Hi,

I am looking for advice as to whether I should carry on using Fxpansion Geist with Sylenth, or should I use Sylenth with some good quality drum loops.

I do feel that the mix does sound a lot more professional with good quality loops.

What do the top producers use?

Where do I get the best quality and value for money drum loops if I go down that route?

Interested in people's views and advice.

Many thanks

Glynn

get quality drum loops. the key to sounding pro is just finding a great drum loop to begin with, and then to apply processing to it to make it your own sound.

quote:

Originally posted by packhorse Hi, I am looking for advice as to whether I should carry on using Fxpansion Geist with Sylenth, or should I use Sylenth with some good quality drum loops. I do feel that the mix does sound a lot more professional with good quality loops. What do the top producers use? Where do I get the best quality and value for money drum loops if I go down that route? Interested in people's views and advice. Many thanks Glynn

Add Zennheiser. I have some of their drum/fx sample packs and they sound great. Their site lists loops and sounds for all their stuff. Priced well too. www.producerloops.com carries most of the major names.

Would stay with GEIST, regarding loops, It's really what your after i guess
IF you want quick plug&play building blocks perfectly safely aligned with all you find on Beaport, yes then go with above packs. I personally can only find fulfilment in programming myself, Loops, no matter how well programmed, don't cut it for me. As it keeps nagging in my brain "I WANT to be able to do that"

Fulfilment for me means trying to MAKE MY sound, not trying to sound like everybody else. (at the end of the day it probably still does, but then it's just in my mind, being able to REcreate what everybody else does, myself))The audience doesn't care, or notice the difference

For me music is really about creating, not micro DJ'ing (not making judgement call on that though.....)

But if your thing is: look up a progression of a song you like on a Youtube tutorial, grab the most popular Sylenth preset sounds. grab a few 8 bar loops from the parties mentioned above. use one of the many midi phrase presets included for your leads and bassline rhythms with many of these midi packs and squeeze out a track, by all means do.

It's the Journey <> Destination thingy (at least in my brain)

Last but not least: There a tons of older FREE samplepacks around, old "dry" TRx0x kits, LM kits etc. you can also experiment "old skool" load these into GEIST, or lay them on a grid as wavs and produce, applying compression, EQ, FX etc to build a groove yourself. your not tied to GEIST, there are many more ways to get creative.

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Last edited by Raphie on Feb-21-2012 at 08:58

create your own drum tracks for your music. its much more interesting, and more fun.

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I agree with the last 2 posters, make your own drums. Ok I'll use the odd loop maybe just to fill out a drop or something but for me personally I want to be like the chef who makes everything fresh from raw ingredients, I dont want to be blending tins of factory sauce.

Some people use loops well and good for them, it's just not something that gives me great pleasure.

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6 of one, half dozen the other AFAIC. In other words, you can get the same result either way, so it's just a matter of your preferred workflow. And, there's nothing keeping you from combining methods. I commonly use straight samples alongside my drum VSTs.

If you decide to go the Geist route, check out Xfer Nerve as an alternative before spending your money.

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I say go with loops, unless you really want/enjoy making them yourself.

You have to realise that there are literally hundreds of thousands of loops out there, so being a purist about it for the sole reason of making it yourself is a little stupid, unless you just want to.

It's not like people are going to frown on your music because or that it will make your music somehow unoriginal by using them.

The analogy of using premade sauce when cooking is wrong IMO - A loop by itself does not make magically make all your percand you have to do a few things to get them sitting there correctly, processed etc.

Making your own perc loops is more akin to growing the ingredients in your own garden to cook with. Using loops is like going to the store buying some ingredients to blend together.

I barely have time to cook, let alone make all my perc from scratch especially when I have thousands of loops to choose from that get chopped/eq'd/FX/etc to make my own my own sounds.

For me it's just something in my head, it's just not me. Had several looppacks in the past, with really good loops. But when applying them, they keep saying to me "you didn't make me, no one will know, but you and I know you didn't make me" and that voice gets so annoying in my head that I just replaced it with my own percs. For me it feels like cheating, like taking shortcuts. I know it's BS, but that's the way it works on my head, can't get inner piece with loops

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Analogue Mastering
Esoteric sound for the discerning ear

Hi,

Thanks for some really useful advice. Given me a lot to think about.

I work full time and must admit, some quality drum loops with me adding the Sylenth melodies, is appealing. However, I do take onboard that the loops are not really my own making.

What would be a good choice of a loop pack for quality sounds with fills and sweeps? Claerly, price is also an issue. Some seem to be very expensive. Any advice welcome.

I am also looking at an Akai LPD8 controller with Geist. Any other views regards this set up?

Very grateful for the replies, and pms.

Glynn

quote:

Originally posted by Richard Butler I agree with the last 2 posters, make your own drums. Ok I'll use the odd loop maybe just to fill out a drop or something but for me personally I want to be like the chef who makes everything fresh from raw ingredients, I dont want to be blending tins of factory sauce. Some people use loops well and good for them, it's just not something that gives me great pleasure.

<3 that analogy. (i work in a work in a damn kitchen) so very true though, I want it all to be the flavor of my creation!

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