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Stormdrum

Sound Module Plugin by EastWest
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Newer Version:
StormDrum 2
Stormdrum has been replaced by: StormDrum 2
Stormdrum
Stormdrum by EastWest is a Virtual Instrument Audio Plugin for macOS and Windows. It includes, and is therefore "powered by", Kompakt, which functions as a VST Plugin and an Audio Units Plugin.
The OS and Format icons below are for the latest version of Kompakt. The version numbers are for Stormdrum.
Product
Version
1.0.8
Product
Version
1.0.8
Instrument
Formats
Copy Protection
Online Activation (Challenge / Response)
My KVR - Groups, Versions, & More
44 KVR members have added Stormdrum to 6 My KVR groups 46 times.
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+6 in private groups

KVR Rank

Overall: 4404   3449   4201

30-Day: 7925; 7-Day: 9933; Yesterday: 4225

Sound Library plugin based on Native Instruments' Kompakt/Intakt. This instrument's interface will be visually identical except for the absence of the menu bar on the left side and is functionally identical except it can only load it's included library.

STORMDRUM includes intense multi-sampled acoustic drumkits. Each drum has up to 24-way velocity switching, with left and right hand samples. There are subtle ambient versions and huge sounding versions as well. There are 18 snares. These have left and right hand samples from the inside and outside of the drum, as well as rimshots. A typical hi-hat contains 200 samples. There are 20 kick drums, 10 cymbals and 8 tom sets.

Features:

  • Access to individual instruments and individual hits within loops.
  • Easy and intuitive user interface.
  • Based on Kontakt audio engine.
  • Loops use one or more of the three sampler-modes: Beat Machine with ISE (Individual Slice Edit), Time Machine and standard Sampler mode.
  • Easy synchronization of loops to MIDI tempo.
  • MIDI file export permits groove, accent, and feel manipulation in any host sequencer.
  • Integrated effects: Group filter including low-pass, high-pass, band-reject or band-pass modes, global filter, lo-fi, distortion, syncable delay.
  • Modulation section provides AHDSR envelope, two individual syncable LFOs, envelope follower and a DBD pitch envelope.
  • Total Recall.

Latest User Reviews

Average user rating of 3.00 from 1 review
Stormdrum

Reviewed By Seidhepriest [all]
February 11th, 2013
Version reviewed: XP SP3 on Windows

The real value of this sampler is in ethnic percussion instruments. Everything else is so-and-so. The taiko is useful, and there's a lot of Mideast percussion, from clay drums to doira to zils, dumbek, and udu (and much more). This is a really useful sampler for percussion flavours and to add unconventional drums to a music piece.

There're some minor Kompakt bugs, like Stormdrum complaining it's running out of memory whenever loading a largeish instrument, thinking the PC "runs out of memory" whenever there's a largeish (>256 MBs?) instrument loaded. That, on a PC with 3 GBs RAM, more than 2 GBs free. Running this together with Battery 3 is dangerous, as it's either Stomdrum's or Battery DFD engine working at a time. You have to render stems in separate DAW projects, then mix them together.

Stormdrum also offers some regular drums, trying to justify the price by throwing in a lot more than just ethnic percussion (which is quite good really). Now this is why it gets the lower review score: the Western percussion is anything but properly arranged and recorded.

GM drumkits are incomplete, missing toms and percussion. Some mappings are crazy, like a hi-hat on A#1 below the bass kick (GM standard is metronome bell). Stuff that would've been pretty easy to record, like handclap, is missing. The cowbell that's offered as a separate instrument tends to sound cold and thin (it does sound more or less fine on monitor speakers, but it breaks into cold on consumer kit). In addition, the drumkits have a natural reverb, which is an issue for someone who's used to dry drums that can be processed with reverb you yourself fancy.

Overall the makers of Stormdrum pride themselves on having used the best Neumann microphones and having invited famous drummers and so on and so forth, but the issue is, because of a lack of high-frequency damping (acoustic treatment?) the drumkits tend to sound cold and with a somewhat muddy reverb. It's not all bad, if you're into using drum samples with natural reverb then it might work. But the character of the samples is more on the cold/foggy side with not as much liveliness (it's only 88.2/24, not even 96/24, and apparently the ADC they used isn't anything special). The problem here looks like the people who recorded this were regular live band sound engineers, not sampling engineers. And, the finer condensers tend to pick up quite a lot of the room ambience/character (unless close-miking), which again is a bother.

So again, if you absolutely need some kind of ethnic percussion (taiko, bodhran, etc. - though at the current prices buying a large bodhran is a lot cheaper) and if you've found this in a bargain bin/sale, then it's worth it. The ethnic percussion does sound rather nicer than the Western drums, and quite special. It was recorded with minimal ambience, too.

Read Review

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Comments & Discussion for EastWest Stormdrum

Discussion
Discussion: Active
tenshin111
tenshin111
12 February 2013 at 11:34am

The good thing is you can open this library in Kontakt and forget about issues with the Kompakt/Intakt players.

Also, this thing comes with a great selection of drum/percussion loops - you didn't mention that. And honestly, this is the bast part of it IMHO. Those loops are great, I use them a lot and heard many of them in commercial productions / soundtracks .

BTW - I bought this thing years ago on a sale for 99 GBP. Considering the price I paid I would give this 8/10.

Seidhepriest
Seidhepriest
12 February 2013 at 9:56pm

Well yes, maybe it's worth 7.5 or so. It's just that I've been recording our own samples and takes for the band, and with the new gear we've got the sound is a lot livelier than Stormdrum. We also have some fancy percussion (berimbao, talking drums, congas, etc.) so usually it's a lot easier to record than use a sampler, unless it's for the unusual things. The drummer can easily cook up his own fancy drum loops though, and all live. We've never used the loops. The one value that we kind of expected was GM drumkits as old drum tracks were written for MIDI channel 10, and Stormdrum just doesn't do it right. But of course you don't get a full GM drumkit as a bonus, only a few drums mapped to GM notes. That's a bit of a bother, it would sure be nice to have a full-res (96/24, or at least 88/24) GM kit.

The issue here is, the samples in Stormdrum have this "recorded ambient" feel and while sometimes they mix just fine, others (in a less crowded mix) the ambience interferes. Maybe it's just getting "spoiled" by the new microphones, etc., but right now we can record better takes for sure than the sample quality in Stormdrum. Still, some things like the taiko and, say, sioux and lion drums we just don't have, so sampled stuff it is.

Seidhepriest
Seidhepriest
12 February 2013 at 10:09pm

Our own samples and takes also mix better, they have more of a definition and don't get lost. The age of Stormdrum shows itself. It's from what, 2004? 9 years old, the new gear simply gives better definition. I would never put a Stormdrum loop or instrument forward in a mix, especially solo.

THIS POST HAS BEEN REMOVED

RobertRandom
RobertRandom
26 July 2014 at 7:33pm

Missing ancient, printed EWQL - Stormdrum Kompakt/Intakt - User Manuals Books.

Hi, .

Is there anyone in this forum still owning the TWO user MANUALS for the EWQL Stormdrum-KOMPAKT and Stormdrum-INTAKT Mac-programs ?

EastWest and Native Instrument discontinued those programs and manuals many years ago and I have lost mine.

Of course I would pay for all expenses associated with the replacement of the manuals/copies.

Thanks in advance for your efforts.

RobertRandom.

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