Next Drum Kit Question.

[philip888]

Hi I have SD 2 and am really enjoying it.
I only have the kit that came with it.
I want to add another kit.
MF has a sale right now. “Purchase any EZX title from Toontrack between 8/1/10 and 8/31/10 at half off!”
Any suggestions?
I was thinking of getting the Nashville EZX and maybe the Jazz EZX.
What is your experience with these?
I am not doing heavy metal music at the moment.
Also could someone shed light on an SDX kit that is a must have.

Thanks
Philip

Gigabyte EX58-UD3R, Intel Core i7 CPU 950, 12GB Mushkin Enhanced Blackline DDR3 1600Mhz, NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT Silent, Digi 003R, PT 9, Windows 7 Ultimate 64 Bit MacBook Pro, Intel Core 2 Duo 2.5, 6GB RAM, OSX 10.6.7, Pro Tools 9, FW 410

Topic

[Mark Williams]

Search through these forums and you’ll find lots of comments on the different expansion packs. There was a recent thread about what everyone’s favorite SDX was. It was a good thread, and would probably be helpful to you. Personally, I prefer ponying up for the SDXs over the EZXs, but that’s me. Depending on your style of music, the NY Vol.2, C&V, or the new Music City SDX could all be good options. I haven’t used the Music CIty yet, but everyone around here seems to love it, so I’ll probably pick it up when it’s on sale someday. The kits and rooms are all pretty different, so there’s not a ton of overlap, in my opinion.

Anyways, welcome to the community! We’re always happy to have more voices around here.

MBP 2.4 GHz | 4GB RAM | OSX 10.6.8 Logic Pro 9.1.5 | Metric Halo LIO-8/4P | Apogee ONE SD 2.3.0 | EZP 1.1.0 | Drumtracker 1.0.2

[philip888]

Thanks for the welcome.

Do you by chance remember what forum that thread was in?

Gigabyte EX58-UD3R, Intel Core i7 CPU 950, 12GB Mushkin Enhanced Blackline DDR3 1600Mhz, NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT Silent, Digi 003R, PT 9, Windows 7 Ultimate 64 Bit MacBook Pro, Intel Core 2 Duo 2.5, 6GB RAM, OSX 10.6.7, Pro Tools 9, FW 410

[Scott]

http://www.toontrack.com/forum/tm.aspx?m=96480

Scott Sibley - Toontrack
Technical Advisor

[philip888]

Thanks Scott.

The C&V sounds amazing.

The New York Studios Vol.2 sounds amazing.

This getting hard.

Do you guys use the MIDI Packs?

Gigabyte EX58-UD3R, Intel Core i7 CPU 950, 12GB Mushkin Enhanced Blackline DDR3 1600Mhz, NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT Silent, Digi 003R, PT 9, Windows 7 Ultimate 64 Bit MacBook Pro, Intel Core 2 Duo 2.5, 6GB RAM, OSX 10.6.7, Pro Tools 9, FW 410

[jgro002]

Hi,

I don’t have any experience with the EZXs so I can’t shed any light there.

As to a must have SDX, what sort of music do you make stylistically? I find all the SDXs to have different ‘flavors’ – certainly you could use any of them in multiple genres but arguably certain SDXs lend themselves more to particular styles than others. Here’s my take (bear in mind this is partly objective and partly subjective):

New York Studios Vol 2 – in my opinion has the best room sounds of any of the SDXs (although I haven’t tried Music City). The Allaire room in particular is just stunning. The kit pieces are a bit more varied than what comes with the Avatar kit too. So you get these big rooms with different kit pieces but recorded by the same team that did Avatar so it still sounds like it ‘fits’ with Avatar. Great for anything ‘rock’.

If you want something that offers a very different sound to the New York stuff (for some variety) then C&V would be worth a look. It’s a much drier sound (not much room) but still has a nice ambience to it, really great if you want a more ‘intimate’ drum sound or more retro feel, compared to the more ‘big rock’ sound of the NY stuff. The drums themselves sound amazing to me – in my opinion this expansion is the one that makes me say “man, that is a beautiful sounding snare” or “wow, that’s an amazing sounding kit”. This SDX to me is about drums sounding great as an instrument rather than just as a production value, if you understand what I mean

The metal foundry – requires more work ‘massaging’ the drums than the other SDXs IMO (because the drums are unprocessed) but means you’ve got the ultimate control to make it your own sound. Also good for styles other than metal, but requires a lot of mixing. Great sounding cymbals in this one, and lots of kit-pieces to choose from.

Evil drums – sounds kinda like a rockier version of C&V. Really amazing sounding drums there and 6 kits to choose from!

Hope that helps you to some extent. Honestly, I don’t think you can go wrong with any of them but it’s hard to say which is a ‘must have’ without knowing your musical tastes. For me I think my favorite is C&V, and it provides a very different sound/feel to Avatar which can’t be a bad thing (variety).

As for the midi, the Songwriter’s DrumPack is awesome IMO.

Cheers,
Jeremy.

iMac 3.06 GHz 4 GB OSX 10.6.5, Focusrite Saffire 6 USB, Logic Pro 9.1.3, Lacie D2 Quadra

[Whitten]

Great critique on the entire line up Jeremy.

OK….I admit you were very nice about C&V.

But overall I think you pretty much nailed all the strengths of the various Superior products (including Platinum – Evil Drums).
Well, in my humble opinion.

[Author]

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