What's your go-to software for the MPD?

Hey guys,

What's some good software to use with the MPD, for basic beat production and just using it as a sampler?

I've been trying to find something that loads MPC kits directly but I haven't actually managed to find anything yet. I tried Poise and Battery 4, but didn't have any luck with those.

(Back in the day, I had a little 16-pad sampler built in to BeatCleaver... I might have to resurrect that...)

Thanks,
Albert

What didn't you like about the pairing with Battery?

Was it that you have no sequencer and still need the sequencer in the host DAW or and it doesn't do the whole flow as standalone?

I made a 64 cell empty template for battery that I use with MPD and MPC's. the way Battery is set up you don't even have to assign the A,B,C,D in Battery it automatically responds to the MPD or MPC MIDI out.

But then none of Battery kits are gonna match the template, so in addition to rolling my own 4 bank kits, I use the fact that Battery has the cells from the factory kits as loadable as singles, with all the cell settings.

And as nice as it is Poise again, no sequencer.

If you want a standalone+VST/AU app, I would recommend MOTU BPM or FXpansion Geist. Geist especially is very deep. They both do most normal MPC things in some way or another.

They both include excellent libraries, not throwaway sounds at all, really dope stuff. And you can sample to both apps from an external source. (audio interface Ins etc.) And Fat Pad or mod that MPD if you haven't already so the velocity response is improved ten fold. I have Maschine, but I keep the MPD right next to it and any other drum/sampler app I let the MPD be the controller for that.

I always loved the Ableton/ Mpd combo. The drum racks in Ableton are set up almost identical to the mpc.

You can not load up the exact mpc program, but it's quite easy to drag and drop all the samples straight to the pads of the drum rack.

Metatron72 wrote:What didn't you like about the pairing with Battery?

Was it that you have no sequencer and still need the sequencer in the host DAW or and it doesn't do the whole flow as standalone?

I mostly didn't like that I couldn't load MPC kits directly and that it came with all the usual NI cruft (*cough* Service Center). Battery could still be the best solution though.

Metatron72 wrote:I made a 64 cell empty template for battery that I use with MPD and MPC's. the way Battery is set up you don't even have to assign the A,B,C,D in Battery it automatically responds to the MPD or MPC MIDI out.

But then none of Battery kits are gonna match the template, so in addition to rolling my own 4 bank kits, I use the fact that Battery has the cells from the factory kits as loadable as singles, with all the cell settings.

And as nice as it is Poise again, no sequencer.

If you want a standalone+VST/AU app, I would recommend MOTU BPM or FXpansion Geist. Geist especially is very deep. They both do most normal MPC things in some way or another.

They both include excellent libraries, not throwaway sounds at all, really dope stuff. And you can sample to both apps from an external source. (audio interface Ins etc.) And Fat Pad or mod that MPD if you haven't already so the velocity response is improved ten fold. I have Maschine, but I keep the MPD right next to it and any other drum/sampler app I let the MPD be the controller for that.

I don't really need a sequencer if the software comes as a VST. I've been using Renoise as a host but I'd like to be able to do stuff like round robin, so I'll have to take another look at Geist and maybe Battery again too. It's weird that MOTU BPM doesn't have a demo though eh? I also found Sonivox Pulse but reviews seem mixed on that one.

Ableton could be an easy solution too!

Thanks for the suggestions guys. This made me realize that if I can't load my premade MPC kits directly into anything, then maybe I need to think a bit more about what exactly I'm looking for.

You hadn't mentioned Renoise, and it always seems like looking for An app with a sequencer is the most common reason people go for some of those over Battery.

Maschine will load MPC PGM's, but obviously that's not at all what you're looking for, with not needing a controller, or another sequencing environment, not to mention Service Center that you said isn't something you like.

Menco's on point on the Ableton Drum Racks they are great, amazing that a built in DAW instrument holds it's own against full drum apps/plugins. I wish the Drum GUI could be made larger, but that's my one and only criticism. plus Live complements just about any software either as a plugin host or over ReWire, the MPD Live preset is solid too.

I've had Battery 3 for about 3 years and only just now am I really grasping what it can really do. I mainly used it as a drum kit for scratch tracks without storing the midi output because I never found a sequencer I liked. But lately I've been using it as a "ghetto" Abelton to do looping.

As far as workflow, I'm learning Geist and I just set up a rig in it to my liking. I wasn't used to having fixed assignment for the pads but I never read the manual to see that are a variety of ways I can get what I want out of it.

Ironically, buying an MPC earlier in the year actually helped me grasp what I could do on the computer so now I use a mix of either or depending on the project I have in mind.

So I'd say right now, Battery & Geist in that order but that could change in the future.

I tried Pulse, Sampla, Guru, FL Studio but I really didn't like the workflows in any of those.

If you're just keeping it basic FL is great to sequence to sequence Battery. FL is so it's own thing even with the pattern/song similarities to an MPC, that I can see not everyone might want to do whole productions in it. Really powerful DAW though overall.

Using it with FL 11 for sequencing, and Shortcircuit 1 for sampling.
All of those sampling options in fl, and I barely touch them lol.
I work too much quicker in Shortcircuit to bother learning a new sampling workflow.

I was using my MPD26 with FXPansionsof Geist. Kind of like a virtual MPC. It has its drawbacks like no LFO and missing effects that an MPC has, but it really synched up well and was great for live in Standalone mode ( not to be compared with maschine or RENso shut up) Now i got an MPC 1000 that im in love with. Nonetheless, i still use Geist (and Ableton) from time to time because of the interface but then dump to the MPC for the road. Give it a go!!!

Best flow for me is FLstudio + Poise. FL studio has an own audio-editor (edison) just dragging the sampes without saving into the Poise-pads. Poise has a really good work flow. Every option on the MPC is available in Poise (except the loop function:( ). Exact the same and its faster because you can highlight al pads and change the pitch/envelope for every pad at the sametime.

For drums, the envelope settings in Poise are really magic !

Ableton (*drumracks) + MPD 26 for me was like using my mpc but on steroids! I had a template set up in ableton with a default drumrack with mpd knobs mapped to my most used controls (filter, resonance, pitch, etc.). It was sick. Could chop up samples right in arrange view and instantly create a drum rack with those chops in a split second. Sold my mpd a few months ago bcuz of a super deal on a maschine. I use Maschine with the "megamaschine template" for ableton...unbelievable control of everything in ableton!!!! (the megamaschine template automatically maps controls for you as you change tracks!) Ableton+maschine=beat making heaven!!! Sorry, went off topic, but yeah ableton and mpd will def get the job done.

Oh and for anyone using mpd and ableton, look up a producer by the name memorecks on youtube. He talks about how you can create a drumrack with all of your drums pre loaded...kiks on pad 1, snares pad 2, etc., but bcuz each drumrack pad has a simpler, you can load up to 128 samples per pad slot. You can then map a control to scroll through each drum sound on each pad. My description might be a bit off as its been a minute doing that stuff in ableton (just use it now to track out maschine tracks and add sounds/fx.

I have to confess I haven't used it much in the last 18 months due to a big move and the fact my MPC 2500 is my go-to for beat making but Geist is, for me, the best 'MPC in software' there is without breaking the bank.