Electronic Drum Kit

[swift_eklipz]

I think I'm going to sell my MPC and get into playing real drums (developing my own sound- kinda thing). Do you guys have any ideas/ suggestions about electronic drums? I know Just Blaze has the Roland V-Drums. So far I'm leaning towards the Roland TD's. I want a set appropriate for a beginner but one thats got a lot of preinstalled kits and good sounds for hip hop production.

 

[LostProfit]

I'm looking at some Roland ones too, I prefer the hardware to the Yamaha I tried but I'm still looking into it.

I'd recommend an acoustic kit if it's appropriate for you, much better to learn and develop a sound and style, I was planning on using the Roland to trigger samples, I think most people do that, the stock sounds are good but nothing special.

 

[swift_eklipz]

The thing is I've done all my drums so far using an MPC. I think moving to even an electronic drum kit will show a big difference in the sound. Most of them nowadays are position sensitive and have very good velocity sensitivity which makes pretty damn close to acoustic drums. I've heard some really impressive drums on electronic kits. But by all means, I would get an acoustic kit if it weren't for a few obstacles they pose.
1)I'm also a college student. Producing is like a hobby/ part-time job for me. I can't maintain an acoustic drum set in my tiny apartment bedroom. I'd get noise complaints.
2)Recording is a pain-in-the-a** for acoustic drums. First, I don't want to have to buy like 6 mics for just recording drums. I don't have my room treated for recording since its expensive and I might move out.
3) Acoustic drums are limiting. You are stuck with the sound of the drum you have. You can't change it unless you get entirely new parts like a new snare, cymbals, and so on, which is very expensive. For electronic drums, Roland and Yamaha release new modules and updates which you can buy.

So I think I'm pretty stuck with get electronic drums until I get more money and move into a house or get a recording studio.

 

[LostProfit]

I'm in pretty much the same position as you, I've had a noise complaint but I'm dealing with it in a civic manner.

I see your point about having more than one sound but you can really get a lot of different sounds out of an acoustic kit, compared to an electronic one, just through tuning, augmentation, different mic, weird playing styles and they can be more affordable in some cases, but I see your point. I'm already eyeing up an entire new acoustic kit.

So you want to add more of the manufacturer-provided multisamples?

so how about samples from records, do you still want to use those kind of samples or would you be completely switching to other sounds?

I'd like to be able to use the Roland drums as a controller sometimes and also use the updates and things...

 

[swift_eklipz]

I see more potential in the multisamples. And if I needed to trigger samples from records, I'd either use FL Studio or purchase a cheap sampler. I mean you could experiment with mapping those samples to the electronic drums. But I don't think it'd be anything different. I know for certain that the latest ones have the ability to take single-shot samples and trigger them with the drums.

What I really want in my beats is just a raw drum-kit-based percussion in the background with my own fills and so on. Its something like what DJ Khalil does in some of his songs. I want to move away if possible from sampled percussion what most hip hop uses nowadays. An acoustic kit would be ideal but I have to settle for an electric kit. I'm almost finalized on one of the Roland TD's.