Coady Combo – A new wave of drop-clutches

And so the old saying goes, necessity gives way to invention. Needs strike, and trigger creativity in one’s mind, and when that occurs, old ideas can be re-invented and new development takes place. From rocks, to arrows, to swords, to machineguns, it is the very nature of the human’s mind, to recreate creation for better serving of its own existence. This process of development can be found everywhere around the world and in almost any industry, and why it should be any different when we examine the drum kit’s development history?

From the comprised sets of the 60’s, to the more elaborated kits from the 70’s, to the gigantic monster kits of the rockin’ 80’s. Because of this constant change, concepts have always been revisited and redesigned (something for better, sometimes for worse). Keith Moon played with a double kick drum, but had to abandon the usage of a hi hat. Modern metal drummers first solved the problem by adding a second hi hat so still could somehow take advantage of the complex sound dynamics offered by this essential part of a drum kit. Later the drop clutch was invented. An ingenious type of hi hat clutch that allows drummers to arm it when playing without the second kick pedal, or disarm it when doing double bass work, having the top hat just laying closed on the bottom hat, which happened to deprive the instrument of it’s characteristic sizzling sound. Forever a compromise, this lack of sizzling caused by the regular drop clutches, added to their noise generating, non-automatic functionality (a stick stroke is required to disarm the clutch). And it was this compromise that sparkled the development-driven, creative spirit of Canadian-based company Billdidit. TheCoady Combo (comprised of Coady Clutch, Coady Wash Control and Coady Trip Arm) arrived on the market with the sole purpose of revolutionizing, refining, and redefining the very existence of its predecessors’ drop clutches.

From the very first glance I took of the Coady, passion for innovation was what the phrase that crossed my mind. A recipe containing mechanics, magnetism, physics and obvious imagination, this three-piece apparatus displays uniqueness with its look while smoothing out many of the problems found on regular drop clutches. The Coady Wash Control provides plenty of customizable sizzling control over the hit hat when the drop crutch is disengaged. This simple and clever piece can be even purchased separately and can prevent any drop clutch from creating lifeless hi hat sound when the top cymbal is dropped. A heavy-duty screw system allows the player to carefully and precisely choose top and bottom hats contact and better serve their taste, style, cymbal weight, and their own dynamic performance. The screw is mounted on top of a heavy-duty spring that absorbs the chock of the cymbals, smoothing the transition between engaged/disengaged clutch positions. The Wash Control is a smart invention that will probably lead other drop clutch manufactures to envy Billdidit, with a feeling of “why didn’t WE think about this before?”

The Coady Clutch itself is another great idea that it works as well in practice as it does in theory. Here, a traditional hi hat clutch design is enhanced by the technologically advanced disk-drop-clutch device. Made of a heavy-duty plastic material, the disk holds the clutch by use of magnets. Simply hit the disk and the clutch will drop. Step on the hi-hat pedal and the magnets engage the clutch once again. The disk features six slots for magnet placement so one can better calibrate the drop clutch sensitivity regarding cymbal’s weight and playing technique. Although the Coady Clutch and the Coady Wash Control already represent a step beyond all other drop-clutch designs and functionalities on the market, theCoady Trip Arm is what brings all these innovative concepts together making this three-piece mechanism the first automatic drop-clutch ever. Why should a drummer have to hit the clutch for the cymbal to drop? Why not make it so that every time you step out of the hi-hat pedal and into the double bass pedals, the clutch drop by itself? That’s exactly what the Trip Arm does. The Trip Arm might turn a few heads when someone first sees it, wondering what that strange device might do, but as strange as it might look, it works, and who knows, it could become the norm and one might eventually wonder why a double bass drummer does not have one on his hi-hat.

