[Nsurround]

Hey, I would agree that producing really good drum tracks based on  song writing or composition can be tedious even using the current ‘bandmate’ feature.  The AI prompt idea I think could work in the editing process once you have a basic groove going that fits with the song style etc. I like the idea as long as the human input is in control of the process. This is a great tool for songwriters and such but I would not like it to turn into something like Suno or other similar apps that seem to be somewhat currently popular. Those apps seem more of a novelty item, at the moment, than a serious production approach to music. That being said, it is all changing for recorded music and where it goes is not clear at this time. My hope is that  live shows/tours will keep steering the interest in music creativity and such so that recorded music is still driven for the most part by skilled or dedicated human musicians and producers. using in part AI as a ‘tool’ and not a ‘crutch’.

[Nsurround]

“For an AI future, I imagine, instead buying  midi packs you would buy a style or a “drummer”/“bassist”/“keyboard player” add-on.”

Yeah, I think the ‘groove’ section could be done better and that the ‘style’ maybe the key. It seems to me that the ‘Bandmate’ feature in EZdrummer 3 is going in that direction. At least for songwriters who do not want to spend much time going thru a whole bunch of grooves via the current options. Seems to me that Superior Drummer 3 has the best sounding library of drum samples but it uses an interface of tweaking options that is somewhat cumbersome to mess with unless you are really into it. I think AI tools could improve that quite a bit and get you much faster to a satisfying end point. Since Toontracks has a infringement clause about using AI training on their products, I assume that the best defense is going on offense and creating the AI tools in their own eco system. Not sure that they can really stop others from AI training of their products unless they have some method of identification of samples and midi grooves etc. To me it would be extremely hard to do this at this point in AI development.

 

[Nsurround]

To: John Rammelt – Toontrack
Technical Advisor

I would agree with most of the commenters here that Bandmate should be in a product like SD3 . But because it was not a more recent release, understand why it is not. That being said, there have been very few updates to SD3 functionality anyway and marketing did label it “superior” right? They did not label it for producers only etc. etc. So the technical reasons you gave for the difference between SD3 and EZdrummer, while may have been true at the time, do not seem to be as valid now.  However there are probably technical or financial reasons that SD3 will not have the Bandmate functions based on how SD3 and EZ3 differ in how they were developed. In any case, I believe it would help if Toontracks gave a definitive answer to the question if SD3 will ever have the Bandmate function.

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Thanked by: Gilles

[Nsurround]

While you can use the tools suggested in the comments above to achieve a less busy drum groove, I am still perplexed why most of these grooves are very busy and give little space at all. Can’t a drummer just lay down some very simple groove patterns? There are a few, but very few. I also find that the drums using the brushes are not that easy to set up using many of the midi grooves that one might use for a slower paced song. Toontracks should take notice and at least do one midi pack that deals with all of this really well and forget the busy drums for a minute or two. There have been many posts about this in the past but not sure toontracks is listening.

Reply To: Simple Fills and Drum Rolls version: 3.0.5
Operating system: Windows 10

[Nsurround]

Would also agree the need for more spaced midi drum beats. Most of the midi sets are filled with very busy drums including the fills etc. Really annoying except for the more uptempo stuff. There has been posts about this issue before but toontracks seem to just keep doing the same thing. The sounds are good but there are very few and I mean very few simpler non busy tracks. You know sometimes a song need some SPACE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . !! I have Superior Drummer 3 with 8 midi paks incl the songwriter stuff and still difficult to use for slower and or more open songs. Really disappointing.

[Author]

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