ON TEST EastWest ProDrummer Virtual Drum Instrument Need a professional drummer in your studio? How about auditioning EastWest’s ProDrummer for the job?

JOH N W A L DEN

astWest have a substantial catalogue of high-end sample E libraries, which are used by an equally high-end roster of composers and musicians. All these products now use EastWest’s own Play 4 engine, albeit often with a customised front-end interface. The latest additions to the EastWest roster are actually two related products, called ProDrummer Vol 1 and ProDrummer Vol 2. The core function of these libraries is not unlike BFD3 or Superior Drummer, in that each library provides you with some mega-detailed, sample-based acoustic drum kits, full mixing facilities, eects options and a huge collection of MIDI drum patterns. The interesting twist is that each ProDrummer volume has been created through collaboration with a top-notch, high-pro le producer. For volume 1, that’s none other than Mark ‘Spike’ Stent, with Steven Sidelnyk, whose credits include on drums. Volume 2, meanwhile, was the subscription level you opt for, you Madonna, Seal and Massive Attack, created by Joe Chiccarelli with drummer can access the entire catalogue (with Matt Chamberlain, whose credits include a combined value of over $11,000) for as Pearl Jam, Bruce Springsteen and Peter long as your subscription lasts. EastWest ProDrummer Gabriel. EastWest’s own Doug Rogers So, if you are in the market for $249 per volume provided the glue to bring it all together. a sophisticated virtual drum instrument, If you happen to be an aspiring how does ProDrummer fare? And, if it P R O S Hollywood composer, you could do a lot nds its way to the top of your wish-list, • Makes it almost ridiculously easy to create worse than equip yourself with a RAID should you go for a one-o payment or a highly produced acoustic drum track. array stued with EastWest’s entire back subscribe to Composer Cloud? • Both volumes stand up well on their own catalogue. Unfortunately, given that and contain plenty of variety. Set Up The Kit • Room-speci c mic channels and that catalogue is (a) extensive and (b) eects options make the sounds expensive (undoubtedly value for money, Volume 1 of ProDrummer is a 60GB highly customisable. but this is top-end stu), you would need download, while Volume 2 comes in at • MIDI groove library is substantial. a loan from someone who actually is just 40GB, with all the samples presented • Composer Cloud subscription would be great for working professional composers. a successful Hollywood composer in order in 24-bit/44.1kHz format. Authorisation to ll said RAID array. can be either machine-speci c or to a USB CON S Well, you would until now... because iLok key but, as with most modern music • Perhaps a little resource-hungry. the other interesting thing about software, this proved pretty painless on SUMMA R Y ProDrummer is that it is EastWest’s rst my test system. You get a stand-alone Either volume of ProDrummer makes it release since they launched their new version of Play 4 plus plug-in versions easy to create a great acoustic drum track. Composer Cloud service. While you in VST, AU and AAX formats. Play itself EastWest’s latest release deserves serious can still buy individual library licences, requires a 64-bit OS but, even though attention alongside the best of the rest in the EastWest now provide a monthly a 64-bit host is also recommended, I was virtual drummer instrument market. subscription option and, depending upon able to run Play with ProDrummer using

32 September 2015 / w w w. sou n donsound. c o m ProDrummer is supplied At first glance, the with an impressive library Mixer screen looks fairly of MIDI patterns that can modest, but it gives be easily searched via the you access to all the Groove Browser page. individual mic channels used when recording the 32-bit version of the kits, as well as Cubase Pro 8. some comprehensive When using either effects options (more of the ProDrummer on these later). The volumes, the main options for controlling Play 4 ‘Player’ your drum mix are, window gives you therefore, considerable. a drummer’s-perspective Beneath the kit 3D graphic of the virtual graphic on the Player drum kit, and you can screen is the Song audition the loaded Builder. This allows you sounds by simply clicking to assemble a series of on the appropriate kit MIDI grooves from the piece. The four large impressive included buttons arranged along collection into a full the top edge provide performance. The access to other elements of the interface. needs a little help. The Browser screen Grooves button opens a further browser, The Settings pane is where you configure allows you to switch between your so you can find, audition and then drag various settings for the instrument, various Play libraries or browse within the and drop the patterns that you want. including useful features for streamlining contents of the two ProDrummer volumes While you can’t edit the MIDI patterns the engine’s workload if your host system to find the preset kit you wish to load. within the Song Builder, you do get all the

