Real versus Sampled drums: the neglected flamewar.

[Hink]

btw I dont play drums at all, now that I have a house in the country and a live room for miking I could indeed mic a kit (got the mics save for a kick drum mic). If I meet a drummer here I would do so but here's my issue with drums. (note I said drums, not drummers) IME anytime it seems there are people around and there is a drumkit there always seems to be one person who always wanted to try the drums

I'm very fussy about my ears (even vacuum with hearing protection), I really do not like putting my ears through the wasted abuse like someone wanting to try drums

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

Sampled Drums will never be able to replace a Real Drum performance

Two different things. The sounds are not the performance.

I'd take David 'Fingers' Haynes on a drum machine over an amateur with 20gig of multi-sampled kit:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oThXwURLLhs

With regard to the actual samples themselves: A well recorded library, with a shiteload of velocities, articulations etc, with the right player, using the right kit/controller, will be indistinguishable from a performance on a real kit

[pljones]

A well recorded library ...<snip>... will be indistinguishable from a performance on a real kit

As jancivil says - and I should have too - that's a "well recorded performance on a real kit", too. A good performance, well produced on a bad sampled kit is going to be better than a bad performance, badly produced on a real kit. Usually. Depends.

[herodotus]

I have to say, this isn't much of a war.

Yes, I am a bit disappointed.

We have damn near started world war 3 over the subtle differences between analog synths and VAs, on numerous occasions, but when it comes to the differences between a live drum performance and samples, we barely get 2 pages.

KVR, you are making me sad.

[Hink]

I have to say, this isn't much of a war.

KVR, you are making me sad.

let me get this straight, you're gonna let kvr MAKE you sad? Well that explains your insecurities as a drummer now doesn't it. It's anti drummer here because face it the first instrument sequenced was probably drums and it's been all down hill since and that has you quaking in your kick pedal. So what do you do? You declare war on the rest of us






































how's that? Better? naturally I didn't mean a word of it

[chk071]

I don't care for either, real or sampled.

[jancivil]

Sampled Drums will never be able to replace a Real Drum performance

Two different things. The sounds are not the performance.

David 'Fingers' Haynes on a drum machine...

david fingers haynes.jpg

Facebook About sez 'Former Drummer at _'

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

Somebody wake me up when it's time for the drummer jokes

[herodotus]

With regard to the actual samples themselves: A well recorded library, with a shiteload of velocities, articulations etc, with the right player, using the right kit/controller, will be indistinguishable from a performance on a real kit

While for the most part this thread was set up as a bit of frivolity, I will say in all seriousness that I do not think this is true.

While I do believe that sampled drums of all sorts have many interesting and creative functions, I don't believe that performances using sample libraries are indistinguishable from a real live performance on a kit.

My point is similar to that of the more reasonable analog purists in our typical "analog vs VA" threads. I don't think the differences are 'night and day'. I don't think sampled drums are 'for kiddies who don't know what they are doing'. In fact, I am sure that a creative musician using samples to record a song can get stellar results. Finally, samples can create performances that are literally impossible for a human to duplicate, which is totally awesome.

But there are subtleties in a live performance by a skilled and dynamic drummer that are really difficult to nail with samples.

[jancivil]

It's true for 99.99% of what happens, IME.

Listen to this - stay with it a minute - without looking at it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s46fo2vzdcg

I hear what you are saying: "But there are subtleties" - yes. but it's usually not happening. It's the same with any vi.

Mr Haynes apparently still has teh real drums:

I’m now equipped to offer acoustic drum recordings for reasonable prices!

Here’s my equipment list;

DRUMS;

Yamaha Live Custom 10,12,14 & 16 floor toms, 18 x 16, 22x 16 kick drums.
Yamaha Oak Custom 10,12,14 & 16 floor toms , 22 x 17 kick drum

Drum Heads; Aquarian

Snares; An assortment of Yamaha Snaredrums

Cymbals; an assortment of Zildjian Cymbals

Drumsticks: Vic Firth
Sennheiser and Neumann Microphones

Audio Interfaces; The Award Winning Focusrite Clarett 8PreX and a Focusrite Clarett OctoPre
running 16 tracks at 24 bit 48k or higher

[jancivil]

just heard a David Haynes performance on real drums that sounded like an 80s drum machine

[herodotus]

Somebody wake me up when it's time for the drummer jokes

Did you know that the drum kit is the only instrument in common use that was explicitly invented by Afro-Americans?

