What would be a good drum program to use with Mixcraft?

[marc32123]

I really like the library in Mixcraft and all the drumbeats that are in there. But there aren't really that many. Is there any good drum software or something that would work well with Mixcraft and has a good library full of beats. I am checking out EZ drummer at the moment.

[outteh]

Mixcraft's own Beatcraft has an excellent sequencer and creates some very nice sounds! You can try it out on trial and see what you think!

[TrevsAudio]

Whilst Mixcraft drums are great, I'm also very happy with EZDrummer

[Mark Bliss]

Couple of thoughts here Marc,

I recall you indicating a pretty tight budget when researching the little red box. And also, based on the range of questions and experiences you have shared, It seems you are still in the earlier parts of the learning curve here. Are you sure you want to add any complications at this stage?

You can do a lot with the Acoustica Studio Drums set you have. Killer drum tracks are possible with what you have now. Learn to multi track a drum sequence, use compression, EQ and reverb with it and it expands the capabilities a great deal. You can also use outside MIDI sequence sources to create some drum sequences quickly. I'm just trying to encourage you not to underestimate the capability you already have in hand.

Someone else suggested Beatcraft, and for a budget solution, this might work well for you. I personally feel that the previous suggestion will likely get you what you want, and its unnecessary. But its a matter of preference, the sequencer is useful, and its possible to add your own samples and such. But if you get to that advanced stage of creation, the steps to import your multitracked drum sequences into Mixcraft are kind of a hassle, and you will likely quickly be to the point of being ready for a more advanced drum program.

There are many to choose from. EZDrummer is a lot of "bang for the buck" in my opinion, but be aware that you will likely want a few additional genre/style specific EZX add-on packs to round out the library from whats included as far as drum samples and MIDI grooves.
So even on sale: http://www.sweetwater.com/store/search. ... &Go=Search you are likely to quickly tie up a couple hundred in that route. There's other offerings, many even more expensive in the long run.

And that brings us back to the learning curve part. It isn't hard to incorporate most drum VSTi's into Mixcraft. But it adds a bunch of stuff to learn. Settings and such to get everything working the way you want. Only you can decide where you are at on this.
Experience has shown that keeping it simple and learning to use what you have well, leads to more content creation than habitual gear acquisition...... Toys are fun, but don't let them get in the way of your goal. Just a suggestion.

[fredfish]

Completely agree with Mbliss - very well said.

For example have a look at the free drum MIDI loops that you can get from groovemonkey ( http://www.groovemonkee.com/en/free-midi) - if you use the loops designed for General MIDI (GM) then these will work perfectly with the Acustica Drums (inc Studio Drums - if you have them). You can then go in and examine the MIDI loops and tweak them to your hearts content.

If you do a search for free MIDI drum loops you will find loads that you can use as starting points. Some will be of questionable quality and usefulness, but if you use them as a starting point they can be an excellent learning tool.

Have fun!!

Cheers

John

[marc32123]

I think I am going to go with what you said mbliss. I don't really need to upgrade as of yet, it's expensive plus a whole new avenue of things I would have to learn. I am just going to go with what I got for now. I actually just created a really awesome drumbeat for a song I am working on today using acoustic studio drums.

[Mark Bliss]

There you go, probably the wise decision.

Here's a little simple project for you to mess with. Its by no means a definitive method, or really intended as an advised way to do this, just some highlighted areas to mess around with and give you some ideas.

If you download the file to your desktop, or your "my recordings" folder, you can open it from there.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/x250e3ke4gtsn ... te%201.mx6

Some things to check out-
First, notice I have multi-tracked the drums in order to allow mixing the individual parts. I also have them in a submix so that once the drums are mixed relative to each other to satisfaction you can adjust the levels, mute, solo them etc. as a group.

Multdrumtut1.jpg (85.15 KiB) Viewed 14880 times

Explore around the FX inserts and you will find some have compression, all have some EQ, though the compressors and EQ's and their settings don't reflect what I might normally use, as I just whipped up a quick example, and had to use what you would have in your version. At the very least I would prefer in many instances to use a parametric EQ, but you should still get the idea. Explore the inserts and see what ideas you come up with.

Next, If you click on the mixer tab-

Mixer tab.jpg (17.03 KiB) Viewed 14880 times

Then click to undock-

Undock.jpg (19.61 KiB) Viewed 14880 times

Continued-

[Mark Bliss]

In this example I have the mixer view adjusted to fit the screen, except at the bottom where I left the transport bar accessible. (Highlighted area 4) Unfortunately that doesnt get saved with the project file, but you can do the same if you wish.

