Which iOS Drum Machines have a ‘fill’ feature?

Wrlds2ndBstGeoshredr

Here's a fun trick. Download the free Noise Drum app. Look for the "groove" patterns in the free patches. Send random notes from your random note generator app (Rozeta Particles or whatever). It will trigger patterns that are groovy and in time, yet ever changing and developing. Adjust the gate length and other controls in Particles for best results.

Some of the IAPs include additional groove patterns, but I'd be leery of sending them any money right now, given the uncertainty over the company's future. It's a good product with excellent IAPs, but an unreliable situation.

BitterGums

the ROLi one?

Wrlds2ndBstGeoshredr

@BitterGums said:
the ROLi one?

Yeah. But now they've sold it to some other firm.

realdawei

GB drummer is good .. but seems downsampled on iOS vs Logic…never had a chance to test the theory

Moderndaycompiler

@Gilbert said:
Randomness and musicality are not equivalent. One is blind the other can be enlighted.

👏👏👏👏

MobileMusic

@NeuM said:

@MobileMusic said:
The Drummers in GarageBand are the top-notch with a lot of AI at work (which may be why no other dev could attempt to replicate it in their apps). We can tweak the fills in many ways and increments to alter their patterns. You have to cut/split the region where you want the fills inserted. Each region can have a different Drummer and all other parameters even on the same track. Each parameter change will result in fill variations. Up to 2 Drummer tracks in a project. If that is not enough, you know already how to work around it (export project/drummer-track, import audio track). Yeah, Drummers beats have great velocities and ghost notes for humanization.

Other apps may involve a lot of work to accomplish some rudimentary fills but GB is so easy - even a kid can do it. You get better results with GB Drummers than Drums.

I agree that the quality of the GarageBand drummers and other options for drums (manual playing and drum machines) make GarageBand a top choice on iOS.

One thing I’d love to see implemented would be an ability for a user to set ‘markers’ on the Drummer timeline which would indicate Start/Stop, Pause or Emphasis for a chosen drummer. Editing a pattern can quickly become an exercise in slicing and dicing to get the best results for a song with a lot of complex or nuanced dynamics.

If I understood correctly:

To stop the Drummer for a specified location/duration, just split and remove the track for the duration it needs to be silent. For emphasis, split the track and tweak the parameters to introduce some variations. You can even assign a different drummer for each split region on the same drummer track. The combination of assigned drummer, preset and various tweakable parameters allow for millions of variations.

MobileMusic

When we add a Drummer track in a GarageBand project, the drummer track gets auto-populated for the entire song with a composition in tune with the time signature, melody, etc. - along with FILLS - all of which can be tweak further.

I haven't tried many drum apps. Do any of the other apps auto-compose the drum sequence track based on the other tracks in the host? Or do we have to still manually compose the drum track? Or do we have to export/import some drum data into the track?

TheOriginalPaulB

@BitterGums said:

@Wrlds2ndBstGeoshredr said:

DrumPerfect is a super frustrating app for me. It’s the best sounding drum app on iOS, and also ridiculously opaque to use. Basic things like dragging patterns to rearrange them are lacking. You have to read the manual to accomplish most tasks; they’re next to impossible figure out on my own. But it sounds so good.

yes. 100%. it's a shame it hasnt had an update. the GUI especially really needs something to drag it out of 2010.

It was released in 2016.

LuisMartinez

Indian Drummer have fills

Franketti

With all these apps i have tried, I have to go on and make my fills manualy. In the songmode of lumbeat or in Auria pro. Watched many drum vids and being Keyboardplayer trying to feel like a drummer. Hard work….

drcongo

@Wrlds2ndBstGeoshredr said:
Here's a fun trick. Download the free Noise Drum app. Look for the "groove" patterns in the free patches. Send random notes from your random note generator app (Rozeta Particles or whatever). It will trigger patterns that are groovy and in time, yet ever changing and developing. Adjust the gate length and other controls in Particles for best results.

Some of the IAPs include additional groove patterns, but I'd be leery of sending them any money right now, given the uncertainty over the company's future. It's a good product with excellent IAPs, but an unreliable situation.

I never really understood Noise Drums until I tried this, I quite like the results.

BitterGums

@TheOriginalPaulB said:

@BitterGums said:

@Wrlds2ndBstGeoshredr said:

DrumPerfect is a super frustrating app for me. It’s the best sounding drum app on iOS, and also ridiculously opaque to use. Basic things like dragging patterns to rearrange them are lacking. You have to read the manual to accomplish most tasks; they’re next to impossible figure out on my own. But it sounds so good.

yes. 100%. it's a shame it hasnt had an update. the GUI especially really needs something to drag it out of 2010.

It was released in 2016.

right , but the GUI looks like iOS 1.0.0.0.0

NeuM

@MobileMusic said:

@NeuM said:

@MobileMusic said:
The Drummers in GarageBand are the top-notch with a lot of AI at work (which may be why no other dev could attempt to replicate it in their apps). We can tweak the fills in many ways and increments to alter their patterns. You have to cut/split the region where you want the fills inserted. Each region can have a different Drummer and all other parameters even on the same track. Each parameter change will result in fill variations. Up to 2 Drummer tracks in a project. If that is not enough, you know already how to work around it (export project/drummer-track, import audio track). Yeah, Drummers beats have great velocities and ghost notes for humanization.

