Dead Serious: Entire album with triggered/sampled drums???

[tomberdude]

WARNING!!!: LENGTHY POST, NOT FOR THE WEAK OF HEART

Ok, so I write songs in their entirety. Some go to my band, some I choose to keep for myself, or the guys in the band can't/won't perform them.

When making a demo for the guys to hear the song, I've done the drums in this manner: FL Studio Sines-Rewire to PT LE 6.4 (001 represent!)- Drumagog

So I am going to do an "album" of the songs that I have kept for myself/didn't go to the band. this method of fake drums is ineffective and inefficient. I want a real drummer, but cannot play them well enough myself, nor can I get a drummer who is good enough to play what i wrote. For drum style range, think of the bands Strung Out (Jordan Burns), A Wilhem Scream (Nick Angelini), Bad Religion (w/ Brooks Wackerman) Fugazi (Brendan Canty), and the Deftones (Abe Cunningham).

I already have my sounds that I want to use sampled, all at the the same velocity (+ or - .75 decibals) so I can control the dynamics later, as needed.

I've got 16-20 samples each of kick, snare, toms 10, 12, and 14 in., 19" and 20" crashes and chokes, 20" ride and bell, and 14" HH opened, closed, and footed.

All drums/cymbals were recorded by all the mics. (close mics on the kit, including XY OHs, and room mic), then using strip silence, turned into samples.

When using drumagog to replace the sines i have sent from FL to trigger in each track, i cannot simultaneously trigger the coinciding bleed tracks with the sample, which causes all kinds of problems, both in preference and in sonics.

How would one group specific samples to be triggered together, but still be able to multi-out, in real time? I've already tried bouncing tracks together, then sampling, with unsatisfactory results. For example, I want to process the kick mic samples on track 1 (samples 01,05,13,18,02, etc.), then process the coinciding bleed samples from the snare mic on track 2 (samples 01,05,13,18,02, etc.). What I have now is something like: track 1 kick (01,05,13,18,02, etc.), track 2 bleed (09,03,07,01,12, etc.), with no specific order. Fuck!

To my understanding, one could do this with Battery 2, but I don't want to waste money and time if it won't work. BFD does this, but their site said you cannot use your own samples with their program. Maybe DFH Superior does??? No matter what, I want to use the samples that I have made, and to be able to get around the "machine-gun" on high tempo (150-200+) 16th note rolls, and slow tempo(100-145) 32nd note rolls.

Also, is there a way in PT LE 6.4 or is there program/editor/plug-in that can "consistently randomize/humanize" multiple audio tracks time and velocity in unison and NOT sound like a talentless drunk? Something along the lines of linked-multitrack "de-quantization"? Being able to control how far out of time to make each hit and setting a range on how much to change the velocity would be great.

Hope you all can help!

-RL

[stevedood]

Have you considered getting an MPC?

[tomberdude]

No I haven't. How would I use that for this situation? Which model would benefit me?

[getreel]

what about EZdrummer or Drumcore? I'm not sure if you can load your own samples, but I know you can buy more. I am thinking of getting EZdrummer myself.

[stevedood]

No I haven't. How would I use that for this situation? Which model would benefit me?

A MPC 1000 would work fine, possibly a 500 if you are OK with 12 pads.
You can transfer in your audio files via USB and then get started creating your drum kits. The nice thing is that it keeps your kits separate from your performances so you can reuse the kits for other songs. It's parametric in this sort of way, allowing you to try different things along the way (much like software is too I'm certain). You can also create neat inhibitive relationships between your samples (think open-hat, close-hat) where they can affect each-other. Of course there's the tactile control using the pads and you can interface via MIDI with alot of devices if you want to trigger the samples through other means.
Not sure if this is what you are looking for as it sounds like you maybe want a software solution, no?

[tomberdude]

From what i understand of EZ drummer, you build a performance from pre-made loops via midi files. Loop-based solutions are out of the question. I want the drums that I wrote, and I am not about to scour a database of loops to find the right fills, kick-snare patterns, and so forth.

The drums I've written are very complex. otherwise I'd record it myself. i can do what i want done at about 1/2 to 3/4 the speed of the actual song, depending on the tempo. a bulk of the songs range between 160-200 BPM with 16th and 32nd note rolls and fills. The only session drummer I know that can do that is Josh Freese, and I can't afford him.

i considered getting an e-kit to do the performance slow then speed it up and re-trigger with the samples, but there are two problems with that.

1) i still don't get to simultaneously trigger the correct bleed samples
2) i will end up spending $600+ on something that will get used very rarely, if more than 3 times over the next 5 years. once for this "album", and 2 more times after I compile enough unreleased songs to warrant recording them for release.

I really hope I am not fucked into considering such an option.

[tomberdude]

The main reason that triggering the correct bleed sample for it's corresponding source sample is so important to me is phase, comb-filtering and realism. I mic'ed the kit very carefully to achieve the sound i want by utilizing the bleed into other mics.