Mixer view.jpg (130.67 KiB) Viewed 14880 times

Notes:
I have some over all compression inserted on the drum bus (Area 3) to "glue" everything together and give the drum set some oomph. (Yes, that's a technical term! )
I have a send bus set up with a reverb on it (Area 1) and the send knobs (area 2) are set to control the amount from each track sent to the reverb bus. I have a modest amount for the various drums to give a sense of space, and some extra dialed in on the snare to add some pop.

Explore around with the various settings, see if you get any ideas.
Also note that you could use it as a template if you wish, and add your own tracks, data, and settings.

[marc32123]

Nice thanks for all the ideas. I am sure I will use them all in time. It's people like you that make this forum awesome. About a month ago when I first started all of this I had no idea even what Mixcraft was when I first heard of it. I remember I wanted to make some drumbeats online and I was checking out EZ drummer. I called Sweetwater and asked them about it and they said I needed a DAW to run it on. I had no idea what they were talking about or what a DAW even was. In this short amount of time I have come along ways, that's for sure. Most of my progress has been because of you and other's on this forum here. I just wanted to say thanks for everything. But I have a question about you last post you just left. You said that
"Some things to check out-
First, notice I have multi-tracked the drums in order to allow mixing the individual parts. I also have them in a submix so that once the drums are mixed relative to each other to satisfaction you can adjust the levels, mute, solo them etc. as a group."

I don't understand exactly what you mean by multi-tracked the drums in order to allow mixing the individual parts. I can understand it if you had more than one kit you wanted to mix the sounds of, but it looked to me like all of your tracks had the same kit, Acoustic Studio Drums. Did you only make separate tracks so you could change the sounds and effects of the indivdual parts on the individual tracks?

[Mark Bliss]

No problem Marc, I am glad to help those who appreciate it if I can, and by publicly posting the tips on the forum, I hope someone else might benefit as well. I have been working on more detailed tutorials when time allows. And I will be quick to point out I am learning from other generous people here all the time too!

it looked to me like all of your tracks had the same kit, Acoustic Studio Drums. Did you only make separate tracks so you could change the sounds and effects of the indivdual parts on the individual tracks?

If you open the file I linked you to, it might become more clear. But yes, in the example all the drums come from the "Studio Drums" kit. But you will find for instance the kick drum is on its own track so you can process and EQ it separately, Then the Snare on its own track, etc on through the set.

By putting them all on a submix track you can for example adjust the level of the drums as a group. Or for example mute them while mixing or working some other tracks. It also allows you to add processing, as in the example project- compression, to the group as a set.

The addition of the reverb send allows you to use one incidence of a reverb plug in to conserve computer resources, but still allow setting different amounts of reverb on the different tracks.

There's more information on setting up "send" and "bus" tracks from the tutorials in the thread at the top of the Mixcraft forum page:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxOqGPViWs4

And some more info from another thread here in the "tips and tricks" forum:
http://forums.acoustica.com/bbs/viewtop ... 12&t=12572

[davefk]

Completely agree with Mbliss - very well said.

For example have a look at the free drum MIDI loops that you can get from groovemonkey ( http://www.groovemonkee.com/en/free-midi) - if you use the loops designed for General MIDI (GM) then these will work perfectly with the Acustica Drums (inc Studio Drums - if you have them). You can then go in and examine the MIDI loops and tweak them to your hearts content.

If you do a search for free MIDI drum loops you will find loads that you can use as starting points. Some will be of questionable quality and usefulness, but if you use them as a starting point they can be an excellent learning tool.

Have fun!!

Cheers

John

Thanks for the link John!

[SteveGad]

Mixcraft's own Beatcraft has an excellent sequencer and creates some very nice sounds! You can try it out on trial and see what you think!

The best thing about Beatcraft is that you can actually put in your own one-shot (single drum) samples, to tweak your own kit to taste.

[Mark Bliss]

For more drum MIDI resources-
http://forums.acoustica.com/bbs/viewtop ... 12&t=14455

[Mark Bliss]

It just occurred to me that I made a mistake on the example/template, and didn't have the drum reverb bus sends set to pre-fader. If you downloaded the project to examine and experiment with, you may want to note this, change your version or re-download. (Fixed now)

Oh and I threw in some other stuff to make it more interesting too......

That's right, OMG! Synthesizer!

[marc32123]

Cool, thanks mbliss. I will defintely be coming back to this thread when I am working on the drumbeat for my next song.