The Coady Combo installation is quite simple. You can intuitively figure out how the system works. The Trip Arm might take a little extra time to perfectly optimized it with your hi hat stand and playing style, but once you find that sweet spot you have no more worries. The Trip Arm not only can be disengaged mid-play, in case you want to use the Coaby Clutch as a traditional drop clutch, but also is easily removable, so you have it ready to go gig after gig in matter of seconds. Once every main device of the combo is perfectly calibrated to your musical taste and style, this revolutionary drop-clutch works terrifically, and it quickly becomes a piece of your drum kit that you don’t even have to think about, yet another thing that sets it apart from traditional drop-clutches. It’s like it is not even there, you go back and forth between pedals and the combo does its job, you’ve got your sizzling hi hat cymbals while playing double bass, you have a controlled and dynamic hi-hat when you groove with the single bass drum pedal.

Ideas come and go. When ideas are well executed, chances are they will create a mark in history. The unique and innovative ideas put on the Coady Combo already are great ones. Double kick drummers worldwide will ultimately decide if this product will make its dent, but in my case, this combo is now a full-time member of my own drum kit.

The Coady Combo retails for $89.98. You can also purchase the pieces separately, The Coady Clutch costs $49.98, TheCoady Wash Control $12.98 and the Coady Trip Arm $34.98.

For more information please visit www.billdidit.ca 

Review: Evans EC1 Reverse Dot

Introduced to the market in 2009, the EC1 Reverse Dot snare head followed the success achieved by the Evans’ EC1 tom heads. With its one-of-a-kind design, the EC1 Reverse Dot surely is proof of Evans’ compromise on drumhead technological innovation. The EC1 is a 14mil single-ply head that features the renowned Evans Edge Control ring mounted on its underside along with its Center Dot, giving this drumhead a distinctive sound and unique character.

Once installed on my snare drum, I discovered that the EC1 Reverse Dot’s uniqueness was not only restricted to its look but was very present in its sound, making my snare drum produce a beautiful warm, woody tone. Because of its combination of thickness and controlled sustain provided by the Edge Rings, the EC1 Reverse Dot gives the drum a bold and fat sound quality while providing extreme durability, making it a great option for heavy-handed rock drummers. Its delicate coating is another factor that gives this head its modern look and sound, defining its woody tone. What impressed me the most though, is the ingenious placement of a center dot. This dot makes the head a hybrid entity with two very distinctive sound textures. The center has a defined, enhanced dense sound, and the edges a resonant, free and live character. Having these two variables of sounds on a single drum gives a drummer the power of further control on snare rolls and effects as well as providing an exploratory environment for creative drumming.

The EC1 Reverse Dot is a head where creative and innovative designs are meshed together culminating in one of the most unique and peculiar sounding snare drumheads in the market. It’s truly a combination of visual and auditory beauty.

For more information on the EC1 Reverse Dot and other Evans products, please visit www.evansdrumheads.com.

Chad Wackerman Trio Hits Live DVD

Besides being a phenomenal jazz and rock drummer, having toured and recorded 26 albums with Frank Zappa, Chad Wackerman is also a man of charisma. Through his serene expressions, perfectly chosen words, and soft voice, he hosts and narrates details of every single song you will see and hear on his first DVD as Chad Wackerman Trio (recent released by the DrumChannel.com).

With pals Mike Miller (guitar) and Doug Lunn (bass) on board, the trio plays a variety of jazz-fusion songs composed by Wackerman himself. Written primarily for a quartet set up, Mike Miller takes on the duty of wisely accommodating vibes and guitar parts with a single instrument. After an introductory chitchat with the band, Chad carefully gives viewers the story behind every song they are about to experience through the performance.

"Sophie’s Beach" is the first tune of the DVD and is a song written for Chad’s daugther, inspired by their trips to the beach in Sydney. The song features a delightful and turbulent, as Chad describes, drum solo at the end. The movie continues with a Miles Davis inspired tune called "Spiral" and then with an old, dramatic and bold song, part of Chad’s first album, titled "Tell Me." "All Sevens" is the song that follows, bringing interesting drum signatures. Inspired by the poem “Welcome to Holland”, the ballad Holland is one of the most beautiful songs on this DVD and personally one of my favorites. Chad taps on dealing with changing expectations as the inspirational motive behind this one. Moving to rock-ish tunes, the trio plays the progressive "Balancing Acts" and the NYC inspired "The City," portraying Big Apple’s bombardment of humanity. The movie ends with another old song called Scream. The DVD features two more tunes under the bonus materials and a drum channel promo video that you might want to skip it.

