Re: Question about electronic drums and Mac looping

[Louie Angulo <louie.angulo@googlemail.com>]

what about lets say using NI battery or such software for recording? im really curious about this,im sure nothing tops a real drummer,but this programs offer amazing sounds and save you so much miking time when producing,im really curious how many professional recordings on the radio have produced hits this way,and im not talking about electronic drums,im talikng about acoustic sample drums they are so realisitic is scarry! i think i would really have a problem nowdays telling the difference and though it might sound weird, i think some drummers are really being challenged with this type of sampled software,though it takes some finger practice and drum producing understanding no doubt;-)
cheers
Luis

On Fri, Dec 3, 2010 at 12:42 AM, Rick Walker <looppool@cruzio.com> wrote:

 andrea trabucco wrote:

Abandoned the choice to live-looping several percussion instruments, I've come to the decision to use some prerecorded stuff via a Mac computer and also do some live-looping with and e-drum pad.

Dear Andrea,

  Maybe it's just because I'm a drummer/percussionist originally as a musician, but having seen literally
hundreds of live looping performances at the Y2K festival and in 15 different countries I have
to say that people who use real sounds as percussion elements (be it recontextualizing their
instruments like guitarist, bassists or vocalists making drumset sounding grooves by banging on
their axes (or beatboxing) feel much more organic, visceral and funky to my ears than
people who use prerecorded loops or even interactive drum machine sequencing programs like
RMX (which I agree is probably one of the best).

It seems to me too, that audiences react more viscerally to people who do their own percussion
even when it is very, very simple (and sometimes specifically because it is very, very simple).

For one thing,  we are inundated in this electronic age with canned drum tracks.

It's so much more fun to see someone be creative even when it is very simplistic to create a rhythmic track
to play over (and on top of that, you can use techniques like double time/half time and reverse to
create sounds that are 'hyper' real.

Just my two cents, but I'm curious why you choose to eschew live percussion in your looping.

Some of my favorite drummers are actually not drummers.  I love, for example, how Gary Regina creatively
uses percussion in his multi-instrumental live looping tracks.

Is it just a matter of being able to mic such things well or is it the bother of learning how to play some things
or even just lugging more gear around?

I'm curious.

respectfully,   rick walker