The Everything "EZDrummer" and "Superior Drums" thread.

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chili
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Yes,I'll re-install tomorrow then and see if I can get to grips with it,cheers fella's.
 
dug dog said:
I've been using Superior Drummer for a couple of years, and I figure that with the amount of time I've spent editing drum tracks, I could have become a decent drummer. However, I couldn't have a real kit where I live, so it's a moot point.
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i have the same problem at my house.. I decided to use an electronic kit (yamaha dt express) and just record the midi into separate tracks only. then apply the midi to either ez/superior drummer, or addictive drums.

I have yet to use this software, but an online friend who does a lot of quality music said he liked this.

Slate Digital Trigger Platinum (Electronic Delivery) | Sweetwater.com
 
Man I use trigger all the time (EX as I didn't buy it for his samples).

I've pretty much stopped using SSD 3.5 though.
 
Friday said:
I had a look at Reaper yesterday and I couldn't even see how to import my VST's into it,I ended up un-installing it.
I guess this is how it goes with DAW's ,once you get used to one all the others appear very alien,maybe I'll have another look at reaper then,cheers.
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Reinstall it.

Create a new track.

Click on the button marked FX

Choose your VSTi plugins

EXDrmmer or Superior will be there.


Gerg - another simple tip to quickly "humanize" your beats in the manner similar to the way a real drummer might hit come notesa little harter than others to support the groove - select all of, say, your hihat beats, so they light up in the iano editor. Then go down to the velocity map window at the bottom (thing that looks like a whole bunch of colored skyscrapers), and being careful not to start on any actual note, sort of left click and drag across, moving higher to emphasize sections you would hit stronger, and lower to emphasize sections you would normally be a little weaker on. It's not 100% perfect, but it quickly adds a little more of a human feel to your drums, and then throwing the Reaper "humanize" option on top to add a little bit of random varation should help a bit too. :)

EDIT - though if you want to use the humanize, merge all your midi files back into a single file when you're done, so you can apply it all at once rather than once for each section, and not have it humanize the loops identically.
 
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For those trying out Reaper, one of the first places you should visit is Preferences. That's where you will tell Reaper where to look for your VST's, VSTi's, etc., as well as a ton of other things.

YouTube has a BUNCH of vids on using EZ Drummer and Superior Drummer, i.e., tips and tricks and even how to use them in Reaper. There's at least one vid that shows how to set up the drum tracks to go to separate tracks in Reaper (kick -> track 1; snare -> track 2, etc.) for more control over the individual drums. Just do a search for EZ Drummer and you'll find them.

And yes, ALWAYS turn the room mic OFF!
 
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DrewPeterson7 said:
...another simple tip to quickly "humanize" your beats....
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I am quite impressed with the "humanize" options in Superior Drummer. I think in EZD you just get one basic choice, just like with the global velocity knob...but in SD there are a handful of individual options, and from the couple of tracks of done so far with SD, it's quite good. There's all kinds of random, human-like variety in the drum hits...and you would be very hard pressed to find any identical/sequenced pattern to them when you examine in the editor.

Much easier comparing to the days of manually "humanizing" beats back in the early MIDI days... headwall.webp...and one of the reasons I got away from sequenced drums...but now I'm really liking the SD package so far. It takes away the "I can't record this song, 'cuz my drummer isn't available to play drums for the next three weeks" scenarios... :) ...as I always prefer to have the drum track down before reocording other tracks. So now I don't have to wait for him, and when he does come over, we can re-track using the SD drums as a guide, which will really give him a headache ;), 'cuz I'll have every hit/roll/fill EXACTLY how/where I want them....and he'll have to try and match it! :D
 
miroslav said:
I am quite impressed with the "humanize" options in Superior Drummer. I think in EZD you just get one basic choice, just like with the global velocity knob...but in SD there are a handful of individual options, and from the couple of tracks of done so far with SD, it's quite good. There's all kinds of random, human-like variety in the drum hits...and you would be very hard pressed to find any identical/sequenced pattern to them when you examine in the editor.
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I bought the crossgrade also, during the t-day weekend. But I gave it to the kids to wrap and give it to me for xmas! After reading this, I can't wait to try it out. :facepalm:

Hurry up Santa!!! :p
 
RAMI said:
A lot of rudiments and techniques are about as important as knowing how to do a 5-finger hammer-off on guitar.

My favorite bands have the simplest drummers. I've never liked a band for the drummer, it's always been the songs and the guitars. I think I was supposed to be a guitar player, because that's always been what made a song cool for me or not, since I was a kid.

As far as being a virtuoso, the so-called "technical" drummers out there generally bore me, even though I can appreciate their talent. I'd rather listen to "Back in Black" or "Machine Head" all the way through than have to endure one Dave Weckl "song".

