Drum machines and non industrial metal are something that usually dont combine very well but i have to say, there is 1 band that does it well and that would be kekal the drums sound actually powerful on their albums.

My problem usually with drum machines is that they sound weak and totally fake. Infact other than the aforementioned kekal i have yet to see any band with drum machine that does not automatically lose points over this.

Thoughts, discussion?

How about Anaal Nathrakh?

Rotting Christ's "Thy Mighty Contract" and "Non Serviam" are both masterpieces, despite the drum machines.

Some bands are totally RUINED by drum machines.

As an example, Fuck off and die!.

Are you talking about bands that purposely use drum machines for the sound they produce (like Mortician) or bands that use the drum machine as a replacement for a drummer simply because they can't find a drummer, as in to actually replicate the sound of drums the best they can?

Nokturnal Mortum and Plague Bringer are two bands who use drum machines well, off the top of my head.

Forefather.

Fuck... I'm Dead is fantastic, though they recently got a real drummer I heard.

Duch band Abattoir Rouge were quite amusing.

Hate Forest

I know let's stop listing bands and actually discuss the subject.

About half the underground, broadly black metal bands I listen to employ a drum machine. I usually try not to get too bothered by this, as I can understand the practical and financial difficulties of employing a real drummer. It's down to what efforts they've made to minimise the fakeness in their sound i.e. the quality of the programming. And to that effect, that they've not added some unplayably fast parts. So basically, if a real drummer could play it in a life setting, I don't mind.

If you know what you're doing, Drumkit from Hell/EZdrummer can sound convincing. Some friend listened to my stuff and said he thought I was an excellent drummer. I don't even have the coordination to play real drums.

I dig drum machines, but for any band, if I had the choice for them to have an organic drummer instead of a drum machine, I'd rather have that; it just sounds... fuller, I guess. And it's easier to appreciate good drumming when done by a human, obviously.

Vladimir Cochet's projects (Mirrorthrone, Weeping Birth, Unholy Matrimony) all have drum machines on them, and he is pretty pro at programming them. He can get a little too "enthusiastic" at times with the capability of "realistic" drumming, but for the most part he does a pretty decent job of coming up with interesting drum patterns. His premiere albums sucked in terms of production and drumming, but his present albums are really clean.

There is no bigger Atmosphere killer than the drum machine in Summoning's Lugburz.

The thing about the Drumkit from Hell is definitely true. Both Devin Townsend and T3h Shred Boiz use it, and it's basically impossible to tell the difference between it and real drums most of the time. Great bass drum sound too.

i ment any band using a drum machine.

What about bands that use a drum machine to get something you cant pull of in real like? Like 3 different snares or whatever?

What about them?

hardy har har

personally, i think the drum and guitar sound in Hacked Up for Barbeque is awesome. I wouldnt have even noticed it in Bloodsoakeds new one

If a band uses a drum machine because they didn't know anyone who could drum (e.g. Rotting Christ) then that is fine. If a band uses a drum machine because they drumming they want is impossible (e.g. The Beserker) then I consider the band worthless.

This is actually their only album with real drums.

Comecon sounded ok because they didn't go too low end, as is the vogue in drummerless DM nowadays.

Triggers are as bad or worse than machines.

Unless you're playing electronic based music (i.e. Industrial, Trip Hop, etc.) and are purposely looking to have a synthetic drum sound, then obviously drum machines are the way to go. Using a drum machine to replicate acoustic drum sounds is, in my opinion, a less than ideal scenario. However, there are always exceptions and necessary evil situations, and I'll relate a personal story to illustrate this.

A change of living situations forced me to change my approach to my project Cold Blank Stare. I recorded my first EP playing acoustic drums. When I was younger and still lived with my family, I had the luxury of having a space to setup and play drums. Now that I'm on my own and crammed into a small apartment, I not only have no space to setup my kit, I'm also not able to due to the close proximity of my neighbors. So before moving, knowing full well I'd not be able to play live drums, I sampled my kit sounds and bought Izotope's iDrum software-it allows you to load and sequence any sample recorded in most audio file formats. For my upcoming full length, I programmed the drums using these samples and a mindset that I'd only program what I can actually play. The results are pretty good, not ideal, but the best I can do in my current situation. When I can afford to upgrade my living situation so I can play drums, I will. But for now, if I want to keep making music, this is what I gotta do.

Yeah I know, tl;dr

I love drum machines. I'm not really sure why.

If it sounds good it's fine.

Quoted for truth. I don't mind drum machines at all unless they are so obviously fake sounding (even then, I can probably forgive that if the music is good enough or if it is in industrial and such genres), and I also agree that triggers generally sound worse than a drum machine.

I think he was being a smartass.

This.



...or maybe he just had his album titles mixed up; there's a song called Lugburz on the Minas Morgul album and, as much as I adore Summoning, the sound on that record is generally pretty damn poor.

Actually, there's nothing in his post indicating that he was talking about the album rather than the song.

From what I hear, ColdWorld uses a drum machine, and it is damn hard to tell it.

The Elysian Fields' album "We... The Enlightened" has some pretty realistic sounding drumming as well, but it's all sequenced. Very impressive.

Amazing band, too -- I'd recommend them, OP, as they fall into the category of what your looking for (up until their most recent, which could be classified as industrial-influenced).

I believe that Countess (a Dutch, Black/trad. Metal band that doesn't suck like a certain Portuguese band who's name shall remain anonymous) makes use of a drum machine. Doesn't take away from the music at all, thankfully. Also, the Swiss Countess nearly-clone (I say nearly because of a greater speed and a much more speed/thrash influenced sound) Mountain King used a drum machine on their first full length. it was kind of obnoxious. however, Satorious has managed to get a real drummer to play on Mountain King's next, as of yet unreleased, album (Gotos-Bloodbath).

are there any bands that sound like this(besides mortician)?

http://rapidshare.com/files/223501086/pb17.mp3

No one mentioned Agoraphobic Nosebleed? The drum machines add this frenzied chaotic vibe to their music which really owns.

Putrid Pile, Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Mortician, The Berzerker, Sikfuk (recently).
And Prostitute Disfigurement's first album.

There are many non industrial bands that use a drum machine, mainly in blackmetal.
I would mention Trollech from my country. The band had been using drum machine for some time before a drummer joined to them.
Other bands with drum machine of which I know are Dagorlad(Bel), Valar and Dawn of Dreams(Aut).
Most of the bands using a drum machine have the rhytmics done so well that one do not even recognize that it is an automat. It sounds very realistic.
I also use automatic drum in my musical project. It has many advantages (accuracy, reliability for example) as well as disadvantages (limited capacity of memory is one of them ). How the whole rhytmic will be look like in the end, it depends mainly on your fancy and your ability to make music.

The drum machine on Vintersorg's Solens Rötter sounds amazingly natural. I'd never have speculated about it not being a real drummer until I read about it after wondering who's that guy that can play so well.

On Vintersorg's early releases the drum machine is noticeable, though, even if the programming was done tasetfully, so it doesn't take anything away from the music.

What about Limbonic Art? Their drum machine sounds like it's being used because the compositions are so complex, not because they need a crutch.

Do Samael still use programmed drums when playing live?

The atmosphere BM band Zuriaake's usage of drum machine is great.From my view point,even better than Summoning,it's mostly because that the drum sound is lower and is melted with the music very well.

By the way, is there a band with drum machines, that actuallly sound good? most bands I've heard with drum machines have this totally weak, flat sound They often use no fills and play only the most basic beats, but that's not the worst thing, lots of bands do that, but why do drum machine sound so shitty all the time?