LPX Drummer grooves?

[Soundhound]

I'm about to dive into trying out Drummer in LPX and wondering about the breadth of the various grooves. When I find a basic groove for a project, I go through a pretty extensive library I have, grooves from Superior, AD, Groove Monkee, etc. In LPX Drummer it looks like there are 10 or so grooves per Drummer. Seems not all that extensive -- I'm wondering what the likelihood is of finding the right groove for any particular song?

[Eriksimon]

This is a bit of an impossible and odd question.

You are asking others to tell you what the likelihood is that you'll find "the right groove"... but OK, I'll give it a shot: about 82 %? But, if you are picky: 58 %. If you are very picky: 46%. If you are really very very picky: 23 % and if you are extremely almost insufferably picky: 3 %.

 

I personally like the drummer feature, it sounds natural to me and it's perfect to get a decent sounding basic drumpart under a song. It's a fine songwriters tool imho, although quality wise it could also be used in a pro production.

I would love to look under the hood though, and fully understand how exactly the x-y control works, and it would be nice if you could build your own drummer, AND assign more drumtrackcontrollers to MIDI.

[cforlong]

2 Drummer Tips & Tricks

 

1. Drummer is not limited to the 'Drum Kit' instrument . You can replace it with any software instrument plugin .

UltraBeat, Stylus, Punch, Geist, Additive Drums ....... or even EXS24, Kontact ..... ANY instrument.

It is not limited to drums. This could allow you to get quite creative if you map the instrument's keys.

 

Just create a Drummer track , then, on the channel strip, simply change the instrument from 'Drum Kit' to what ever you wish to use.

All of Drummer's Controls (the widget in the lower pane) are still at your command. Note: You will need to turn off 'PLAY' on your drum instrument if it is 'ON' by default.

 

2. Drummer uses some A.I. to create grooves. *

But you can add ANY groove that you might already have from another Drum plugin or library.

Just drag and drop the groove into the Drummer track , then select right mouse click on the groove and select Convert to Drummer Region.

 

*For most of my workflow, I instantiate Drummer AFTER I have some of my tune laid down.

[cforlong]

I believe that a project can have only ONE instance of Drummer. But you can still add multiple tracks/instruments and have the Drummer track control those tracks. This allows me to change a Kit anywhere within a song. I just did a composition that jumps back and forth between Punch and Ultrabeat ... and then to Sculpture . Experiment and get the creative juices flowing.

[Daggilarr]

2. Drummer uses some A.I. to create grooves. *

But you can add ANY groove that you might already have from another Drum plugin or library.

Just drag and drop the groove into the Drummer track , then select right mouse click on the groove and select Convert to Drummer Region.

 

I tried this, but it did not work the converted track just becomes whiter drummer groove is selected.

[cforlong]

Works for me :https://www.dropbox.com/s/54ehvmnbj5efmp8/convert.png

[Soundhound]

<<2. Drummer uses some A.I. to create grooves. *

But you can add ANY groove that you might already have from another Drum plugin or library.

Just drag and drop the groove into the Drummer track , then select right mouse click on the groove and select Convert to Drummer Region.>>

 

That would certainly solve the issue!

 

I guess my overall question really is, if I normally have been sifting through a library of thousands of grooves to find the feel for a song, I can't imagine that I'd find what I'm looking for in Drummers short list of grooves.

 

I think I may not be getting the idea behind Drummer. I'm going to try it today on a funky thing I'm working on. I love the idea of Drummer, there's a program I've been wanting to try forever called Jamstix, but its only been for PC (the osx version is finally coming out this year) which seems like a more comprehensive version of Drummer. I always loved the idea if it actually worked, what a great way to speed up the writing process....

[Soundhound]

<*For most of my workflow, I instantiate Drummer AFTER I have some of my tune laid down.>

 

This is how I was imagining using it in some cases. Laying down a piano or bass or clav or whatever track, and having Drummer listen to it and play along. Is that what you do?

[Nola111]

Soundhound, all the replies so far are spot on, and I just want to add that it's slightly like comparing apples to oranges if trying to compare Drummer to a list of MIDI grooves that you scroll through in other drum VI's. Sure, the short list on the left is exactly that - a short list of basic MIDI grooves in the style of that particular drummer. But, they are just a starting point to get your drummer playing the drums. From there, everything is dynamic, on-the-fly changes you can apply to get to the exact kind of groove that fits your song perfectly. With a list of static MIDI grooves, there's a lot more effort involved with importing the groove and manually changing around MIDI notes to fit your needs, plus, static MIDI grooves can't replicate the "Follow" function of Drummer at all (again w/o a lot of extra steps of groove extraction and application). It's really an intuitive plug, quite a simplified, Apple-fied version of Jamstix. I love it.

[Daggilarr]

I still find that the imported groove reverts to whatever "drummer' groove is selected.

 

I just wish there was a "Jazz" drummer and a "Latin" percussionist included, it would also benefit from a mixer, but having said that it is great.

 

For my first go I used an simple ultra beat groove more or less a a click track until I had something going on then replaced that with drummer

and worked on that region by region to get a natural feel. WAY faster to get an acceptable result, just wish it had those extra genres.

[Soundhound]

Thanks, that helps clarify for me a great deal. I need to dive in and see how it works. Since I've been building tracks the last few years with midi grooves, I can't yet quite get my head around how Drummer will work for me. When I come up with an idea, somewhere in there is the feel I'm looking for, and I search around in my library until I find it, or something close... Sounds like using Drummer will be a different way of working.

 

 

 

Soundhound, all the replies so far are spot on, and I just want to add that it's slightly like comparing apples to oranges if trying to compare Drummer to a list of MIDI grooves that you scroll through in other drum VI's. Sure, the short list on the left is exactly that - a short list of basic MIDI grooves in the style of that particular drummer. But, they are just a starting point to get your drummer playing the drums. From there, everything is dynamic, on-the-fly changes you can apply to get to the exact kind of groove that fits your song perfectly. With a list of static MIDI grooves, there's a lot more effort involved with importing the groove and manually changing around MIDI notes to fit your needs, plus, static MIDI grooves can't replicate the "Follow" function of Drummer at all (again w/o a lot of extra steps of groove extraction and application). It's really an intuitive plug, quite a simplified, Apple-fied version of Jamstix. I love it.