Please help ! Octatrack drum pairing suggestion

True on the Nord Drum 2. Maybe consider a Nord Drum 1. They go for much cheaper. Main diff is lack of cc control from what I recall. I really, really wanted cc control but now that I have it… meh. Don’t really use it. Probably should but I think I could use a Nord Drum 1 and be just as happy.

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Also 4 tracks vs 6 tracks no ?

LXR is really amazing, it kinda behaves like octatrack in some ways, and soundwise you can go bananas on that thing. I recomend it for sure, and 260€ is nothing for it BUT you need to put and solder whole board together, thats why they sell it so cheap. If you are good at soldering get yo self a Christmas present

I am eventually getting nord for sure, my friend has it and i really like the sound of it

I use Model Samples mainly as a drum machine with the OT. Biggest advantage is that you also have the elektron sequencer on it. You can get nice organic sounding drums out it and you have a lot of patterns and banks. And the price fits your budget.

Er-1 is good fun , has built in fx and straight forward programming.

I’d probably go for one with built in sequencer and not use octatrack to program it ( except for fills ).

Maybe even an mc101 Roland thing if you want classic style sounds. You could run 4 x drum tracks or make you own with samples.

The tones aren’t too bad either.
Or novation circuit.

Not strictly drum machines.

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It depends on what sound you want and how you want to work. In that price range my suggestions would be:

  • Tanzbar mk1 used. That thing just sounds good. Pure synthesis, but the best of this imo
  • rytm mk1 used. The rytm can basically be any machine you want. It can do samples and synthesis and has really good distortion per channel. It also has a lot more gimmicks on board. To that it has the elektron sequencer.

I would vote against the tanzmaus. I’ve owned it, and while it isn’t a bad machine, for the price it is a toy compared to the other two. Tanzbar and rytm are probably just a bit over your budget, but maybe save a bit longer or hope to be lucky and score one of them cheap.

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I’ve tried it in store for like 20 min, but haven’t tried it at my studio where i can take time.

Thing is, i’m making music let’s say inspired from boards of canada and stuff like that…and with just a drum machine where i have one general signature sound is not going to work for me, since i constantly need to change sound design of drums and since i can’t afford couple of drum machines, I came to this thought that digitakt would serve me perfekt in this case. I use a lot of acoustic drum sounds too which is really hard to emulate with brute. If i had more money this would’ve not been a case of course, since i want to have every drummachine :slight_smile:

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BOC fan here too. Yes the Digitakt with an o coast is the best percussive combo. But a Digitakt does offer a lot more than the ones mentioned for versatlity.

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Old mpc would be fine too.
Then you heading towards sampler territory and can grab a lot of good rack bargains with multiple outputs and good fx

Eg Yamaha a5000, akai s5000 , akai z4

Or hook up an iPad
Too many options :slight_smile:

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Maybe this track is not the best example For drum sound since i have too many techno tracks on soundcloud, but you’ll get maybe better idea of what i meant about sampler “As drum machine” before i have more money. it’s kinda electronic but accoustic too and i really need to be able to perform this way when i play live.

And yeah i think so too that another sampler “Digitakt i guess coz i can score it insanely cheap” would serve me better as drum machine atm before i sell my soul and have more money to buy stuff what i want.

Thanks a lot for suggestions Everyone. i really appreciate it

@Unifono

I can’t wait around for an ND2, so I’ve ordered a 3P.

Thank you for helping me spend some money.

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A eurorack drum skiff could be nice too!

Many more but those 2 are on my short list.

For techno: Jomox, Mutant drums, … tip-top drum modules … the list goes on.

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Yes. I think the Digitak. would be perfect. The detuned lead synth over the top of Sampled drum loop you could cover so many bases with your budget by buying the Digitakt.

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I have honestly dropped the thought of using a drum machine. I have been obsessed with getting the right one for years and have bought MD, ND2, Drumbrute, MC and afternoon MC I kind of felt like there is always something I don’t like about them. I’ve had the most fun with using samplers as drum machines. So I’m sticking to using octatrack. I’ve also thought of getting a squid Salmple or Assimil8or but I’m definetly dropping the thought of synthesized drums.

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I think modular drums with an OT will get you a long way. You need the recorder trigs on the OT so you can capture timed loops. That way you can build up layers and grooves. I don’t believe the DT has recorder trigs.
I use Squid Salmple instead of OT.

The special sauce is using something like Grids a rhythm generator to trigger Plonk a physical modelling percussion module. Plonk has a bunch of presets which you can switch between by modulating. Run Plonk through a delay and just keep cycling through Grids random collection of drum patterns. When you run that against a four four kick you get a lot of happy accidents where a good groove will drop out.

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anytime :grin:

Nord Drum 2 + 3 have the deepest drum synth engines there are AFAIK. It can go way beyond being a drum machine I have access to a ND3 which I’ve sampled the hell out of. It does have a wide dynamic range: Live (at least with my accomplice whacking it), limiter/ compression is pretty essential. Excuse referencing my music, but reckon it’s apt here. The Latin-esque melody that comes in at 5:50 is ND3 sequenced by Octatrck and then loaded and twisted in OT; ND also being played live (partner uses Octapad to drum in and loop patterns on the OT). Not BOC style. Kick is Tanzmaus!

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to pair with Octatrack I like having a machine/module that has synthesized drums. nice to have control you can’t have with samples, and the pairing play off one another well; create your own unique drum sound. there’s lots of options for this, but currently I’m pretty stoked on the Vermona drm1 and Model:Cycles with the OT. FM and analog voicing, next to the samples. what you’ll want to use is totally dependent on your sound, of course…

whatever you do though, just stay the hell away from Jomox. sound is great. OS is hot garbage.

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