Drum Machines

Take greater advantage of Drum Machine Designer in Logic Pro X by customising Smart Controls.

Even a killer rhythm pattern won't make the grade if it's played with lacklustre sounds. In the concluding part of this series, Nicholas Rowland puts on his sound designer's head and explains how you can re-tread your tired timbres...

Nicholas Rowland explains how you can take advantage of your computerised drummer to generate effects that sound anything but human...

The debate's been going on for as long as drum machines have been around: can they really sound human? Nicholas Rowland takes jazz drumming as his test case and tries to find out.

If you're after a great rhythm section, these days it's very easy to whip up a great groove from a MIDI file disk. But an inside knowledge of how and why drum patterns work can help make you a better musician and get your rhythm section really working.