www.soundonsound.com / September 2015 33 on test EastWest Prodrummer

usual tools for changing the The right end of the virtual mixer lengths of patterns, copying, includes all the additional room deleting and reordering, mic channels that can be used to as well as export options provide some natural ambience to for patterns or a full song. your kit. However, if you’re using ProDrummer as a plug-in, think there is a duff sound grooves can also be to be had, but I particularly dragged and dropped onto liked the ‘Kit 2 — MixSuite a MIDI track in your DAW, LA Kitchen’ presets, which where you can use all your seemed to have a very usual MIDI editing tools on well-balanced sound the patterns. and a really nice ‘room’ Other controls in the character; I could imagine bottom strip include these working in almost any transport and tempo modern rock or pop context. options, plus the Sync To In contrast, the ‘master’ Host button. The Drums preset for Kit 5, recorded in button overlays labels on EastWest’s own Studio 3B, the drum graphics in the has a somewhat ‘bigger’ Player display to show you which specific the kit pieces have been recorded in sound, if you want something that will drum was used for the currently loaded different rooms) but you can, of course, attract a bit more attention. The Mixer samples. For some kits, a small drop-down always add your own reverb/ambience does, of course, allow you to dial in more menu within these labels allows you to either through the Mixer or via your host’s or less ‘room’ for any of the presets. load alternative drum samples. processing options. As described more fully below, one The final option within this strip is Turn Up The Volume, Part 2 aspect of both ProDrummer volumes is the Vel Proc section where you can In Vol 2, you get a good crop of presets that they have been recorded in multiple use the Thresh, Ratio and Makeup built around four different kits and spread studio rooms. This gives you some very controls to fine-tune the MIDI velocity across 40GB of samples. These were all distinctive and characterful drum sounds response of the drums (rather like recorded in EastWest’s own studio spaces, but, as the aim of the instrument is to a ‘MIDI compressor’). This is very but the Joe Chiccarelli/Matt Chamberlain provide you with a ‘real’ drum kit, and effective and can change the dynamics of combination still manages to generate the presets offer a series of examples of a performance in some useful ways. a diverse set of production-ready drum those kits pre-mixed by Spike Stent and presets. Kit pieces are derived from Joe Chiccarelli, the bulk of the presets Turn Up The Volume, Part 1 Craviotto, Ludwig, Tama, Slingerland, limit you to using a set of drums that What about the sample content itself? Gretsch, Istanbul and Zildjian. This volume were recorded within the same physical Well, Spike Stent’s Vol 1 is built around also includes ‘J37 Tape’ mic options space. However, if you pick the ‘hybrid’ drum pieces from Drum Workshop, within the mixer; these are alternate mics presets, then you can mix and match Slingerland, Gretsch, Ludwig, Yamaha, that were run through a Studer J37 tape from these different rooms. The down Orange County and Zildjian, and was machine for a subtle bit of extra vintage side is that you don’t then have access to recorded in five different studios. The analogue sound. the various room mic channels (because 60GB of sample content is organised into Comparing the ‘master’ preset for seven main kits, although you actually get all four kits, Kit 1 would make a great a good number of presets built around modern rock kit, while Kit 2 is perhaps Test Spec each kit with different mixer/effects combinations. The PDF manual provides Alternatives Minimum System Requirements a comprehensive list of which kit was There are a number of high-end virtual • Mac: Intel Core 2 Duo processor 2.1GHz or drum instruments that might be considered faster, 8GB RAM, OS 10.5 or later, 7200rpm or recorded where, and the MIDI mapping competitors with ProDrummer, and faster hard drive for sample streaming, 60GB used. This follows pretty standard practice SOS has looked at most of the obvious (Vol 1) or 40GB (Vol 2) free hard-drive space. for the main articulations such as snare, candidates. For example, FXpansions’s • PC: Intel Core 2 Duo or AMD Dual Core 2 BFD3, Toontrack’s Superior Drummer 2 and kick and hi-hat, but you also get the 2.1GHz or better, 8GB RAM, Windows XP XLN Audio’s Addictive Drums all provide SP2, Vista or Windows 7 or later, soundcard extra articulations — drum and cymbal a similar combination of highly detailed with ASIO drivers, 7200rpm or faster hard edges, short and long snare rolls, and so drum sampling, virtual mixing, effects, MIDI drive for sample streaming, 60GB and/or on — mapped higher in the MIDI note grooves and optional expansion packs. 40GB of free hard-drive space. A further option — and one which gets range, so if you want to craft in all the close to the ‘celebrity drummer’ element of Test System subtleties that a real drummer produces ProDrummer — would be Spitfire Audio’s • Apple iMac with 3.5GHz Intel Core i7 CPU in a performance, you have the tools to recent library The Grange, although it is and 32GB RAM, running Mac OS 10.9.2. do it with. perhaps as much about the place it was • Focusrite Scarlett 8i6. recorded (Headley Grange) as it is about the And just how does a set of seven Spike fact that Roger Taylor, Chad Smith and Andy • Steinberg Cubase Pro 8 (v.8.0.20). Stent/Steven Sidelnyk drum sessions Gangadeen were behind the various kits. • ProDrummer with EastWest Play v.4.2.35. sound? Well, very good indeed. I don’t

