<muso> No rhythm

[InfiniteFury]

Much as I enjoy making music the one thing that I always find lacking in anything I do is a good old drum beat.

The problem I have is that I have no rhythm whatsoever and I'm incapable of writing a MIDI beat which isn't either ugly or just, well, crap.

There are sites for finding guitar tabs (like http://www.tabrobot.com)
which is fantastic but I've never seen anywhere that will let you download MIDI drum tracks for free.

Do any of you lot know where to get hold of them from?

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

I'm no good at drumming, but I've found it quite useful to record all of the drum noises seperately and then layer them in an audio editing program to create a drum line.

[El Unicornio, mang]

If you want realistic drum tracks, get hold of Groove Agent. It has over 50 different styles, from 1940s swing and jazz to 90s trip hop and rnb with everything inbetween, and the ability to tweak it to create your perfect drumkit.
It's 180 quid, but well worth it*

More info here:
http://www.arbitermt.co.uk/steinberg/products/grooveagent.htm

*If you can't afford it, there are *ahem* other ways to get it easily

[Mr Colossal]

There are sites for finding guitar tabs (like http://www.tabrobot.com)
which is fantastic but I've never seen anywhere that will let you download MIDI drum tracks for free.

But there are thousands of MIDI files of already existing songs that you can nick the drum beats from... Im not exactly sure of what your after, but heres a system of a down page for example.

http://www.soadonline.net/midi.html

If you are trying to recreate an actual drumkits sound in a program I think you will have trouble getting it sounding as good as the real thing, unless you have some really good drumkit samples, and know what plug-ins/effects to use.

Whats wrong with sampling a drum beat you like, then trying as best you can to imitate using something  like fruityloops? It helps if you slow it right down.

You can reacreate most beats/rhythms on a basic level with just a kick, a snare and a hi-hat... the more complex ones rely on using differing volumes and out of sync beats, like triplets, to create a certain groove/rhythm.

Fruity again also has some Groove/level pre-sets in the 'Humanize Presents' section which you can drop onto your patterns, but they are only really of any use once you have your samples in the correct places.

[V]

If it's real drums you're after, this is very good:-

http://www.fxpansion.com/product-bfd-main.php

Comes with a 'Groove Librarian'* full of MIDI files which sound amazing played through the BFD samples. £180, but very realistic sounding.

If, however, you want to make brainless plug and pray one note knob twiddling hip-hop shite, you might want to look at this:-

http://www.spectrasonics.net/instruments/stylusrmx.html







*Two words you don't often see together. Suddenly I'm thinking about Susie Dent. Again.

[InfiniteFury]

Thanks for the pointers there chaps. I'm definitely going to get a look at this Groove Agent malarkey.