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Drum Tracks, The hard part
Scorpiotic
Apr 5 2012, 03:41 AM
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Hi all !

How do you guys make drum tracks (without a drummer)?

I love making riffs and lyrics. Then I record them and put them in my audio software (FruityLoops 10 atm - if anyone have better suggestions I'm all ears).

Problem: I never get my drums tracks right. I got some sort of an idea of how I want it, but I just cant seem to program the loops. Adding a sampled bass is usually quite easy, but man that drum track.

This is mainly what is holding back the completion of my songs - after several days back and forth trying to make the drums right, I just scrap it.

So if anyone got any advice/strategy/software that can help that area of my music, I'd really like to hear about it.

Cheers !



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thefireball
Apr 5 2012, 06:46 AM
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Exactly how I felt before I bought EZdrummer. smile.gif I got the expansion pack Drums from Hell and it really helped me dial in the METAL tone. It's how I am making my songs now. They are humble mixes, but I do it, nonetheless. The ideas are there. You can hear the quality of amateur mixes in the last two videos here. It's just a matter of dragging and dropping beats and changing them up.

In-depth tutorial of how I make my backing tracks:


Solo from my Progressive Metal song:


Part of a playthrough of another metal piece:


I highly recommend EZdrummer! It's a worthy investment and cheap too!

-Brandon Burch

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Scorpiotic
Apr 5 2012, 10:05 AM
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thanks alot for the suggestion, i'll check it out smile.gif

after a quick reading I wonder; is this a plugin for me to use in FruityLoops or a standalone program?

(no i havent seen ur indepth vid yet tongue.gif )

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This post has been edited by Scorpiotic: Apr 5 2012, 10:26 AM


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dark dude
Apr 5 2012, 02:14 PM
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QUOTE (Scorpiotic @ Apr 5 2012, 10:05 AM) *
after a quick reading I wonder; is this a plugin for me to use in FruityLoops or a standalone program?

You can open it in FL.

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Scorpiotic
Apr 5 2012, 03:16 PM
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there i got it smile.gif
only one thing left now... i got the kits and different grooves etc but i seem to be missing a feature; the dropdown menu on topleft where options like "ambience" as shown in your vid Fireball. The rest of my interface looks the same smile.gif

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This post has been edited by Scorpiotic: Apr 5 2012, 04:15 PM


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Scorpiotic
Apr 5 2012, 04:27 PM
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hm... i keep getting errors in Reaper that it will not transfer my loops to the tracks... having a similar problem in FL...
I'll keep working at it, but if anyone knows of this problem that "shortcut" would be appreciated tongue.gif

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ElHombre
Apr 5 2012, 05:46 PM
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Sorry for "stealing" the thread but want to ask what you guys use for what shall I say electronical sounds, you could use keyboard too but do you use a program of some kind.

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thefireball
Apr 5 2012, 06:05 PM
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I'm sorry, Scorpiotic, but I don't know to what you are referring.

@ElHombre I use the free plugin SuperWaveP8 for my synth sounds.

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SirJamsalot
Apr 5 2012, 06:13 PM
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QUOTE (thefireball @ Apr 5 2012, 10:05 AM) *
I'm sorry, Scorpiotic, but I don't know to what you are referring.

@ElHombre I use the free plugin SuperWaveP8 for my synth sounds.


Oh cool! I'll have to check this out. I've also been looking for some free synth sounds and I just don't have the $$ right now to shovel out for Kontact's goodies biggrin.gif Any others?

chris!

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thefireball
Apr 5 2012, 06:14 PM
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QUOTE (SirJamsalot @ Apr 5 2012, 12:13 PM) *
Oh cool! I'll have to check this out. I've also been looking for some free synth sounds and I just don't have the $$ right now to shovel out for Kontact's goodies biggrin.gif Any others?

chris!


No that's all I use at the moment. It suits me just fine for right now. Although I wish I could come up with some exotic synths like Red Seas Fire has.

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SirJamsalot
Apr 5 2012, 06:24 PM
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I would recommend getting your hands on REAPER, first and foremost ~ Fruity Loops is not really a DAW in the traditional sense. And, as Fireball pointed out, EZ Drummer is a tremendously valuable tool for getting drum tracks down quickly, especially when working with a DAW. There are other drum programs as well, but for beginning, this is an excellent choice.

In fact I'm in the middle of programming drums for the song I'm linking below using EZ drummer. Since it's just midi, you can move beats around in a MIDI editor. For this composition, I went through a ton of different drum patterns, then copy pasted small selections from the various events to create my own custom ones for the rhythm I'm trying to accomplish. Check out what I've been able to do so far using it - (ignore the vocals ~ they're just me playing around with ideas smile.gif

http://s3.amazonaws.com/1K6M3Y5WPCNJ6M657A...0317-091529.mp3

Takes a while to get good at editing the midi like what I did in this, but it's totally doable, and the drums are already panned, or you can edit them to pan them manually.



QUOTE (Scorpiotic @ Apr 4 2012, 07:41 PM) *
Hi all !

How do you guys make drum tracks (without a drummer)?

I love making riffs and lyrics. Then I record them and put them in my audio software (FruityLoops 10 atm - if anyone have better suggestions I'm all ears).

Problem: I never get my drums tracks right. I got some sort of an idea of how I want it, but I just cant seem to program the loops. Adding a sampled bass is usually quite easy, but man that drum track.

This is mainly what is holding back the completion of my songs - after several days back and forth trying to make the drums right, I just scrap it.

So if anyone got any advice/strategy/software that can help that area of my music, I'd really like to hear about it.

Cheers !

You are at GuitarMasterClass.net


Don't miss today's free lick. Plus all our lessons are packed with free content!