34 September 2015 / www.soundonsound.com on test EastWest Prodrummer

a little softer and has a more vintage vibe. The Vel Proc section provides a sort of ‘MIDI Kit 3 was recorded in EastWest’s Studio velocity compressor’ for adjusting the dynamics of 2 Live Room and the ‘master’ preset has the MIDI patterns. an obvious room character. Again, you can dial that in or out to taste using the cater for their own needs here but, for mixing options. Kit 4 (like Kit 7 in Vol 1) is everyone else, EastWest have included a hybrid kit, which combines drums from a library of over 14,000 MIDI drum each of the other Kits. This sounds great grooves covering a wide range of musical and makes for a very good multi-purpose styles. As described above, the Groove acoustic drum kit. Note that within these Browser allows you to track down what hybrid presets (but also elsewhere on you need and includes genre, sub-genre, occasions), there are some ‘layered’ drum style and type filters. sounds included where, for example, Musically, the ground covers samples from two different snares have everything from jazz through to metal, been blended to give a composite sound. a very respectable amp simulator so, with plenty of stops along the way. As if you want to let a drum or two roar well as short patterns of a few bars, the In The Mix through a virtual Marshall stack, then collection also includes a good number As with all the top virtual drum that’s perfectly possible. of ‘full song’ MIDI files that give you instruments, the samples themselves However, that’s not your only ‘added a complete drum track running for 80 are only part of the story; you also get grit’ option, because each channel also or so bars. I’m a big fan of the way a sophisticated mixing environment to includes an instance of Ohm Force’s Toontrack allow you to extend SD2 by tailor your sound. The Mixer covers the Ohmicide multi-band dynamics and offering inexpensive add-on MIDI groove obvious basics — faders, mute/solo distortion processor. This is quite a beast packs, and it will be interesting to see if buttons, pan, and so on — but each and includes over 80 different distortion EastWest also decide to go down that channel also has an FX button, a send to options, ranging from tape saturation route. However, the core MIDI content the master reverb effect (you can access through to very crunchy overdrive. supplied with ProDrummer is a substantial this, and a master bus compressor, via the Each of the four bands offers a range of starting point for any new user, and is of FX button on the master output channel processing options including Mid/Sides a consistently high standard. strip) and a further button that contains matrixing, gate, dynamics, distortion, the drum label. This is a kind of ‘resource stereo and feedback. If you like to get all Beat it? saver’ button; if you toggle it off (grey), NIN or EDM with your drum sounds, then In use, you soon realise that ProDrummer the samples related to that channel this is just the tool for you. offers the sound quality, impressively strip/microphone are purged. Toggle it detailed sampling (including the range of back on and the samples are reloaded. Get In The Groove articulation variations) and level of control At the base of each channel strip, you So, ProDrummer has the detailed required to shape your drum track in the can also assign any channel to a specific sampling and playback engine, and it has sorts of ways that you might in a top-level virtual output pair (10 are available) if the mixing environment... The other vital recording studio. Despite that, the Play you want to process certain channels ingredient is the performance. Drummers front end makes it almost unbelievably separately within your host DAW’s mixer. (or drum programmers) can obviously easy to produce a polished drum track. There are two elements of ProDrummer’s mixing environment that deserve a special mention. First, as you scroll to the right end of the channel set, you can see various overhead and room mic channels. These vary from one kit to another depending upon what was used for the specific session, but it is here that you can add or subtract the sound of the room or the amount of mic bleed. As with BFD3 and SD2, this is a key element in making the kit come together, and ProDrummer certainly doesn’t disappoint in this respect: there is plenty of control available. Second, both the channel and master effects options are impressive. In the channel effects you get the comprehensive SSL channel strip emulation combining filters, EQ, a transient shaper, compressor and gate/ expander. This is complemented with The effects options for each mic channel are very impressive.

