynamics and will trigger reliably for quite a long while if you don't beat them to death. Mine are four years old and still work flawlessly. Yamaha has an entry level kit that also deserves a look. http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/DTX400K

[jonnybutter]

Thanks so much for the reply! I am going to copy and paste this into the other thread I started about this, if you don't mind.

I'm not a real drummer, but always wanted to be, so...I try. I like the look of the Alesis and will try to find one, or the next model. It's exactly what I need. Then it's a matter of saving up for the Roland or something like it.

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/TD4KPS This is reasonably rugged, portable and will get the job done; just add sticks, a kick pedal and a throne, and you're still probably under a thousand USD. (maybe add a monitor, if you're gonna gig it) It costs less than my first electric kit, an Alesis DM10Pro, and I plan to pick one up for casual gigs, because setup is super quick and simple-you could keep it in a closet when you're not using it, because it folds up, but mine will probably live in the truck with my other gig rigs. The TD4K can be upgraded with a mesh-head snare, which I'd recommend, cuz you can't do rimshots or cross-stick without it, though there are workarounds if you're using VIs.

My home rig is the DM10Pro, plus this: http://www.alesis.com/controlpad Sadly, it's been discontinued; it has no sounds of its own, but makes for a great and cheap expander, once you figure out a way to mount it. (there's hardware available, but I just used industrial Velcro) If you can add a laptop and interface, you can run a VI like Addictive Drums; I probably will, cuz I've never yet heard a hardware electric kit with internal sounds that satisfied me. Speaking of which, if you're already an acoustic drummer, you're never going to be entirely happy with the feel of an electronic kit, better to get triggers for your own tubs if you're particular.

[mojobone]

I am going to copy and paste this into the other thread I started about this, if you don't mind.

Please do; I'm all about the dissemination. If I'd wanted to reserve any rights, I know how to do that.

[BillPerry]

Sorry I'm a little late on this post, but like Marc Blackwell I'm a fan of EZ Drummer as well. The Song Creator function Marc mentions is cool. You can also add to or subtract from the patterns, and when you're happy with the result you can print each part to its own audio track for further eq''ing, balancing, etc. More functionality than my meager skills can handle!

[lesmac]

Thanks for the input Bill and everyone else.
To be honest at this stage I'm just gunna keep using Pro tools midi editor and my BFD kits and work at getting better.
I have a friend who uses Ezy drummer so when I next see him I will ask him to demo it for me.
Jamstix may be a possibility but for now it's learn your chops time for me.