Drum machines? does anyone even use them?

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Drum machines? does anyone even use them?

Postby lalala18 » Sat Feb 26, 2011 10:56 pm

i was bored and contemplating life and wondered to myself, does anyone use drum machines and sequencers with breakcore? and not the fancy software ones but the real analog ones with all the pretty buttons :shock:

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Postby divtech » Sun Feb 27, 2011 1:36 am

i see them used all the time, sometimes with live equip and sometimes as an instrument to be sampled, I've never owned one but i think theyre pretty dope

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Postby Ridylan G » Fri Mar 04, 2011 3:00 pm

Ya I've played breakcore sets without a computer or decks. Just drum machines and synths run through a mixer.

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Postby lalala18 » Tue Mar 08, 2011 1:25 am

which would you recommend. i use renoise and reason now but i was thinking bout getting a drum machine. is it worth it?

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Postby Ridylan G » Tue Mar 08, 2011 12:52 pm

no peice of hardware will be as handy as renoise for tricky drum breaking. but the limitations of the drum machine will force you to find a new way of making your drums sound tecked out.. If i could have any drum machine it would be the elektron machine drum.

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Postby SideshowKenny » Mon Mar 14, 2011 10:53 am

I quite enjoy my EM-1 midi sync'd and audio in into my EMX. :P

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Postby Ozma » Sat Mar 19, 2011 4:10 pm

i play live sets with hardware. i'm writing music on the laptop now, but still have to get a usb to 1/4" line mixer before i can play from it.

my set up was yamaha rs7000 sampler sequencer, MIDI'd with roland sh-32 synth. then boss sp-505 sampler, <----also works well as a thru for fx. and one turntable, but mainly just in case i get stuck and need time to load a new file on the sequencer, keep the sound going.

you can't really program new beats into the rs while it is playing, but if you come prepared with enough loops, there are lots of ways to fuck around with them that its a pretty fun set up. definietly keeps me busy anyway. would be interesting to get 2 rs7000s and juggle between them though, really program the beats as you go

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Postby Skornsteen » Sun Mar 27, 2011 5:03 pm

Yes, i use alot of drum machines, i usually control them with midi from renoise. The Tr-505 is usually used with it's own sequencer since there is a bug in my OS on the machine which in fact sounds terrific.
I also use my akai s950 alot since i can digitally put samples on it and it has 8 outs, apart from that it makes my breakbeats very gritty.
Circuit bend drum boxes are dope too.

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Postby lalala18 » Sun Mar 27, 2011 11:10 pm

wait how do you control a drum box though renoise?

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Postby Ozma » Mon Mar 28, 2011 3:49 am

lalala18 wrote:which would you recommend. i use renoise and reason now but i was thinking bout getting a drum machine. is it worth it?


i'm not sure what to recommend, not really up on what is out there right now. sampler capabilities maybe... in case you get bored with the built-in drum sounds. you can sample your break slices and put them in there, thats always good. and pattern-chaining is something you might want to look for in a drum machine. its helpful if for some reason you need to automate it, and not manually change the loop pattern every 4-8 measures or whatever. and have some idea if you are gonna like how their screen interface is set up, usually they will have a little screen on there to tell you where you're placing notes in the measure. thats probably the most important thing.

i'll bet you could get a pretty good deal on something like an older Akai MPC, find one on ebay for cheap.

i don't know, just don't rush into anything and find out as much as you can about a machine before you decide.

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Postby Skornsteen » Mon Mar 28, 2011 7:20 pm

Controlling a drumbox, or other stuff which is midi controllable:
While in renoise select an empty instrument/vsti/sample spot
Go to instrument settings, on your left select your soundcard midi out in the midi properties.
You now get an extra inst. Called: midi
Make sure the midi channel on your renoise is the same as the drumbox.
Only thing that i couldnt control this way was te novation x station

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Postby Skornsteen » Mon Mar 28, 2011 7:34 pm

lalala18 wrote:which would you recommend. i use renoise and reason now but i was thinking bout getting a drum machine. is it worth it?
It depends what you'd like to achieve with your machines, simply jam some preset loops? A fat analog sound? More editable parameters and maybe ability to load in own sounds?
If your good with a soldering iron maybe your ready for some circuit bending.
Also price range whould be nice.
I'll make you a list

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Postby Iron Attorney » Sun Jun 12, 2011 2:44 pm

I've been looking myself at getting a drum machine. My live sets so far consist of me playing my tracks off cd's, which is pretty lame.

I've done a fair bit of research now, and it's quite obvious if money isn't a problem the elektron machinedrum sps-1 uw mkii is the way to go, not that I've tried it myself.

I sadly can't afford one of these, but I have narrowed my affordable options to either the Roland MC909 or the Yamaha RS7000. Anyone have any experience with these two machines?

From what I can tell most people prefer the RS7000, though the MC909 is slightly winning so far for no other reason than I know you can load samples from your PC. Anyone know if there's any way of loading your own samples onto the RS7000? Any way at all? If there is then that's the way i'm gonna be going.

The other option I've seen highly recommended is just getting both these machines and linking them up.

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Postby Ozma » Sun Jun 12, 2011 6:07 pm

oh shit, son, thats cool that youre looking at the RS. i love that machine. made breakcore on it for years starting out, its good you can automate everything or manually chain the loops together live. you'll wish you had another one running parallel with it though b/c you can't prog new beats into while it is running, but you load a whole set of different kits & scenes of loops to piece together or mash with effects. but as an addition to a setup with a computer could be lots of fun to use alongside.

i know someone who had the mc909. i was a little jealous when it came out like 2 wks after i got the rs, cuz it seemd like a lot better machine. it has better quality synthesis, but the way it works for putting things together as a song, i think the RS was a lot better, mc909 you don't really have a choice but to manually mute/unmute tracks as they play and switch scenes in order to run your song. kinda old school like that.

i'm RS7000 all the way, specially if you got an outside synth to hook up as midi slave to it, (since, like i said the synth patches in are literally like 10 that i would EVER use.. )or already have a computer. great machine to mash out beats though. it has a sick midi delay that just makes beats fuckin fly if you know how to use it. i still miss the dist & verb FX on there, can't find anything like it in a vst ...good shit

if you wanna know what you can do with it, check out my track 'Heart Attack Quartet' i have it uploaded on here, made that all on my rs7000 set up way back.


as far as loading samples into it? there is a SCSI hookup. i never used it, i don't really do SCSI that shit is like i don't even know, maybe you know how. i always just recorded samples via 1/4" line

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Postby Iron Attorney » Sun Jun 12, 2011 6:23 pm

Haha, crazy! I actually downloaded that song a while back cos i thought it was pretty sick :D so the RS7000 has definite breakcore potential then, good stuff!

I am very nearly sold completely on the RS7000 now, especially seeing as the cheapest MC909 I can find is about £450 (starting price on ebay with no bids yet...) and I've found RS7000 for not much over £200. You say you can record your samples in as audio via jak cable? bit rustic but that works for me, as long as I have some means of getting them on there so I can play something slightly resembling the tracks I've made in FL for the last 3 years.

Now I just have to scrape the cash together!

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