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BEATS BEATS BEATS - Drum Machines, Drum Synths, Groove Boxes, etc.
There are now dozens upon dozens of apps for beat creation from scratch on your iPad... We have a myriad of options like DM1, SeekBeats, Drum Perfect, Electrify NXT, Impaktor, iElectribe, Noisepad, Easybeats, etc. etc. etc. ... but let's narrow it down. Which are the best?
Which Drum and Beat apps have you tried? Hated? Loved? What's your music style, and which drum apps suit it best?
If you had to choose only 2 beat creation apps which would they be? And Why?
(For the sake of the topic let's leave out apps such as SECTOR, Glitchbreaks, etc, since they are beat manipulators rather than beat creators.) 
Comments
Drum Perfect for more natural sounding drums for rock, blues, country, pop.
Top choices for me:
1st DM1
2nd (Tie between iElectribe & Funkbox)
I recently took the plunge on Funkbox and I really like it; DM1 is also great (although the ease with which projects can be overwritten stinks). Both of these are simple, intuitive, have sequencers, and get the job done. Gadget would be up there for me, but the no landscape kills it for me. And also the bounce function adds silence even when I don't use reverb.
I don't know that I would choose any others. I think Seekbeats is capable of great things, but I can't stand the interface. Impaktor sounds fantastic, but to me it's more of an instrument than a drum machine. I REALLY wish it had a sequencer (but I've accepted that might defeat the purpose). iElectribe doesn't have IAA, which is becoming more and more important to me, but for whatever reason, i feel very meh about it.
Don't forget that iMS-20 can be used as a drum machine (if you feel like investing some time and sort it out...)
Impaktor technically does have a sequencer. It's definitely different than other sequencers, but it is a sequencer.
I like papertiger's iMS-20 recommendation. To take that a step further, iPolySix also has a pretty great drum synth (and workable MIDI implementation).
I personally prefer Seekbeats, 'cause unlike papertiger, I actually love the layout of it, esp. after the last update. I like the way the grids/pads are setup (the repeat/velocity options on the pads really works for me, for some reason), love the randomizer, the sound editing capabilities are great (I love getting a sound I like from the main editing screen, saving that, then going into the envelopes, mangling the hell out of that sound, and save that as a copy, haha), great swing, etc. If they made it so the drums could be triggered by MIDI In notes, and those notes would respond to the randomizer...I would seriously be in heaven.
I also like Beat-Machine. Great layout, easy to get to simple editing features I want with a drum machine without having to go all over the place. Will play 24-bit samples.
I will eventually tire of all this and probably go back to using BM2's drum sequencer, but not yet...
Beat-Machine may very well jump into my list with the next update. :-)
@CalCutta said:
fair enough! how about step sequencer, then.
this is a great thread. can't wait to see what's out there that i don't know about/haven't tried...
Beatmaker 2 and drumjam are still my killer combination for producing acoustic drum tracks.
If I'm just writing or messing around, I'll use Gadget or drum loops HD + Loopy as Beatmaker can be poison to creativity and fun.
As a side note, recently I'm loving Earhoof as a weird percussion instrument type thingy.
I have DrumJam, and I like it for ethnic percussion. If you do ethnic percussion, it's great! I just don't use much ethnic percussion....
I totally forgot DrumJam. The Bedlam feature they recently added (and it's implementation, specifically the probability options), along with the quality of sounds they provide...great app!
I went nuts researching and trying these out last month, so maybe I can help:
THE "A-LIST" DIVISION (Go-to, full-featured favorites)
"AWESOME, BUT LIMITED SOMEHOW/NEEDS AN UPDATE" DIVISION
"COOL, BUT HAVEN'T BOUGHT YET" DIVISION
I've made some super fat groove loops on the impaktor to export via audio copy. Of course it has no song mode but with an epad it becomes a super intuitive 'real' instrument. I like the tweakability of seekbeats but somehow long for ielectribe and it's one page view and automation. As far as real kit emulation, can't comment, not my kind of thing. DM 1, good UI, shit samples and fx IMHO. Beat machine's hot update's about to drop so who knows.
I posted a huge write-up. Search my username for old posts.
Great info in here. I didn't even know about a couple of these. Beat Machine looks like it could be shaping up to be quite a heavy contender for best of the beats. And only a buck?! Wow.
It's funny to see some of these generally full featured apps made by one person and selling for low prices... and then to see well established companies entering their take on the same and missing so many features and functions. For instance I am currently beta testing an app we'll call BeatShark, for a good sized company with solid product history... the app looks slick and is quick to respond, but as it stands is functionally VERY basic compared to many of these other apps already available from indy devs for less than a latte. Makes me a bit puzzled what their "BeatShark" target is, and if they have done any research on what other apps are available... and what those have to offer/compete with. Hopefully it's just early on and more is to be added to that app, but sheesh. Anyhow, OT.
@StormJH1 Great post. Thank you for that helpful rundown.
@b0bert0 Same to you man. Went through your write up, and your thoughts seem to be the general consensus, seeing the same reactions echoed by others here in this thread. Thank you for listing apps to avoid as well, always helpful.
Anyhow, I really like what I see happening in here. All of these opinions, details, reviews and suggestions are super valuable and help everyone narrow in on the apps that will work best for their own music and production style, and maybe even find something completely new or unknown. Thanks, all!
