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Old 06-09-2018, 02:53 PM   #18
ashcat_lt
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Join Date: Dec 2012
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@serr - The OP has specifically said that this is not for live performance, but I was actually going to mention something that's kind of related.

Acoustic drums are, in general, really fucking loud and dynamic. They go from almost reasonable volume when barely hit to pretty painful when slammed. Most drummers are used to that, and I think a large part of why some complain about the "velocity sensitivity" is actually more about sheer SPL. They hit the thing, and it's not as loud at their ears as they think it should be, so they hit it harder and it sounds about right but then they hit it harder still and it tops out and so doesn't get as much louder as they think it should and then they complain that it's not following their dynamics. Sometimes, if you just turn the damn thing up to be actually louder overall, the complaints go away. There's less of a disconnect between hands and ears and everything is more comfortable and easy to play. Then they start playing the things like actual drums instead of like some completely different instrument that they're kind of just learning.

It's also important to remember that the drummer expects that sound to be right in their face. A speaker across the room isn't going to feel right. Part of that is volume. Part is the ratio of direct sound to room sound. Some is actually the delay of the sound moving through the air which is adding to whatever other latency there might be in the system.

So I guess for the OP - make sure you've got a good set of high output headphones and a headphone amp that can drive them to "natural" sounding levels. Then crank them up before you start trying to dial in the sensitivity controls. For live use, either the gorllia has to live with (similarly very loud) headphones or have a loud, clean monitor blasting directly at them. They may also benefit from less of the "room mic" in their monitor.

Then they play more naturally, and a decent MMS sample kit responds in its intended range, and it's a lot easier to sell them as realistic sounding drums.

(Insert comment that any time I'm in a venue where a significant portion of the drum sound comes through the PA, they don't sound anything like natural anyway. If you want "live drum" sound out of AD or Superior, you're going to have to do all the horrible things that "sound guys" do to acoustic drums. )

I personally think that most of the point of an e-kit on stage is that it allows for a truly "silent" stage where nobody gets to hide behind their own instrument and ignore everything else in the mix. Then, once everybody is dependent on a decent monitor mix, it becomes everybody's issue to make sure you can get it. It means carrying PA speakers instead of guitar amps and drum pieces, unless you are lucky enough that the venue has something useable.


Edit - BTW, if you want to know my thoughts on amp sims for live use, just go back through this post and substitute "guitar" or "amp" or "guitarist" as appropriate.

Edit again to add - I'm not any kind of drummer, but I do have a set of drum triggers and I sometimes convince people to play them for me. What I've been doing lately is to forgo the drum "brain" altogether and just plug the triggers themselves directly into my interface as audio inputs. This lets me use any plugin I have to condition the signal both before and after it is converted to MIDI. That gives you a lot more options for tweaking things to feel just right. Any decent brain with a decent VSTi probably has all the control most people need, but if you want to get tweaky about it... The real reason I went this way was so I didn't have to carry that extra rack unit.

Last edited by ashcat_lt; 06-09-2018 at 03:09 PM.
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