Greetings everyone....
recently i've started to work on this album (MY FIRST PROJECT...) and i am confused...

as i'm using EZDrummer 2 and and MIDI Collection of pre-made beats, i'm confused as to if i should find a BEAT that suits my song and alter/modify it or simply use electronic drum samples....

all suggestions are welcome and tips about your personal preferences and approach to writing a drum part for your tracks, because based on this decision i'm looking to go forward with this project cause i dont want to end up using REAL DRUMS in some and EDRUMS in others....

 

Why not??
You simply pick the sounds that your respective song "asks for", and I hope your songs don't all sound the same?
Use whatever keeps your song going well!

 

Actually the choice will affect the feel of the track. I sometimes load AD2 & Geist onto the same track, and flick between the two of them to see which one I like. You can even combine both! Play around with some FX too.

 

Last edited: Mar 4, 2016

Drumlab may be an interesting choice for your album / tracks. Good luck with whatever you decide upon.

 

I use EZ Drummer and Reaper. I will build my drum track in EZ Drummer using the pre-made MIDI Parts, then Export the MIDI to Reaper.

You can tweak it there, change parts, modify the velocities, and even humanize or quantize the track. I often will route the MIDI to 2 EZ Drummers then blend the sounds. I've been a pro drummer for most of my life, if you want help or guidance feel free to pm me.

 

Like some others have said it will directly affect the way the tracks overall, but its fine to mix and match both, there is no hard or fast rules about it. Its just taste and how the end product will end up sounding. If you could give us some examples of maybe what you are trying to aim for drums wise, then ill be able to tell you how those drums were made.

 

@fiction - the reason i want to avoid a mix of both is simply because the listener will (when listening to the trax in a sequential order) will get confused as to what TYPE of GENRE do these BELONG to..!!?? and that is something i'm trying to avoid....

 

will try your suggestions... thnx mate....

 

actually the way i used to work before was that i used to drag the MIDI from EZD2 to the arrangement page and then tweak it there....
but what i didn't understand was that you said that you ROUTE THE MIDI TO 2 EZ DRUMMERS...!!??? i mean why would i want to hog double the CPU power to get the same sound from both and why dont just use FX to fatten it up... please explain that a bit to me....

#Noobs@Work.... hehe.... but cant help it.....

 

since this is a CHURCH-BASED MUSIC.... i just heard it yesterday and was wondering if it is possible at all to get sounds such these....

or instead i should just stick with E-Drums as then the listener wont get an idea about everything being done ITB.... such as this one....

 

What counts is the results. Me too I start with EZ Drummer and EZ keys using the midi packs for the chord progression. Because this speed my workflow. In the music they are no rules.

 

yes i agree there are no hard and fast rules. But it simply helps to know just what to do instead of just fiddling around and losing "that creative SPARK".....

 

There will definitely be a kit in either EZ drummer or AD 2. You will need parallel compression on a standardish kit, quite low velocity hits for nearly all hits and normalish velocity hits for the kick and snare. By velocity i mean the number from 1-127 in the midi. so for example the hats and shakers or other hits to be something like 60 then the normal velocity should be like 90ish. Then clean up with a small amount of eq where necessary. then create a send and put on a good impulse reverb like a hall/concert style, and lower the level to taste. That should get it pretty close to the first example. The second example requires a lot less mixing, more just finding the right electronic drum samples and low passing the kick and getting the levels correct for them. It actually sounds more like 2 electronic toms with really short release at slightly different pitches with a really quiet hat/ride

 

well looks like i have a lot to explore in this field....
thaks for the iNFO.. will try this tonight and post back about the results.....

 

The Key is to not use the same drum set for both EZdrummers.

People have been blending together sounds to augment their drums for a long time. In the golden days of recording we might add gated pink noise to the snare or a gated low tone to the kick. Now we sometimes trigger electronic drums with acoustic drums. A wise recording engineer will record triggers with acoustic drums for possible use later.

With MIDI if you send to 2 EZ drummers they will sound at the exactly the same time with the same articulation, perfect for blending tones. For example try blending a 808 electronic kick with an acoustic sounding kick, You now have a exclusive custom drum sound all your own. It works great for snares also, like a big tubby one with a tight one for definition. This does not work that well for cymbals, If doing this method, I use only one set of cymbals.

With Reaper the load for an extra EZ Drummer is about 2% of cpu so I don't worry about it much. A high quality reverb uses more cpu. I will also burn cpu with drum effects. Remember you can freeze tracks if you need the cpu power.

CPU power, Use it or loose it, You can't take it with you when you go. LOL.

 

Last edited: Mar 5, 2016

New Order are one of my favorite bands and they always mixed their kits. It's the result that counts Ditto electric bass/synth bass, guitar/synth, etc. I regard it as being an advantage knowing how to combine diverse sounds.

 

Last edited: Mar 5, 2016

get a real drummer is always an advantage. It swing, groove like no one. A machine drum is fantastic but when you try to mimic a real drummer it sucks. A real drummer has it own feeling and you can obviously exagerate or minimalise it as you want. You can easily transform the sound of a drum kit into something "machinish". The inverse is not so easy. What you can do, as an example, is to have the snare and kick by your fav software and ask a drummer to play the HH. That gives a cool groove to your pattern. You will have to edit it 'cause the drummer will add his own swing/groove feeling ( leadback /a bit speed etc…).

 

Ahhh.... well then i'll definitely give it a try and.... well let's see what churns out from the "CREATIVE Factory"...

 

Yeah well actually most of the CCM Music has also started combining both ACOUSTIC and ELECTRONIC instruments.....
as for me i'm trying to avoid having a lot of instruments because i dont wanna "clutter" up my arrangement...
i'm into drums, guitar and keyboard so just staying with those....

 

actually i'm myself a drummer, but playing DRUMS with a KEYBOARD is definitely not im my reportoire...
but just ordered NEKTAR LX25 and it has pads.... so excited to play with those...