Ableton Forum

hi guys, I'm new to ableton, using the live 5 full version. I just got playing with the drum loops and stuff.. However, I find that the drum loops sound very electronic and rather fake.. Is there someone along the same frequency as me, who creates Ableton drum loops for acoustic rock or alternative rock rather than electronic music? Or is there some effect that I could toggle to make the drums sound more'real' and natural? Is there someone that knows where to get natural sounding drum loops? Please help! I'm all the way from Singapore where few people use Ableton..

THANKS ALOT AND MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A BLESSED NEW YEAR

Making natural sounding drums is HARD. You need to vary timing, velocity and drum hits. You probably need a serious drum sampler like BFD which has lots of samples for the same drum, ie it changes the sample depending on velocity, and can change the sample to a slightly different version even if you play the same velocity.

http://www.fxpansion.com/index.php?page=30

Talking of natural sounding drums, is there a way to apply random groove in Live, so far I've only found swing kind of grooves, but no other settings

Live 6 has a midi effect called Velocity (not found on ableton 5)

This randomizes the velocity, and with randomizing a bit your quantization you can make them sound more "natural" ...

Consider quality reverb, proper mix and good midi programing.

Samplers don't do miracles.

Variying something doesn't mean that it will make it more natural obviusly. Listen to a good drumer in an uncompressed recording and examine who he plays focusing on velocity and timing.

this is why i still use fruity loops for drums. I really haven't found anyhting that can beat it as a drum -rewire

Let me introduce you digital performer ...

there are tools where you do amazing things with midi to give them life.

Can't be bother to write them all here (sorry)
visit motu.com to find out about it.

http://www.motu.com/products/software/dp/

bitcrush

FWIW,

this sounded to me like ye olde "warping" problem

thedaysofjoel wrote:hi guys, I'm new to ableton, using the live 5 full version. I just got playing with the drum loops and stuff.. However, I find that the drum loops sound very electronic and rather fake.. Is there someone along the same frequency as me, who creates Ableton drum loops for acoustic rock or alternative rock rather than electronic music? Or is there some effect that I could toggle to make the drums sound more'real' and natural? Is there someone that knows where to get natural sounding drum loops? Please help! I'm all the way from Singapore where few people use Ableton..

THANKS ALOT AND MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A BLESSED NEW YEAR

I have solved partially my problems buying things here :
http://www.smartloops.com/

Buy the MIDI version only if you have a GM compatible module or VSTi.
You can buy the Drum Loops and use the single shot samples to build different sound in an impulse set. When joining the loops together you can obtain similar 'real life' sounding Drum Tracks, but it will took time. A lot of time actually. I have obtained better results that way, but I think a real drummer cannot be emulated.

Happy XMAS.

djazz wrote:Live 6 has a midi effect called Velocity (not found on ableton 5)

Velocity was in Live 4 already....

if you're running mac, look for and download Antiloop923. If a drum sequencer that uses probablility matrixes to create the loop, so it sounds incredible, and it never repeats like a midi loop. plus it's FREE. kind of a bitch to wrap your head around at first but once you do it's great. it's also got the capability to rewire the audio into live, but i hvaen't figured out how to get it to sync with the master clock. the bitch wont do it!!!

there's a really nice sample bank for kontakt called NI studio drums. i use it a lot, it's really great. has all the samples mapped to change w velocity, etc... very realistic texture as well.

Part of the problem is that unlike most other DAW's/MIDI sequencers, it's a real pain in the ass to program different velocity values as you are constructing a pattern (drawing velocities - especially the way Ableton has implemented it - is LAME!)

eg. in Cubase, you can enter 4 note velocity values by holding different buttons on your alphanumeric keyboard. You Hi-Hat patterns *immediately* have more life and flavor with this sort of feature.

Honestly, this is one of my number one concerns with Live and has been ever since they brought in MIDI sequencing. I really wish Ableton would quit farting around with all sorts of "value-adds" such as sample packs and focus on refining the core product.

I love the ReDrum in reason. I rewire it from time to time with my "refills" which sound very natural. As for "Humanizing" drums one word,

EZdrummer

good vst

In my opinion, without a real drummer and a set there's no way you are going to get the sound of a real drummer.

If you're going to use a drum track you should probably not really attempt to make it sound like a real drummer, because it won't. The tradeoff is you have a chance to do something really creative with your rhythym sounds... and if you're buying software anyway, why not just hire a drummer instead?