In truth few drum machines are that good that you can get away with playing them over the top of tracks or by themselves. The majority of productions that you hear have had an awfull lot of work put into the rythm track to beef it up. Even the world famous Roland 808 and 909 machines were crap in their raw sound without effects. Compression, reverb and stereo enhancments to name but a few. Drum machines by themselves can sound very dry and lifeless. If you are going to get something I would recomend some form of groovebox (They tend to have their own effects to beef up sound). Gives you bassline too and will work nicely with your accapellas.
Music equipment is a sort of business where you get what you pay for. To get pro sounding stuff you really have to pay pro prices. This is not to say that there aren't deals out there but you have to know what you are looking at.

Cheers
Nem

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https://www.mixcloud.com/Calvin_Karass/

I’ve not heard of the unit you’ve mentioned. However, here are some good resources to start your investigation: Synth Museum & Vintage Synth. They are good for older synths and drum machines etc. If it’s a newer machine just google it and see what comes up!

As for adding elements to your mix, as far as trance goes they’re not much use. In Techno however they can be used really effectively as a mix tool, though essentially all you’ll be using it for is to cut to. It’s the programming in of interesting patterns that will help spice things up here. As nem says though, with out them going through the studio process they can sound flat and uninteresting.

Hopefully I’ll be getting my hands on a Roland TR-707 soon which I want to use for production mainly, but I’ll hook it up to the mixer and have a play with it in the mix too.

I listened to some samples and finally figured out what kind of sound drum machines produce. I think it can be used in parts of tracks where there is only a simply bass and a simple synthline. Other than that there is not much use though, except for techno of course

thanks for the replies

I've heard of djs adding an xtra 4/4 or on off beat clap to records while playing live. Never used one myself, but I heard that the Roland DJ-1000 was made for using drum machines with it.

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JustinKredible