The beauty of this DVD is found not only on the skillfully crafted songs but also in the showing of an artist’s way finding true inspiration for the creation of his masterpiece. Chad’s remarks on how the relationship of band behind the scenes reflects profoundly on its musicality serves as great advice to all musicians. Personally speaking, the only thing missing on The Chad Wackerman Trio: Hits Live DVD is a crowd to intensify the overall performances. Either way this movie will make want to just dim the lights, pour some scotch, light a cigar, relax and enjoy.

Million Dollar Drums with Drumagog 5

It’s never been this easy to have exactly what you want. Well, at least in the music recording world. Virtual instruments, effects, and emulators are giving the power of music creation to any musician on the planet for only a fraction of the cost of real hardware and music recording paraphernalia. It’s a free musical-world indeed, where records are no longer made in multi-million dollar studios, but are now crafted in living rooms, basements, and garages. Where new music, good and bad, floods every corner of the World Wide Web. The digital revolution completely changed the music industry for better or for worse, and is here to stay.

On the drummer’s side of this shift from expensive-analog to inexpensive-digital, there will be no harder task than recording and creating a great sounding kit without having to lay out the real bucks for it. A drum set sound has as much to do with the room it is in as the sticks you are using to hit it. And as you might know, not just any room will make your drums sound good. Acoustically treated, engineered, and specifically designed studio rooms are expensive, and nowadays are even going through an extinction process. Besides the architectural aspect of recording drums, a few no less important aspects play a crucial part in achieving a perfect-sounding drum recording. Great mics, preamps, sound processors and the most critical, a competent sound engineer will also be required to capture the best of your performance. So let’s do the math: expensive place + expensive equipment + expensive staff = (logically) a very expensive drum recording.

But in a digital world where everything is possible, the time (and money) consuming process of drum recording can simply be digitally recreated, virtually emulated, and drummers anywhere on the planet can have the best sounding kit, simply and quickly, a few mouse clicks away. What if you could replace your bad sounding recorded kit with an astonishing, professional sounding one, while still preserving the integrity of your performance? WaveMachine Labs, creators of Drumagog 5, had just that in mind and took care of business. Welcome to digitally created perfection. Drumagog has become one of the best, most recognized and recommended, most essential and efficient drum replacer plug-in on the market. And with this fifth version of Drumagog, WaveMachine Labs brings on the best of their game. A user-friendly interface with powerful and exclusive features.

Drumagog 5 relies on its newly designed Auto Align 2.0, developed in conjunction with mp3 format inventors, Fraunhofer. Auto Align 2.0 is a powerful algorithm that efficiently aligns samples with extreme accuracy. By the very first time you load Drumagog 5 to one of your drum tracks on your favorite DAW, you will experience right the way the excellence of this product. With a fresh, completely redesigned, bigger and more powerful interface, this new incarnation of Drumagog blew my mind (and some bad sounding drums) away unimaginably fast. Gog file loaded and your lame drum sound is immediately replaced by a professionally recorded and articulately played one all in real time. A drum sample library of 5 gigabytes gives you plenty of options for choosing the drum sound that best fit your track’s needs. And if 5 gigabytes is not enough, Drumagog 5 comes with new features, including one of my personal favorites. Under the Plugin tab you can load your favorite third party drum sample or virtual instrument software inside of Drumagog, infinitely expanding your sounds options. Not only can you make use of the third party library as you can quickly mix it and ingenuously blend it with Drumagog’s sound samples and built-in effects. Speaking of effects, another new feature of Drumagog 5 is that comes with two new and powerful built-in effects; Convolution Reverb and Morph Engine. Along with Drumagog’s built-in Synth feature, these will help you further shape Drumagog’s sounds. The possibilities are seemingly endless with these tools that also offer mind-blowing presets. The Synth offers Oscillation and Filter parameter controls that can completely redefine what you usually call drums. The Stealth Mode feature is another great tool for maintaining the integrity of a drummer’s performance but still being able to replace the drum sound without completing eliminating the room bleeding from that specific track.

