EZ Drummer 3 announced.

[noiseboyuk]

For SD4 to really go to that next level - it needs to make a quantum leap - in the Ai space - something like say - Jamstix - where "drummer brain" functionality can create realistic tracks on the fly without being "told" what to do with a bunch of midi files.

Dragging/dropping/stacking and then playing back a series of MIDI files (edited or not) in your DAW was next level back in 2008 but if SD4 is really going to change the game - I don't really see anything left it cannot do except start drumming for me by somehow making the same kinds of groove/timing/fill/pocket decisions that a real drummer would in a typical performance.

They’re half way there with the Song Creator function, that generates variations and fills on the starting groove and works pretty well.

I’m not sure how auto-throwing things in would work, that does sound more aimed at EZD initially perhaps, it would be a strange thing for SD4 to lead with. I think a massive new core library is more likely… I just don’t think I really want it.

Jeepers, the amount of stuff I’ve got now… last I counted I had 500 snares in there.

[Aloysius]

Tap2Find with step-time input is great. It's really like having a drummer in the band. You give the non-binary a rough idea what you want and they/them follow along.

Alternatively, you play some music and the drummer makes up their own part, in the style of your choosing.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

Tap2Find with step-time input is great. It's really like having a drummer in the band. You give the non-binary a rough idea what you want and they/them follow along.

Alternatively, you play some music and the drummer makes up their own part, in the style of your choosing.

Yeah, this works well. I had been thinking about something very similar to this (had even been looking at JamStix hoping it would work like this) so I'm glad to see a product do this so well. It still feels a little clumsy from a UI perspective, but to save hours writing drum parts, it's more than well worth it.

[Aloysius]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRVpnJjwgR0

EZDrummer 3 Bandmate Stress Test & Analysis

[MadDogE134]

hope ez keys upgrade is soon to match and i wish they allowed use of 'sender' plugin as in ez bass to feed the bandmate. maybe they will?

[guitarmiester]

Disappointing to see all the issues with drag and drop for the bandmate feature. That was the main reason I bought the upgrade even though I can't yet use EzDrummer3 in Reason until they add VST3 support. Was planning to use another DAW to program drums, export and then import to Reason. Clunky workaround but whatever works, right?

I'm hoping to mess around with it later today.

Same here. I've been using the export function from Reason to use with EZdrummer3 in standalone to try it all out. Dragging audio or MDI works fine in standalone.

I guess then I could export the MIDI from EZD3 then use it in EZD2 in Reason.
I fired up Ableton Lite (seems to be very cheaply available) to also experiment but I don't know my way around it at all.

I finally had a chance to mess with EZD3 to get a feel for using EZD3 standalone with Reason (I'm using Reason 11 Suite). Export loops from my Reason session and then dropping the audio or midi into EZD3 was working really well.

It's a little annoying to not have VST3 support in Reason but bouncing between the two interfaces won't be as annoying as I was thinking it'd be. I'd most likely do similar to what you mentioned. I'll export from Reason, import to EZD3, program my drums in EZD3, export to midi, import the midi in Reason and then run it through EZD2 like usual. We'll be missing out on being able to use the new kits but not the end of the world. Hopefully Reason catches up to the year 2022 at some point.

Even with a short EZD3 session I'm already liking the upgrade. Bandmate takes audio and midi really well although I was seeing a lot of people say otherwise. It did well picking up the correct tempos, too. I also like how you can expand Bandmate to Tap2Find for a larger selection of grooves. That way you're not totally boxed into the selection it generates. I rarely use stock midi grooves. I'm in the camp where I'll use it as a starting point to map out songs and then edit the entire drum track later to program exactly what I want. Get the skeleton out of the way and then do the heavy lifting later. Works well for me.

I'm excited to dig deeper. Jealous of you guys that are using a DAW with VST3 support.

[Kevin63101]

Found another new feature in EZD3 that isn't in SD3.

Under EZD3 "Tap2Find", there's an option to manually type on a grid a part as a search filter. You can choose / add which drums, cymbals, percussion for search grid ... up to 2 measures in 1/32 notes. Very similar to programing beats in FLStudio, except this is for your search criteria.

You can play search pattern to hear before searching libraries, then add other filtering search criteria to locate midi.

Pretty cool tool, especially with having piles of addon drum midi to search.

[noiseboyuk]

Yup, the grid in Tap2Find was trailed in advance and is definitely nice to have - most usefully when you've played a simple groove but you want to tweak a thing in it. However, it's offset for me by the mandatory quantize horror, which renders half of the kind of things you might want to search for useless.

[hotmitts]

So people are finding that dragging audio clips from the media browser in reaper to bandmates works...is it the same for Midi ( I'm really not up with reaper, been using reason but no vst3 yet as stated so need to learn a new DAW )

[noiseboyuk]

This is a good, succinct video of Bandmate from Production Expert:

https://youtu.be/xIfTgdTcY6I

But here's the thing. To me those grooves were very obvious. As soon as I heard the audio I knew what I'd do. So I did it - went into Tap2Find (hey it's not swing!) and tapped it in a few seconds. Results instantly - and no need to export any audio, tidy anything up with top and tailing or quantize, tweak tempo etc.

I wouldn't go as far as to say it's a solution in search of a problem - it's clever and it's a way to go if rhythm terrifies you. But for me, I just can't see myself ever using it because I always know - very roughly - what I want the beat to be. And Tap2Find is way less hassle. If it's not swing...

[hotmitts]

So if I understand correctly you could still tap a rhythm with swing elements, unquantised and whatever on your Daw and drag that in, with swing element intact? (Provided you can work out how to drag midi in from your Daw which I still need to)?

[noiseboyuk]

So if I understand correctly you could still tap a rhythm with swing elements, unquantised and whatever on your Daw and drag that in, with swing element intact? (Provided you can work out how to drag midi in from your Daw which I still need to)?

Yes, that would work.

[guitarmiester]

I started using Bandlab to test drag/drop audio and midi with EZD3 since I can't with Reason. It's hit or miss. I'm finding EZD3 freezes up often even if I browse for audio or midi files. I'll stick with using EZD3 standalone until it's optimized.

I do like the new kits. It might be time for me to do some spring cleaning and narrow down to a few EZX rather than keep all the ones I have. It's nice having a large selection of drum shots to layer but definitely don't need as many as I have.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

Speaking of the content, I was really happy to see C&C kits in this library. I don't have any sampled C&C kits in any of my massive drum libraries and these sound great. So kudos on that front!

[noiseboyuk]

So if I understand correctly you could still tap a rhythm with swing elements, unquantised and whatever on your Daw and drag that in, with swing element intact? (Provided you can work out how to drag midi in from your Daw which I still need to)?

Yes, that would work.

When I tried this just now, the algorithm didn’t do a very good or consistent job as identifying it as swung. In a reply on my Toontrack forum thread they said they algorithm maybe needed a tweak for this - initially I thought this wasn't the case based on prior use. But looking at it more closely, they’re right.