Technical questions for the MPC2000xl and the MPC2000
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By aaron Sat Dec 20, 2003 4:59 pm
Okay.
I made a thread before this, everyone said to mess with Note variation/Tap tempo button..

Ive been practicing this for weeks and I still can't get the proper drum rolls I want, I mean my shi,t sounds like the tasmanian devil in a kitchen.............

I attempted to do a drum roll like the one from Slow Jamz, we all know this right?
bad results...

Then I tried programming drum hits to different tracks, and adjusting the pitch to them.....

Can someone help me out here?

By D_Samp Sun Dec 21, 2003 2:44 am
try copying the sound you want to roll to at least two pads, and record yourself playing it in, in real time on its own Track.

by doing it on its own track you can handle it easier and makes for mute/unmute goodness.

practice makes perfect like anything i guess.

By DjFuSeONe Mon Dec 22, 2003 8:57 am
when u press tap tempo u can change the speed of the tap by changing the timming ex 1/16 or 1/32.....may be that would help u out.....
By roxstar Mon Dec 22, 2003 10:05 am
Is to just buy a sample cd with an actual drummer playing. There should be a section on drum rolls, and all the other tricks that drummers can do. If you must do it yourself, drum rolls can be a little difficult to emulate on mpc pads. Your going to have to turn the quantization off, and use the 16 levels of velocity if you need the absolute realism of actual drums.

. ..roxstar. ..
By jontakiff Tue Dec 23, 2003 7:40 pm
Here's the easiest way, I think...besides just sampling a drum roll, which might be better...

take the track you want to put the drum roll in. Turn the timing to note off. Now, slow down the existing track....slow it way, way, way down until you can practically go to the bathroom in between beats. What this does is allows you to play subdivisions that you wouldn't be able to play at a fast tempo. Cause you cant play 32nd notes at 120 bpm's, you know? What I do is, on a two bar sequence I'll slow the tempo from 96 or whatever to like 48bpm. Then I'll put the snare sound on 2 pads, and play 32-notes. Stop the sequencer, listen to it. Record again with overdub. Play some notes maybe a little softer along with what's already there, just layering it. Stop the sequencer. If it sounds good, keep going, if not, undo. Just keep going around and around and layering snares on the same track...if you want a crescendo, use 16-level and get a little louder with each hit. It is pretty unscientific but it works.
By jontakiff Tue Dec 23, 2003 7:42 pm
oops...and then, when you're done, put the tempo back to 96, or whatever you started with...there you go, you got a roll that you can't program any other way.
User avatar
By descartes Tue Dec 23, 2003 8:07 pm
...it may be helpful to use it to cut up a drum roll similar to the one you want, export that drum roll as a midi sequence to your akai, and then really look at it: where are the drum hits falling (for example on the sraight thirty second beat, are they swung, whatever) in the drum fill sample you want to model? This may put you on the right track as then you have something to emulate rather than just some vaugue notion that if you keep pressing the tap tempo button you will one day be able to make killer drum fills.
Of course, if you don't have recycle, this advice will be meaningless to you.