36 September 2015 / www.soundonsound.com on test EastWest Prodrummer

Pick a kit preset, drop some suitable The Ohmicide MIDI grooves into the Song Builder, effect is great if you tweak a few faders in the Mixer and, with want to turn your ProDrummer, you could have a complete acoustic drum kit drum track in less time than it takes to into something set up a snare mic. Things only really get just a touch more technical than this if you choose more industrial. to delve into the excellent processing options offered within the FX section of the Mixer. These are pretty deep (a My only good thing) but that also means a bit of qualifier here a learning curve. would be In terms of a comparison with some of that I found the obvious competition, ProDrummer’s ProDrummer to individual volumes are in a similar be a touch more price bracket to the likes of BFD3 and resource-hungry. Superior Drummer. I’ve used both of For example, these products on a regular basis, and comparing the ProDrummer is somewhat different in stand-alone terms of the approach adopted (for versions of ProDrummer and BFD3 amount of RAM. That said, if your host is example, in the use of name producers side-by-side with similar kits and playing flagging a little, the ‘lite’ preset versions and drummers and the sound of specific similar basic rock drum patterns, still sound very impressive (you lose recording spaces) but is certainly in the ProDrummer used noticeably more CPU some of the extra articulations such as same lofty bracket in terms of results. cycles than BFD3, and a very similar some ‘edge’ hits). If you want to squeeze every last drop out of the library, and you have the computer to do it, there’s Cloud Funding also the ‘powerful system’ version which includes extra round-robin and double-hit Following the lead of a number of other major is perhaps not such a big issue. However, now, software producers, EastWest are now offering for a fixed — and very manageable — monthly articulations. users the option of a subscription-based budget, a budding composer can have access payment model: Composer Cloud. Before to all of the same sounds. This still might Conclusion we go any further, I should make it clear that seem like a bit of a stretch for those just In building ProDrummer’s content around this is in addition to the existing ‘buy once’ starting out, but I can see Composer Cloud named producers and, in particular, approach rather than a replacement for it. being very popular with composers who are around a collection of kits recorded There are a number of different monthly working professionally but not yet perhaps pricing options, with the best deals available at the ‘Hollywood’ level. The ability to fix the in named rooms with distinctive sonic if you commit for an initial 12-month period monthly budget is going to be a big plus for characters, EastWest are coming at (although month-on-month subscriptions such users. the concept of a sophisticated virtual are also possible). Initially, there were two drummer instrument from a slightly main tariffs, one costing $29.99 per month different angle. Both volumes, however, which gave you access to seven instrument deliver fabulous results. Do you need collections, and the other costing $49.99 per month and granting you access to all both? Well, that’s a tricky call, and you current collections plus any new releases. might easily decide that the mixing However, EastWest have now simplified this options provide you with more than by scrapping the first tariff and reducing the enough variation from just one volume price of the second to $29.99 per month, which when getting started. Alternatively, opting makes things easier, not to mention cheaper. for a Composer Cloud subscription gives For the purposes of this review, I was you all the choice you could want! given a short-term account for Composer Cloud. Download times aside (there are That said, both Spike Stent and Joe many multi-gigabyte libraries available), the Chiccarelli — plus the EastWest team EastWest catalogue is hugely impressive, and if of course — have done a great job in you are serious about your virtual instruments, creating these libraries. If you are in and in particular about being able to access the market for a top-end virtual drum some of the best orchestral and ‘world’ sounds, instrument, ProDrummer, whether Vol 1 this is certainly a very cost-effective means of doing so. Accounts are easy to manage online or Vol 2 or both, should most certainly and the EastWest Installation Centre software be on you audition list alongside the makes it very easy to install and organise the obvious competition. required downloads. EastWest products are used by many of the top film and TV composers. For those The EastWest Installation Centre makes $$ ProDrummer Vol 1 $249, ProDrummer working in that tier of the industry, the managing your Composer Cloud libraries Vol 2 $249. pricing of the individual virtual instruments very straightforward. WW www.soundsonline.com

38 September 2015 / www.soundonsound.com