Other apps may involve a lot of work to accomplish some rudimentary fills but GB is so easy - even a kid can do it. You get better results with GB Drummers than Drums.

I agree that the quality of the GarageBand drummers and other options for drums (manual playing and drum machines) make GarageBand a top choice on iOS.

One thing I’d love to see implemented would be an ability for a user to set ‘markers’ on the Drummer timeline which would indicate Start/Stop, Pause or Emphasis for a chosen drummer. Editing a pattern can quickly become an exercise in slicing and dicing to get the best results for a song with a lot of complex or nuanced dynamics.

If I understood correctly:

To stop the Drummer for a specified location/duration, just split and remove the track for the duration it needs to be silent. For emphasis, split the track and tweak the parameters to introduce some variations. You can even assign a different drummer for each split region on the same drummer track. The combination of assigned drummer, preset and various tweakable parameters allow for millions of variations.

Yes, I know how it is now. I was suggesting that it could be improved if it was possible to insert markers with "stage direction" for the Drummer (for example to add punctuation here or there, to match a complex or nuanced piece of music).

MobileMusic

@NeuM said:

@MobileMusic said:

@NeuM said:

@MobileMusic said:
The Drummers in GarageBand are the top-notch with a lot of AI at work (which may be why no other dev could attempt to replicate it in their apps). We can tweak the fills in many ways and increments to alter their patterns. You have to cut/split the region where you want the fills inserted. Each region can have a different Drummer and all other parameters even on the same track. Each parameter change will result in fill variations. Up to 2 Drummer tracks in a project. If that is not enough, you know already how to work around it (export project/drummer-track, import audio track). Yeah, Drummers beats have great velocities and ghost notes for humanization.

Other apps may involve a lot of work to accomplish some rudimentary fills but GB is so easy - even a kid can do it. You get better results with GB Drummers than Drums.

I agree that the quality of the GarageBand drummers and other options for drums (manual playing and drum machines) make GarageBand a top choice on iOS.

One thing I’d love to see implemented would be an ability for a user to set ‘markers’ on the Drummer timeline which would indicate Start/Stop, Pause or Emphasis for a chosen drummer. Editing a pattern can quickly become an exercise in slicing and dicing to get the best results for a song with a lot of complex or nuanced dynamics.

If I understood correctly:

To stop the Drummer for a specified location/duration, just split and remove the track for the duration it needs to be silent. For emphasis, split the track and tweak the parameters to introduce some variations. You can even assign a different drummer for each split region on the same drummer track. The combination of assigned drummer, preset and various tweakable parameters allow for millions of variations.

Yes, I know how it is now. I was suggesting that it could be improved if it was possible to insert markers with "stage direction" for the Drummer (for example to add punctuation here or there, to match a complex or nuanced piece of music).

Unlike MIDI notes, the notes on the Drummer track have fixed positions in sync with the melody of other tracks. We cannot move the Drummer notes by moving the regions (the regions slide but notes remain fixed). Deleting portions of a Drummer track just mute/suppress the track for the deleted range. If we stretch the region into the deleted/empty area, the muted/hidden/suppressed notes reappear.

Poppadocrock

Drum computer has that arrow bar in the bottom right that does different fill types with each arrow you add. I think it’s called remix. Or you can’t set it to do auto 1 or auto 2.

Poppadocrock

Lots of Bram bos apps have that mutation feature which provides great fills if played with manually, or set up a cc to turn mutation high up at certain points.

NoiseHorse

@Gilbert said:
Some ( extensive ) thoughts about drum fills.

An automatic fill feature might appeal to the non drummer, but pls remember that fills are not a category unrelated to grooves. It means that for different grooves, specific fills will work or not. The fill must match the groove, the style, and many other factors. And this is valid not only for drums but for any instrument or music style.
Even beyond music. When you fill a glass with a good wine, it has to match the fine meal it accompanies.

To design a fill generator without taking in context the groove it is supposed to...fill, might not be very coherent. Also among the myriad of possible combinations, each "real life" drummer, trough experience, usually build his repertoire of favorites fills, which reflects his good taste, musicality, character, etc...

Randomness and musicality are not equivalent. One is blind the other can be enlightened.

I programmed many fills in different styles for DrumPerfect Pro packs. Some are plain simple others are highly complex.
It involved long hours of listening to top drummers ( any style ), to understand the subtil relationship between the grooves and the fills they would play in context to the tune. The key here is listening. Good drummers listen to the band, and their playing support the music. I can hardly imagine how randomness can pretend replicate this.

That said some probability combined with a judicious selection of fills related to the groove, could mimic this musical behavior, if done with a sensitive understanding of the tune.
Some new plugins nowadays are attempting to emulate this musicianship.

What professional drummers have to say? Anyone on this forum?

@Gilbert sir, your programming and hard work on drum perfect pro are very much appreciated by me and many others on this forum. Drum Perfect Pro stands apart from other drum apps on the depth and high quality of what it does.