@OmnilimbO - No problem, let us know if you have any questions about specific apps. Yes, all of this information is probably somewhere on these forums already, but I think a good rundown topic on "best apps for ______" is a nice resource when people are starting out. Heck, I've been on here constantly for several weeks, and I'm still learning about brand new stuff I never saw previously.
Your point about single (or smaller) developers is a great one. Yes, the bigger companies should have more resources and may have a better starting point to make a more polished app. But I love the collection of smaller developers who are really passionate about making products that miss the features THEY want in an app. And some of the most popular music apps have very basic or outdated looking interfaces, but functionality will eventually help them rise to the top.
What about Robotic Drummer?
Impaktor is sooooooo close to being incredible. As it stands, it's pretty great. BUT I would love to see some MIDI options. Namely, the ability to turn it ON and OFF, and to switch between instruments via MIDI cc. I've been using it with my bass as the input, and....wow. I play percussively to begin with, so to be able to loop drum parts LIVE with what I'm doing without having a MIDI system is blowing my mind. If only I could control it with foot pedals...
DM1 is my go-to if I'm not playing bass. I loop synths (Magellen, Animoog, etc) while running DM1 in the background. I really love the built in FX in DM1. It's great, because I can have my FX programs affecting synths or Loopy's output, while having a whole other set of effects for only the drums.
DrumJam sounds great and produces a nice variety of sounds easily. I agree it would be better if they added some traditional rock drum kits.
Seems like most users of Impaktor have the same gripes about lack of MIDI and a sequencer. Having those be such widespread requests, it would probably be a bit foolish for the dev to not be working on those for an update.
Speaking of updates, is that Beat-Machine supposed to be getting an update soon? Or was that recently past?
I've been thinking about getting SeekBeats. From what very little I can find to listen to I think it could possibly be a good fit for me, sonically, but the UI just seems a little sloppy and uninspiring from what I can see. And I can't find much of any demos of it anywhere aside from like 3 videos. Having some varied audio demos would be super helpful too.
Really, I've gotten a bit burnt out on buying app after app that misses the mark or just falls a little flat.
I'd rather see Impaktor support the AB effects slot so I can feed it sequenced input.
I edited my (long) post above to add JamMaestro. JamMaestro and Caustic are examples of two apps that do so many different things well, they tend to get overlooked for the specific functions they serve. In the case of JamMaestro, it has like a dozen onboard rock-oriented kits, and the best importing options in the business for getting .wav files into usable/swappable kits.
I feel like shouting from the hills how good the drums are in this thing because people look at the name and the screenshots and assume it's a guitar tab app. It is - but it's so much more. Grab it for $2.99 while the sale is on.
This is why all of us Impaktor users should get in touch with beepstreet and show there is genuine interest in further development of this app. I've been in touch with him via Facebook and got a reply that there may be impaktor 2 coming out at the end of the year. Right now he is developing a new synth so hands full. I use impaktor in my live looping set up and I'm not too worried about midi sync at all as it has perfect timing with loopy and they don't go out of sync unless.....you switch from impaktor to other apps where the sequencer gets a hiccup and goes off. I have workarounds but would rather have a latest AB sdk with track muting (live fx style) or/and that hiccup sorted out as it can be restrictive in use as it is.
@joegrant413 said:
Thanks! But just for clarity, it does include several good velocity-layered rock drum kits for pad or midi play, but it doesn't have many rock-centric loops. Currently the two halves of the app aren't really as tightly coupled as most users think on first glance. The loops are based on audio recordings done in multiple tempos so they can be time stretched for good quality.
The kits are normal multi sampled instruments for "manual" play with no sequencing involved. All recording in the app is audio.
In future versions I may introduce sequenced event recordings of your in-app pad perfomances (including optional quantization) and the subsequent playback of these, presented in the loop section. Either that or do some timestretch pre-rendering so that recorded audio loops can be played back in the app.
@PaulB said:
I don't understand. Are you saying you'd like to run stuff through impaktor's fx (??!!) or sequence its sounds with external sequencer (you wouldn't need fx slot for that).
@supadom said:
Right, because apps like Lemur can sequence anything without AB, correct?
Lemur couldn't sequence Impaktor. Inpaktor has no MIDI or OSC implementation.
Impaktor should implement MIDI clock in to queue the sequencer/recording, and CC controls over the synth parameters. Honestly don't see how this isn't possible (I've heard the dev has stated MIDI implementation isn't possible). I'm ignorant to developement/programming though, so this may just be hopeless optimism.
Ok. Normal Impaktor operation is to listen to the mic input and make noises when I bang on stuff.
I'd like it to listen to an AB compatible app (eg, DrumJam or DrumPerfect) in the input slot and feed the noises it makes to a DAW in the output slot. Hmm, where could it go to achieve that?
Ok, gotcha. Sorry somehow I see it mostly as a generative app but yes that could be interesting.
Ahh, Impaktor kinda like Drumagog...neat!
Hey, I like the sound of that, @PaulB... err, rather, I'd LIKE to hear the sound of that. Great idea.
Couldn't you just play the audio output with an adjacent device/speaker (like an iPad) and record the syncopation thru the mic? May not be percussive enough though...