Same thing with any of these guys like Satriani. Behind the guitar aerobics, there's some really mundane shit going on.
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I quite like all that guitar wankery ~ if I happen to like the song that it's part of. And if I don't like the song, then all the nimble fingeredness is caca to me. Although I do find some guitarists really annoying even when I like the songs they're playing in. A good example of that is Al Di Meola. Quite a few of the songs he did with Return to Forever are good songs but he just irritates me with his million notes per second runs. He said he wanted to be known as the fastest gun slinger on 6 strings. He's slowed down as he matured ! Whereas the likes of John McLaughlin, Bill Connors, Angus Young, Richie Blackmore, Larry Coryell, Jim Hendrix and others never did annoy me because.....heck, I don't know why !
Same with drummers. I get into them once I'm into the songs they happen to be be on.

And this has nothing to do with the thread except that it does because I say the word 'drummer'. :D
 
I bought a Korg Nano Pad and made a bass pedal trigger thingy and now I hate EZD at least 40% less! I still don't dig the stock sounds but at least I don't have to draw in MIDI notes anymore! It's much nicer to be able to just tap out a pattern than to have to write it manually... that approach really took the 'spirit' away for me. If anybody's interested, I can share my plans for the pedal trigger - it's really very simple.
 
I'm gonna go for the crossgrade.

Which of the Superior expansion packs is most versatile/"best" sounding?
 
Honestly I still think the stock avatar kit sounds the best.

However the nashville expansion also sounds really really good.

I would say metal foundry is one of the least versatile expansions.
 
I recently got the Nashville and Americana packs...and they are good, and add a lot of nice kit options, but so far I'm liking the Avatar kit for more beefier Rock drums...but will probably use the others on stuff in the future, as the song calls for it.

The expansion pack I want to get next is the NY Legacy Vol 2.....which supposedly has some great stuff and quite a lot of it, recorded at the Hit Factory NY and Allaire Studios, both no longer in existance.
There is also the NY Legacy Vol 3...but that was also done at Avatar, so not sure how much different than what you get with the stock SD pack.
 
miroslav said:
I am quite impressed with the "humanize" options in Superior Drummer. I think in EZD you just get one basic choice, just like with the global velocity knob...but in SD there are a handful of individual options, and from the couple of tracks of done so far with SD, it's quite good. There's all kinds of random, human-like variety in the drum hits...and you would be very hard pressed to find any identical/sequenced pattern to them when you examine in the editor.
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I'm not sure I know what you mean... Are you referring to the included MIDI, or some sort of setting in Superior that actually modifies your MIDI files to make them more "human"?
 
In EZD it's one knob for the whole kit that just combines drum hit randomizing and non-cycling.

EZD.webp



In SD you get more "humanize" features and more control over them...per drum selection.

SD.webp
 
I'm leaning towards the Roots/Sticks expack but wondering if all of the content is going to overwhelm my circa-2005 P4 3.4gHz with 4g RAM.

Is it possible to put the Superior samples on a 2nd or 3rd HD or does that just cause problems?

I thought I saw in one of the videos a bit about there being a function to reduce CPU usage. Anybody have any experience with that?

I would assume that it would only load the samples needed by any individual project once you have established kit/MIDI velocities/etc.
 
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The issue is HD space...and yes, you can load the files anywhere.
AFA the CPU/mem usage, you can control what gets loaded into an active session, and it's possible to minimize the requirement....so it shouldn't be an issue.
My DAW is pretty old too...and I don't see any problems.
 
Okay, thanks Miro.

Went ahead and got the Roots/Sticks pack because I really like the stuff they have on the Toontrack site.

I'm gonna get the EZ Keys next. That looks like it's not only really handy for creating keyboard chord tracks but I think it will really help with understanding music theory and relative pitch/chord recognition.
 
I've had Roots for a couple of weeks now and it's completely messed up my productivity.

It sounds so great that all I want to do is listen to the drums without any other instruments!
 
My stuff showed up yesterday, but I can't get the Avatar sound library to load. Repeated error message about not being able to copy certain files on the DVD. :( I tried the installer that comes on the disk and also the updated installer with same results.

Roots/Sticks loaded without a hitch and the raw sounds are pretty far out.

Now I'm thinking I need a bigger HD. :eek:

Sweetwater has 2Tb/7200rpm Seagate SATA internal drives for $150.
 
c7sus said:
...I can't get the Avatar sound library to load...


....Roots/Sticks loaded without a hitch....
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Not following you....
How are you loading the Roots expansion pack if you didn't get the initial EZD/Avatar stuff to load....?
IOW....you would need the basic app loaded before you start adding expansion packs.
 
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