working with loops Addictive Drums

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Sniffyduke

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I like the sound of the AD drums.

However when I make music, each time I have to pick my beats
in AD and then drag them into Cubase and struggle with grids and
time sigs.

Also it takes hours if I want to seperate each individual drum in AD
just because sometimes I like remove all the effects on the beats in the edit page
and use waves to add comp and other effects to each individual drum.

Is there an easy program where I can use the beats in AD to construct
a song.

It sometimes takes a long time to drag them into Cubase 5 and paste
repeats. Getting it in sync with time is rough.

Any tips on what you guys do?

Also, all the beats I drag in are MIDI on instrument tracks.
How do you comvert these beats to wave formats?
 
I don't really mean to sound like an ass, but this is the type of situation you just have to deal with when you are trying to be a drummer and are not. The drummer has to deal with all the sync and timing issues just like you do but on the fly. Just having good sounds is only the beginning point of having good drum tracks.
I understand sometimes there is no drummer in your available group.
It is the same thing when keyboardists try to be an orchestra or a horn section or play a keyboard "guitar" track...to make it sound convincing you have to investigate and deal with the instrumentalist's mindset.

I guess what I am saying is...your's is a common situation of trying to do everything by yourself, when what generally adds the most and works the fastest is collaborating with others.
There are TONS of on-line collaboration forums that may end up being a lot easier and more enjoyable than beating your computer.
 
Im not sure with cubase but I know in ableton you just grab the end of the midi loop and you can drag it as far along the page as you want?? you can also turn time sigs off and create your own...maybe time to jump DAW ship or get a copy of Live lite (most folks get a free version with keyboard controllers etc) and construct your tracks in there...in fact EZ Player will allow you to do that, Im not sure if AD drums would be supported though, worth checking out

as for having to tweak drums sounds man I love that bit...in fact I love drum track construction so much Im going to get an electronic kit as soon as I get more space and learn how to play

Rather than treat it as a chore delve in and enjoy it...drums can make or break a track
 
Sniffyduke said:
I like the sound of the AD drums.

However when I make music, each time I have to pick my beats
in AD and then drag them into Cubase and struggle with grids and
time sigs.
Click to expand...

Yep. This is how I see it. Is there a better way?

I agree with tmix to some degree in that the altertnative is you get a drummer in, with the mics and the mixer etc.

Being a home recorder, I think that unless you know and can obtain the use of Vinnie Coliauta for an afternoon, *and* have the skills and equipment to mic up his kit and record it properly, then the programmable world of Addictive Drums and it's ilk is a good way to go.

Once you've refined the track and make it sound as real as possible, the Addictive Drums drummer will never let you down! Beaufitully spaced yet natural hi-hat parrididdles, flams, synchopated bell hits preceeded by a subtle left handed snare roll. Impossible situation for me - If I could get in a drummer to do of these things as I wanted him to, he wouldn't be in my studio playing my shit music! He'd be making money somewhere else.

I end up editing the entire song manually since that is the only way to make Addictive Drums (as *great* as it is) sound like a human has gone into a studio and drummed it - I change all the velocities and positions to suit.

And yes, for effects outside the Addictive Drums capability, I produce a separate wav file that I can then do as I please. In fact for busy sections especially with lots of symbols I notice that Addictive Drums tends to not play out it's samples properly (maybe it's user error) so I Wav file these as one of the final steps in the song process

If someone else chimes in, they might let us both know the alternative!

Hope this helps,
Cheers,
FM
 
Last edited:
ocnor said:
EZdrummer and Reaper nuff said.
Click to expand...


Addictive Drums and Reaper.

Reaper is the easiest midi editor I have used although I havnt tried Live Lite ( wink to KC )


In this case you open up multiple instances of ADD by duplicating tracks then just pulling out the components you dont want to hear by clicking on the corresponding keyboard mapped note and then hitting delete.

So,
Get reaper demo.
Add an ADD track but not with separate channels for each instrument ( so just route it to a stereo pair )
Add your beats ( very easy in reaper )
Duplicate tracks
Edit out instruments
Change ADD presets and add your own effects to suit.

Note.You can even blend ( recombine ) your separate midi instances on the same track by using "Free item positioning"
 
You can just turn off all the effects and send every output of the AD plugin (snare, bass drum, each tom, room...) to separate channels of your DAW. It's described in the manual. I did that with Reaper and what you get is an AD channel with multiple outputs. Then all you got to do is "rewire" your multiple outputs to separate tracks. The channel matrix was the hard part, AD was easy. Dragging the loops is a piece of cake, too you just need to turn on grid functinality so the loops snap to positions/hits. Adjusting the velocity to my liking helps the track a lot to sound like a real drummer.

Cheers
Tim
 
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