Seriously, scholars have long traced the evolution of the modern drum kit to origins in New Orleans, where drums from defunct confederate army bands were cheap and unwanted and ready to be repurposed by creative and innovative African Americans. There is a parallel here to the way 303s and 808s were cheap and unwanted until they were repurposed by people like Derrick May and Juan Atkins.

[herodotus]

I have to say, this isn't much of a war.

KVR, you are making me sad.

let me get this straight, you're gonna let kvr MAKE you sad? Well that explains your insecurities as a drummer now doesn't it. It's anti drummer here because face it the first instrument sequenced was probably drums and it's been all down hill since and that has you quaking in your kick pedal. So what do you do? You declare war on the rest of us

Yep

how's that? Better? naturally I didn't mean a word of it

Fraterizing with the enemy, eh?

[funky lime]

So, generally, sampled kits are good enough. If you think you need better, record a real kit. Simples.

I've recorded drums. It's not better than anything I have in BFD. I would alter that to read, if you can record drums better than what happens at FXpansion for BFD2 or BFD3 maybe do that if you have all the time in the world and you have all these resources to do that.

Let's have a poll and find out how many of us that is, here.

Not every song needs a million dollar drum sound. Show me how to get a ratty old kit with tea towels on it in BFD (without paying ~$99 for virtual tea towels).

Don't get me wrong. BFD3 is awesome, and I prefer it over the alternatives I've tried (NI, addictive, superior, ez) but I've got a number of songs where i just pointed a single cheap condenser across the room in the general direction of my ratty old kit with tea towels on it and it just worked, after spending hours in BFD trying to get a lo-fi 60s sound that wasn't all "pristine samples with some lofi plugins and tons of eq" sounding. For instance, the resonant head on my Slingerland is all torn to shreds, and it gives the snare a really unique sound that can't be emulated digitally. And usually I leave the resonant heads off my toms and kick because I prefer the tone in most situations. I can't get that in BFD no matter how many expansions I buy. Also, I don't always want my cymbal sustains ringing out for 20 seconds in a pristine studio environment; I put duct tape on one of my rides because I like it.

Also, as with any sample library developer, FXpansion has made a lot of the creative decisions for you, such as mic choice and placement, drum tuning (though this is somewhat flexible through emulation, looser/tighter heads totally change the feel when playing a real kit), size/material of drumsticks, where exactly on the heads you are striking the drums (and at what angle), which drummer and engineer to use, which recording medium and outboard gear on the signal chain, etc.

If I want/need a million dollar drum sound, I'll use BFD. It's awesome for that.

As for the performance side, well I've been finger-drumming for like 18 years, almost as long as I've played a kit, and it all really comes down to creating a mapping that works for your style, and having your expectations clearly defined. They're two different beasts, really; you can do stuff on a kit you could never do on a keyboard, and vice versa. It's great to have both options. It's somewhat like acoustic vs electric guitar, or rhodes vs piano.

[herodotus]

I hear what you are saying: "But there are subtleties" - yes. but it's usually not happening. It's the same with any vi.

I would say, rather, that they happen all of the time, but that no one really cares about these subtle details. I am not even sure that I care about them, at least for my own music.

Most of these details only come into musical play in rare cases. Let me get specific.

The hardest drum kit performances to 'nail' with samples emphasize a great deal of subtle control over the many different ways that you can hit a drum or a cymbal. And it should be stated outright that for the vast majority of music, from pop to alt country to the most technical black metal, these subtleties serve no function.

The example that most comes to mind is Bill Bruford. Especially his work during the 70s with King Crimson. Just take his work on the album 'Red'. Songs like 'One More Red Nightmare' or 'Providence' would be a nightmare to try to program. There are so many different sounds that he gets out of a single Chinese Cymbal that you would need at least 5 keys to represent them alone.

Now these subtleties are necessary parts of the music in this case, but this is unusual music we are talking about. In most cases, they simply don't matter.

As a general rule, the more inventive and idiosyncratic the drummer, the harder they will be to mimic with samples. The only way to do it would be to design the sample set around their idiosyncrasies from the bottom up. And why would anyone put that amount of work into such a niche product?