Air Music Technology's Drum Synth 500

[SparkySpark]

Hi,

Thinking of expanding my drums palette, and noticed Air Music's Drum Synth 500 is now for sale at 50 bucks at pluginboutique. With 500 samples, synthesized sounds and 500 MIDI patterns, it intrigues me.

Here's a two minute showcase (at ca 13.30): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Po3MDatOoN4

Any thoughts or better deals? (I personally don't use sampled loops, so a sample loop library won't be a substitute, and I'm not looking for analog drums, but techno/synth pop/DM-ish sounds.) And yes, I get it that it will be cheaper in the future.

Thanks, and Enjoy Black Friday!

[reusenoise]

I demo it, nothing special, maybe when they put @9,99 I consider to buy it

[telecharge]

It has its limitations and the UI isn't for everyone, but how about BreakTweaker Expanded for 10 bucks? https://www.pluginboutique.com/products/834

[mabian]

Does it have multiple outputs?

- Mario

[starflakeprj]

Why buy anything that you know is unsupported directly after its release (more or less)? We are talking about AIR here you know. Would be a stupid move, unless you are fine with paying 50 bucks for something that will never get an update, and never be resizable.

[starflakeprj]

And if you are after just the midi loops, download the update file on their website which contains all 500 midi loops. Samples you can get elsewhere, both free and paid.

[SparkySpark]

It has its limitations and the UI isn't for everyone, but how about BreakTweaker Expanded for 10 bucks? https://www.pluginboutique.com/products/834

Thanks! As a whole it's thirty years ahead of my music but I guess I can use it for added percussive spice if nothing else. Plus a ton of samples for ten bucks makes it a great deal even if it may not be entirely for me. As Izotope wrote "Traditional sequencing is so 1984". Well, that's about what my music sounds like.

A quick question: does it respond to a MIDI track (i.e. can I use it traditionally)? In the video I saw, they make a beat and drag it to Live as an audio clip. In my mind, that makes today's music so static, so I hope it's controllable through the DAW (and not just the other way around).

Thanks a lot!

[SparkySpark]

Does it have multiple outputs?

- Mario

I wonder that as well. But it must have, I think: how else could one side-chain the BD? (Well, apart from a LP filter or so.)

[SparkySpark]

And if you are after just the midi loops, download the update file on their website which contains all 500 midi loops.

Sneaky!

(Have looked into sample libraries, but it just becomes a mess after a while I think, like downloading preset banks for Synth 1, SoundFonts etc. I mean, I just want an editable drum track that sounds ok and carries the music.)

[SLiC]

Given AKAI and Air are the same group, I would guess the 8 part drum synth they just added free to the MPC hardware and software is basically the same thing.

https://www.akaipro.com/drumsynth

I have this installed in my MPC Live and MPC software and it sounds pretty good to me...at least as good as Maschines synth drums.

Akai MPC software 2.9 has these drums and a ton of other stuff so may also be worth looking out for on the sales, it can go very cheap, for example 40 quid with 5 MPC expansions

https://www.thomann.de/gb/akai_mpc_2_st ... 61457bb88c

[SparkySpark]

Given AKAI and Air are the same group, I would guess the 8 part drum synth they just added free to the MPC hardware and software is basically the same thing.

https://www.akaipro.com/drumsynth

I have this installed in my MPC Live and MPC software and it sounds pretty good to me...at least as good as Maschines synth drums.

Akai MPC software 2.9 has these drums and a ton of other stuff so may also be worth looking out for on the sales, it can go very cheap, for example 40 quid with 5 MPC expansions

https://www.thomann.de/gb/akai_mpc_2_st ... 61457bb88c

Thanks! I agree with you, having looked at Drumsynth now.

[SparkySpark]

BTW, I just got this in my email, from BPB:

https://bedroomproducersblog.com/2020/1 ... r-88-free/

It's a retro drum synth from AudioThing, priced at 29 euros, now free for the 99sounds/BPB readers.

Being AudioThing, it can't be bad.

[telecharge]

A quick question: does it respond to a MIDI track (i.e. can I use it traditionally)?

Yes, it works like a sampler. Check out the manual. It's only 52 pages and not very dense.
https://www.izotope.com/content/dam/izo ... r-help.pdf

Here's an excerpt from page 11:
"There are 24 available patterns in BreakTweaker. Each pattern is assigned to a MIDI note from C2 through B3. Playing one of these notes into BreakTweaker will cause the pattern associated with that MIDI note to start playing."

The patterns can only be 2 bars long. That's one of the limitations I was referring to.

Learn BreakTweaker in 10 Minutes - https://www.izotope.com/en/learn/learn- ... nutes.html

[yul]

It seems the Drum Synth 500 contains a lot more than the SR-88 (with only "5" individual sounds).

I was quite interested recently in BOOM which is more lightweight and contains essential drum machines.

The Akai seems interesting but believe you need to own an MPC of some form.

BOOM might be the simpler, easier solution (especially with the low price).

Any other suggestions?

[SparkySpark]

It seems the Drum Synth 500 contains a lot more than the SR-88 (with only "5" individual sounds).

I was quite interested recently in BOOM which is more lightweight and contains essential drum machines.

The Akai seems interesting but believe you need to own an MPC of some form.

BOOM might be the simpler, easier solution (especially with the low price).

Any other suggestions?

I agree. In fact, the DrumSynth 500 seems like a good and useful tool anyway (though I'd liked it more if were insanely low priced like most of Air Music's things). FWIW, I personally have no beef myself with Air Music's lack of upgrades. The XPand!2 rompler is probably what I use most, as it's so versatile and fast.