Need some unusual drum machine advice

[Justus Johnston]

Name's Justus, and I write music for video games.

Here's the deal:

I've been using a Roland Soundcanvas (mixed with a few live instruments) for my tracks, but I've finally come into a little money, and have begun to expand things. I've got some great software synths now, like EastWest Collosus, Drumkit from Hell, and Pentagon I. With Pentagon, I can make awesome leads, I get nice realistic instruments out of Collosus, and DfH provides me with a drumkit that can fool professional session drummers. What I really want now though are some drum sounds that are extremely fake, and larger than life, just like the classic game soundtracks I remember from the early 90s. That's right, I want very very fake-sounding drums. My old Soundcanvas has a few like that, but not enough, and even those aren't REALLY huge like I'd like.

Here's an MP3 I threw together containing several crossfaded examples of the kind of sound I'm shooting for. It's not a sound you hear much these days.

Since everyone nowadays is obsessed with real sounds, finding drums this huge and this fake is really hard. I'm assuming I'll be looking at possibly a large variety of really old drum machines, but I really have no idea what to search for to get these kinds of sounds. If there's a way to get these sorts of sounds using software, I'm down with that too.

The thing is, I don't only want some drums that sound like a couple of these, I want about this much variety too! It's worth noting that all of these examples come from only three different games, so the variety is obviously out there to be had.

One other thing: I don't care at all about pre-programmed patterns. I always make all my own patterns from scratch via MIDI. So, all it needs is a MIDI In, and wonderfully unrealistic drum sounds....admittedly, a trigger would be kind of cool too, so I could use the sounds when I record my friend who plays actual drums.

I've got a good amount of money now, so that's not much object.

So, any advice?

 

[Cloneboy Studio]

Roland R8 Drum Machine is probably the king of the old PCM sampler-based drum machines. If you're looking for a really old feel, one of the more interesting boxes that covers analog (and 8 bit digital) drum sounds well is the Quasimidi 309. Of course, you could get an old Akai sampler or Emu Emax but you'll need sound libraries for that.

 

[Adam P]

First of all, let me say that listening to that little mix was great.

Secondly, I don't know if my answer will help you in any way, shape, or form. It just popped into my head reading your post. That said, Propellerhead recently made its ReBirth program available for free download at www.rebirthmuseum.com. It's a software emulation of the old Roland TB303, TR808, and TR909 machines, so you might be able to get some huge or "cheesy" sounds out of it. Plus, its free, so what the heck? All you need is a Torrent program to download it (they have a link to one if you don't have one already), and a blank CD to burn the disc image file to CD so that you can install it (why they made it this way, I don't know). So yeah, this probably doesn't help much, but it could be interesting.

 

[Halion]

The processing of the drums also helps to make it sound really fake. Like, huge (I mean HUGE) reverbs, overly compressed snares (preferably with a really cheap compressor, something like the Alesis 3630), repeating hihat samples (like, a single closed hat sample all the time).

 

[FALKEN]

two ideas off the top of my head...

1. fruity loops can really change drum sounds with some of the settings

2. mario paint...SNES game where you could write music. I've been wanting to get a copy (with the mouse) for a while now to make some beats.

but that rebirth program might be exactly what you want.

 

[Bulls Hit]

You can really abuse drums sounds with some of the guitar/amp modelling plugins like Amplitube

 

[Justus Johnston]

Thanks to everyone for all the advice.

After looking around and thinking about it, I think PCM-based machines are what I'm looking for, and what will sound closest to the demo I posted above.

I think CloneboyStudio's suggestion of a Roland R-8 seems the closest to what I'm looking for. I just ordered one off of Ebay (got outbid on an R-8 MkII, then settled for an M-8 rack version. damn!) I figure I can turn around and sell it back on E-bay if it's not what I'm looking for. But it looks like the expansion cards for it can be had occassionally for as little as $15-$30 at times (though not at the moment), so I'll look forward to trying a few of those out as well. Since I already own a Roland machine (SC-8850), I think I have some idea what I'm in store for, particularly given the familiarity of the naming scheme for their upgrade cards (I know EXACTLY what kinds of sounds to expect from the Dance upgrade, for instance), also being already intimately familiar with Roland's typical MIDI implementation is a bonus.

First of all, let me say that listening to that little mix was great.

Thanks! I know I certainly love this type of music, though you don't hear much like it any more, even in video games.

I knew about Rebirth being released. Yeah, it's mainly emulations of old analog drum machines, which, while neat, is not going to make sounds like in the demo above no matter WHAT I do to the sound.

I've done plenty of experimentation with taking the samples I do have and mangling them every which way...usually just to hear the sound quality go to pot! There's only so much you can do to a sound before it's more like a noise. Luckily, I am blessed with many friends who play real instruments, and the means to record them. For many songs, I'll just use acoustic drums, and I've gotten to where I can make an acoustically recorded kit sound pretty large. But it still doesn't cut through without overpowering the way the drums do in the sample above.

You can really abuse drums sounds with some of the guitar/amp modelling plugins like Amplitube

That you can! I can certainly attest to that. I've also enjoyed running drum sounds to other amp modellers, like Slayer and Nomad. Not the sound I'm looking for though. All these ways of mangling sound just makes the drums get all in your face, whereas the ones in the sample I posted are just large, clean, and fit well in a mix without trying to dominate complex harmonies and stuff. So basically: large and clean, not large and dirty

This piece of music I recorded last summer represents about the best I've been able to do with acoustic drums (and by extension, taking any drum patches I have and mangling them). As you can hear, I've definately gotten them to sound larger than most of what you hear in mainstream recorded music, without turning the sound quality to crap or overpowering everything else...but it just doesn't cut through a mix the way the samples do in the MP3 from my first post.

two ideas off the top of my head...

1. fruity loops can really change drum sounds with some of the settings

2. mario paint...SNES game where you could write music. I've been wanting to get a copy (with the mouse) for a while now to make some beats.

I've gotten some pretty cool techno drum sounds out of Fruity, but not just ridiculous huge ones. Mario Paint...now that brings back some memories. It was actually the first time I ever tried to use "software" to make music, at age 13 (oddly enough, I purchased Finale the next year, and started playing with MIDI, and then Cakewalk Pro Audio the year after that). There were definately some charming little sounds in Mario Paint (all held within the mammoth 64K of sound RAM onboard the SPC700, the SNES' sound chip). Before you get excited about making beats on it, you might remember a few limitations it had:

- You could only play three sounds at any given time (the SPC700 itself could mix up to 8)
- the smallest unit of quantisation was an eighth note
- no dotted rhyhtms
- Maximum song length was something like 26 measures or some such (I don't remember exactly)
- There was no way to use accidentals at all! So basically, you're stuck with "white keys"

Well, I mean it WAS a child's toy after all...

 

[Cloneboy Studio]

I just got done sampling my R8 and all the soundcards. Even though I'm selling it I still want those sounds because they are awesome.

 

[Justus Johnston]

I just got done sampling my R8 and all the soundcards. Even though I'm selling it I still want those sounds because they are awesome.

You're selling? Do you have a buyer lined up? I might be interested in taking some of that off your hands otherwise.