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thefireball
Apr 6 2012, 01:23 AM
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Hey guys!

I found another really cool vst synth! It's called Crystal soft synth. Listen to a demo I cooked up using only the sounds from it. I layered several synths by the way. smile.gif

http://soundcloud.com/fireball100/decimate-eerie-synth-intro

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Scorpiotic
Apr 6 2012, 01:33 AM
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Posts: 127
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From: Australia
QUOTE (thefireball @ Apr 5 2012, 06:05 PM) *
I'm sorry, Scorpiotic, but I don't know to what you are referring.


Look at ur ezdrummer interface. Top middle is the name EZDrummer, with a menu below for kits
To the left of that one there is dropdown menu on your vid. That one i miss =/

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The Uncreator
Apr 6 2012, 01:39 AM
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QUOTE (ElHombre @ Apr 5 2012, 12:46 PM) *
Sorry for "stealing" the thread but want to ask what you guys use for what shall I say electronical sounds, you could use keyboard too but do you use a program of some kind.


I, on ocassion, have done some electronic stuff such as this.

http://soundcloud.com/lascailles-shroud/prologue-she-dreams-of-earth

Even my other songs have heavy "synthestration" in them, and without the doubt, the easiest, and most versatile products available are made by Native Instruments, these are the ones I use.







I also have begun using this, which is amazing, still learning it though.



For drums, I use this



The tonality options, level of customization, and ease of mixing make this my favorite Drum VSTi. Superior Drummer 2.0 is also highly notable but much more expensive. EX Version of Slate is only $100 smile.gif

When making the tracks, I highly suggest manually making your own drum beats, as you will learn more about song structure and composition this way, and this also gives you a chance to do manual automation, which is a pain, but it really adds humanistic elements to your songs. Steven Slate actually has a humanizer built into to, which is pretty good at what it does.

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Todd Simpson
Apr 6 2012, 06:08 AM
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EZ Ddrummer is a KILLER plugin and you can run it by itself but most people run it inside a DAW like
REAPER. If you have not started using reaper, download it for free and give it a shot. You can get some
good results with FL and the new version is very good. But REAPER comes with wads of plugins built in and loads of folks use it
so you can collaborate on real projects which is awesome.

There are several great drum plugins but ez drummer is a great place to start. its affordable, and has lots of grooves built in. And you can upgrade it later with other drum kits like the Metal kit.

Well done fireball!

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Alex Feather
Apr 7 2012, 08:29 AM
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From: Los Angeles
QUOTE (Scorpiotic @ Apr 5 2012, 02:41 AM) *
Hi all !

How do you guys make drum tracks (without a drummer)?

I love making riffs and lyrics. Then I record them and put them in my audio software (FruityLoops 10 atm - if anyone have better suggestions I'm all ears).

Problem: I never get my drums tracks right. I got some sort of an idea of how I want it, but I just cant seem to program the loops. Adding a sampled bass is usually quite easy, but man that drum track.

This is mainly what is holding back the completion of my songs - after several days back and forth trying to make the drums right, I just scrap it.

So if anyone got any advice/strategy/software that can help that area of my music, I'd really like to hear about it.

Cheers !

I would suggest to get EZ Drummer or Ocean Way drums those already have groove and you can edit them on the spot but you will have a good sounding track with less effort! Frooty Loops is cool but I don't like editing process it's very time consuming if you are trying to get a good sounding track!

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Scorpiotic
Apr 11 2012, 04:04 AM
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Now I finally got EZDrummer to work properly in both Reaper and FL Studio, so happy smile.gif also tried out Absynth, FM8 and Massive, great stuff guys.

A final question; I'm really into orchestral music, specifically the use of it in metal (epic/orchestral metal) and was wondering if anyone knew any softwares for those kind of sounds?
The synth softwares already mentioned got a few patches dedicated to such but they are too processed (as in they done have warmth, seems so electronic).

Ideas - GO! smile.gif

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Todd Simpson
Apr 11 2012, 05:43 AM
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There are TONS of apps just for this. Everyone has their fav. I'm a big fan of one of the simpler ones called SESSION STRINGS and SESSION STRINGS PRO. They are from NATIVE INSTRUMENTS and are not crazy pricey and are easy to control. Some of the strings plugins are a bit too complex.

SESSION STRINGS is cheaper than pro and a good place to start. It runs about $120 U.S. I don't know of any other package that gives as much Bang for each Buck.

http://www.native-instruments.com/#/en/pro...ession-strings/



QUOTE (Scorpiotic @ Apr 10 2012, 11:04 PM) *
Now I finally got EZDrummer to work properly in both Reaper and FL Studio, so happy smile.gif also tried out Absynth, FM8 and Massive, great stuff guys.

A final question; I'm really into orchestral music, specifically the use of it in metal (epic/orchestral metal) and was wondering if anyone knew any softwares for those kind of sounds?
The synth softwares already mentioned got a few patches dedicated to such but they are too processed (as in they done have warmth, seems so electronic).

Ideas - GO! smile.gif

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Scorpiotic
Apr 11 2012, 06:53 AM
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Thanks i'll check it out smile.gif

Oh i forgot to mention; im also looking for vocals/choir sets
Does session strings got any good choir patches?

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Rammikin
Apr 11 2012, 07:55 AM
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QUOTE (thefireball @ Apr 6 2012, 12:23 AM) *
I found another really cool vst synth! It's calledCrystal soft synth. Listen to a demo I cooked up using only the sounds from it. I layered several synths by the way. smile.gif

fyi, to download Crystal, visit the Crystal web site: http://www.greenoak.com/crystal

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