Bad real drums vs bad sequenced drums

[jdbunda]

Originally Posted by crooked09

edit: depending what is meant by bad, I voted for bad real drums being worse. at least with programmable they will be on time and the sample will sound good! in other words, they won't detract from the song probably, but they just won't add. bad real drums however definitely have potential to take away from the song.

I also think there are fake drums, and then there are fake drums. I find some of the obviously deliberately fake 80's style dance-music drums to be like fingernails on a chalkboard. The fakey electro-drum sounds and robo-rhythms are, to me, utterly soulless and unmusical. This does make it hard for me to appreciate house/techno stuff that uses it. But - there is a whole continuum of quality from there to well-done tracks you can get with modern software, EZDrummer and the like (not to mention sample replacement, which in my mind is, I suppose, technically fake, but...)

Also it can depend what you are trying to achieve. For songwriting and demos, I think what you can do with fake drums these days is stunning, and you can get very close to a good full band sound with just you, a guitar, a MIDI controller, and a mic or two in your basement.

Do "real drums" sound better? In most cases I think yes, just because it is SO much easier for a real drummer to insert variations, fills, and so on, (dare we use the "o" word?) which can be a painstaking and tedious process with a MIDI editor (am I the only one with no patience for this? ). But now we get into the recording quality issues - does your drum recording technique sound as good as the samples, and is your drummer is better than the beats you are using - it's harder and harder to tell the difference between real and fake. And - even to agree on the distinction!

[OldDog]

Having stood on the right side of too many bad drummers I will take a "bad machine", as a bass player there was nothing worse then trying to sync up with a guy with no sense of time!

One of the bands that made me realize I wanted to record music as well as play it was Roxy Music. It seems to me that one of the tricks to their sound was the use of both a real drummer and a machine. The machine sets up the groove and then the drummer fills in making the sound human.

[cakewalkgg]

I'd have to side on the programmed drums.. ive jammed with bad drummers and awesome drummers..
bad drummers are torture for me to try and jam with or listen too... Drums are noisy things... if the drummer sticks, they really make a racket

On the other side, the OP asks whats worse, poorly played drums or poorly sequenced drums.. In this context Im inclined to not only include sampled sounds but whether the programming is bad. I have heard some tracks where the programming is aweful and the sequenced drums arent even in time. Like they turned the grid and snapping off and just painted notes.. that sounds aweful also

[frshtrx]

This question hits me right in the middle of the personal project...I've got 12 songs, 5 have bad real drums, 6 have crappy loops...

for the variety of casual listeners I've subjected to the torture of listening to the entire CD...almost everyone has picked different 'favorites' with no correlation or even a mention of the drums being on the 'real' drum songs or the 'fake' ones.

My summary: unless you're a musician, or a drummer, as long as the drums don't get in the way of the lyrics or beat, it doesn't matter how they were created.

as a result...I'm not going to bother using a real drummer to finish the project. The only drummer I found who isn't a pain in the *8tt about recording is the only one who started as a guitarist.
There are drummers I wish I could record that would enhance the works quite a bit...but I guess I'm not worthy. Oh well, most listeners will never think about it.

My next project I'm going to buy a 'finger drum kit' and see how that goes...