For example, the D112 on the resonant head of the Kick (1.5"-2" from hole aiming slightly towards high stand) has the LOW end and beef, while the 991 on the snare shell (10 o'clock aiming at center of snare from drummer perspective, an inch from the top rim) adds the punch and clarity it will need for cutting through at high tempos and audibility on small speakers. The same kind of inter-mic relationship goes for the entire kit, with varying relationships between the mics based on specific parts of the kit.

It is very important that when Kick D112 sample #04 is triggered, Kick 991 sample #04 is triggered on another track, not Kick 991 sample #15.

I mic'ed the kit as one would for any drum recording. I recorded single hits of every drum/cymbal with all the mics recording to get the natural bleed, until i had 16-20 hits from every drum/cymbal within .75db + or - of -18dbFS.

I then used Strip Silence to cut all 8 tracks of these hits into individual samples. When strip silence was done, each hit was now it's own region, on all the tracks.

[stevedood]

you can setup the mpc to trigger up to 4 samples with one pad; I can't remember if you can delay anyone of them independently relative to the trigger...but you could always add silence to the start of the wav file if you need a small delay.
I've heard you can also use Battery to make PGM files for the MPC (PGM files are the "kits" I'm referring to)

If you want to run a little experiment and send me some notes to build up into a kit, let me know.

-Steve

[eeldip]

alternately, you could go the big black route, and just embrace the drum machine....

jus sayin'.

personally, i think your end product would be better.

[tomberdude]

No I haven't. How would I use that for this situation? Which model would benefit me?

A MPC 1000 would work fine, possibly a 500 if you are OK with 12 pads.
You can transfer in your audio files via USB and then get started creating your drum kits. The nice thing is that it keeps your kits separate from your performances so you can reuse the kits for other songs. It's parametric in this sort of way, allowing you to try different things along the way (much like software is too I'm certain). You can also create neat inhibitive relationships between your samples (think open-hat, close-hat) where they can affect each-other. Of course there's the tactile control using the pads and you can interface via MIDI with alot of devices if you want to trigger the samples through other means.
Not sure if this is what you are looking for as it sounds like you maybe want a software solution, no?

Thanks for the suggestion, and i don't care if it's hardware or software.

I checked out the Akai site, but the info on those modules didn't specify whether one hit could trigger multiple samples simultaneously, or if one could link samples together for simultaneous triggering. (EDIT: Stevedood posted an answer to this while i was originally typing this up.)

I am currently able to create inhibitive relationships with drumagog by setting up different thresholds for groups of samples to triggered. For example, I'll set open hat sample group threshold at -18db, closed hat sample group threshold at -15db, and footed hat sample group at -12db.

Since I have FL Studio setup where open, closed, and footed are all sequenced on 3 different tracks but routed to the same track in PT, and all three tracks play the same sine wave sample, all i have to do i set the track volume on the open to -18, the closed to -15, and the footed to -12. VOILA!

I never have to worry about mis-triggering either, since FL is sending a sine. This same process is how I take care of Ride/Ride Bell, and Cymbals/Cymbal Chokes.

So drumagog does have that going for itself, it just can't trigger source and bleed samples together, at least as far i as i know.

[tomberdude]

you can setup the mpc to trigger up to 4 samples with one pad; I can't remember if you can delay anyone of them independently relative to the trigger...but you could always add silence to the start of the wav file if you need a small delay.
I've heard you can also use Battery to make PGM files for the MPC (PGM files are the "kits" I'm referring to)

If you want to run a little experiment and send me some notes to build up into a kit, let me know.

-Steve

I think I will do that. Send me a private message with your email, and how you want the files grouped/organized. Do you have FTP ability on your website?

[joser111482]

I wrote an entire drum part using GarageBand and EZ Drummer. Down to the finest detail. I even randomized on my own the velocity of most of the hits.

No maps or default anything. I only did it really well once, though.

[tomberdude]

I wrote an entire drum part using GarageBand and EZ Drummer. Down to the finest detail. I even randomized on my own the velocity of most of the hits.

No maps or default anything. I only did it really well once, though.

Are you able to use your own samples with linked-sample triggering?

[inverseroom]

A totally opposite approach, but which might get you good results, is to use the program Jamstix, a "virtual" drummer, which you can program to improvise appropriately for the material. You can use its own samples or drive your own with it.

[tomberdude]

A totally opposite approach, but which might get you good results, is to use the program Jamstix, a "virtual" drummer, which you can program to improvise appropriately for the material. You can use its own samples or drive your own with it.

Thanks alot inverse. By the way, "Counterfit Umbrella"- nice.

I checked out Jamstix, and I don't think that will help my the problem I have getting the correct bleed sample to be triggered when it's corresponding source sample is triggered.

As for humanizing, this plug-in may be a good way to save time from manually editing velocity and time. As well all know, perfectly on time drums suck.

How have your results been using it to "de-quantize"?