Creating songs - drum machine?

manicguitarist

I’ve always written songs with a drummist. Jam away, song develops then add lyrics. 

Currently without a band. Which makes me sad, I mean I’ve been playing in heavy metal bands for nigh on 40yrs. Any ways….

With all this AI malarkey- is there a drum machine that listens to what you’re playing and jams along?
I am thinking probably not, but also probably not that far away. 

Anyways….in the absence of that - what drum machine would you recommend?
I’ll be plugging it into my mixing desk and feeding it through my PA to jam along with - so no PC based solutions please. 

Whilst I can explain to a drummist the kind of sound I want (“play ba-dumpa-dumpa here”) I have no real idea about drumming* so please bear that in mind. 

*beyond standing stage left for my whole gig career has truly fucked my right ear cos of the cymbals

blobb

Trio+

blobb

(and it's got a Heavy Metal 'style' setting - although it's more nu-metal to me, all double bass pedal and hectic dugga dugga stuff. not so much Bill Ward).

manicguitarist

blobb said:

(and it's got a Heavy Metal 'style' setting - although it's more nu-metal to me, all double bass pedal and hectic dugga dugga stuff. not so much Bill Ward).

Can you tell me more about it? I know literally zip about it. 

manicguitarist

Also - thank you. 

PolarityMan

I love drum programming so if you record some riffs to a click I'd be happy to add some drums.

manicguitarist

PolarityMan said:

I love drum programming so if you record some riffs to a click I'd be happy to add some drums.

Thank you. 

It’s more an evolving process, I crank up my old Marshall stack and noodle away and the drummist plays something and then it goes from there. 

roberty

I'm interested in programming drums for demos now. Be interested to know how you do it @PolarityMan. I am using Pro Tools

blobb

manicguitarist said:

blobb said:

(and it's got a Heavy Metal 'style' setting - although it's more nu-metal to me, all double bass pedal and hectic dugga dugga stuff. not so much Bill Ward).

Can you tell me more about it? I know literally zip about it. 

It's a pedal. You arm it, play a couple of riffs, it detects the length, tempo and style and generates a drummer and bass player that play along. The drummer is assembled from a set of samples in it's libraray but they are real drum fills, you can't see the joins. The bass blayer is some synthesised hybrid which can get a bit off key if you let it or you can one shot it. It has a looper so second time around you arm the loop and record your riffs over the top. Then away you go, noodle heaven. Loop out to amp and rhythm to your interface. And you can sequence 5 parts. Here's a quick demo.

manicguitarist

blobb said:

Trio+

Thank you. Looked into it-seems just what I need. 

Ordered one. Cheers doood!

blobb

Did you gto for the plus version? - the original didn't have the looper.

stickyfiddle

I thought a lot about this a few years back. I took up drums instead. Still haven't recorded anything... 

manicguitarist

blobb said:

Did you gto for the plus version? - the original didn't have the looper.

Yes, trio +.
got an additional footswitch as well.

Jonathangus

I guess it's too late to point out the one in the Classifieds...

https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/250469/pedals

manicguitarist

Jonathangus said:

I guess it's too late to point out the one in the Classifieds...

https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/250469/pedals

Damnit!
Me and my premature GAS....

Vintage65

I use EzDrummer 3. Of course the drums can be replaced at a later time, either real or programmed, but it does the job for sketching out new ideas.

manicguitarist

Update:
Got a Trio plus. 

Brilliant bit of kit. 

Am “training” it through one stack and then playing along with it outputting drums&bass to the PA and looped guitar to another stack. 

Just need to wire up a midi patch switch to analog momentary connection so I can have it change song parts as I change channel via my pedal board. 

\m/

marxski

Apple drummer in Logic is supposed to ‘follow’ a track you specify.

EZ Drummer 3 promised something similar.

I found them both fantastically average at it. In the end I threw the towel in and hired/paid a session guy. It just turned into too much faffing about. For me it was a fast track to kill a passion.

Both the above sound really good but I don’t think they are anything special at the ‘playing to music’ thing. 

octatonic

marxski said:

Apple drummer in Logic is supposed to ‘follow’ a track you specify.

EZ Drummer 3 promised something similar.

I found them both fantastically average at it. In the end I threw the towel in and hired/paid a session guy. It just turned into too much faffing about. For me it was a fast track to kill a passion.

Both the above sound really good but I don’t think they are anything special at the ‘playing to music’ thing. 

Follow was never meant to replace a real drummer.

Drummer is really just a series of presets arranged on a grid, rather than in a list.
There isn't a lot of intelligence in there- although I expect that to change in successive releases.

blobb

manicguitarist said:

Update:
Got a Trio plus. 

Brilliant bit of kit. 

Am “training” it through one stack and then playing along with it outputting drums&bass to the PA and looped guitar to another stack. 

Just need to wire up a midi patch switch to analog momentary connection so I can have it change song parts as I change channel via my pedal board. 

\m/

Good isn't it? .... and we await Trio + + (like that's ever going to happen.). I like throwing random stuff at mine to see what it comes up with. You can get some good timing variations if you know your 3, 4, 5 & 7 times tables, even though it officially only does 3 & 4 time. That metal drummer needs to calm down a bit though.

willo

marxski said:

I found them both fantastically average at it. In the end I threw the towel in and hired/paid a session guy. 

Can I ask - how did you find the session guy? And did they do the recurring at their side and send it over, or did you get them into your studio?

I'm asking because I'm rubbish with programming drums and need some tracks that cover a lot of time signature changes, so it all gets complicated, too complicated, for me to do.