WaveMachine Labs also developed a feature on this new version that can finally deal with the most articulate and dynamic piece of a drum kit. The hi hat. In the past it has proved to be a real pain in the *&% to try to replace and recreate the dynamics and articulation of a hi hat sound and performance. By adding the Auto Hi Hat Tracking device on Drumagog, WaveMachine Labs tried to solve this problem once for all. Since kick and specially snare bleeds are the major problem here, once you tweak the Sensitivity and Resolution parameters a little as well as the Auto HH Threshold (found under the Settings tab), you will be able to closely mimic the original articulations of your Hi Hat track with Drumagog’s sounds. The only problem about this feature is that adds latency (is this a word?). Nothing worse than having a hi hat out of place in a beat. I was able to fix it by moving my Hi Hat track manually on my DAW. The Auto Hi Hat Tracking is certainly a great initiative from WaveMachine Labs part; with a little more development it can definitely surpass expectations.

With old and new (but equally powerful) features, the fifth version of Drumagog truly is a evidence of how technology is facilitating many tasks only before reached with countless hours and dollars invested. A tool that serves as an example of how things in life should be: simple and efficient. No more worries about having a perfect drum take without a perfect sound. Accurate sound layering has never been so easy. The world belongs to those with power and Drumagog 5 gives the power to the performer to create a million dollar sounding drum anywhere he (or she) wants.

For more information about Drumagog 5 please visit www.drumagog.com

Drumagog 5 Platinum currently retails for $379.

Evans GMAD – A Breed of Punch & Tone

There was a time when the only solution to get more punch, controlled sustain, and presence out of a bass drum in the mix was to run to your bedroom and grab the first available pillow or blanket, and shove it right into the drum. Although this creative technique is still put in practice in studios and on stages all around the world, many of the biggest names in drumhead manufacturing have sent their designing skills to the drawing board to create a more polished version of this concept, not only making the application of such a technique more refined, but also saving us the embarrassment of having our old bedding items as part of our drum equipment.

Evans started to experiment with the idea of creating mounted dampening systems on bass drum heads with the release of their EMAD series. The EMADs quickly became one of the company’s most used heads. Pushing the concept a little further, Evans then decided to synthesize EMAD’s dampening system with the dense, punchy and durable qualities of their G Plus series. The G Plus features an exclusive 12-mil single ply film made especially for Evans. The breeding result of these two heads gives birth to the GMAD.

Evans’ GMAD can be considered a sort-of “kit” for punchy bass drums, if you will. Single thick film for attack and low-end tonality, a set of two (3/4” and 1 ½”) foam rings for the featured mounted system, and Evans’ slam patch. Truly a nice combo if you want a bass drum with a super defined attack, something that I believe most drummers want, but can’t always easily obtain. The combination of these ideas culminates in what differs this head from those propped by pillows or blankets, Tonal Quality. Commonly, if you want more attack and punch, chances are sustain and tone will suffer. This certainly doesn’t apply to GMAD. The externally mounted adjustable damping system enhances and sharpens attack definition while controlling and not killing the true tone of the head. Because of its thickness, the 12-mil single-ply film creates bold low-end frequencies, which is then controlled and smoothed by the EMAD system, giving it a shorter decay.

The sum of the concepts applied on GMAD gives this drumhead an aggressive attack character but with a beautiful and rich tonal core. The GMAD fits well on many music styles, from RnB to Pop to Metal. For those looking for professional and punchy sounding kick, the GMAD is certainly a great option to go with.

For more information please visit www.evansdrumheads.com

Ddrum's Reflex - A Drum to Reflect On

For a long time, Ddrum was a name only synonymous with drum triggers. At its inception this made a lot of sense, but lets fast forward through the company history and development.

The brand actually began as a division of Clavia, the Swedish electronic instruments manufacturer best known for the Nord line of keyboards. In 2005, Ddrum was acquired by Armadillo Enterprises, a company who also owns Dean Guitars. The acquisition turned out to be not only a turning point in the company’s history, but it also helped broaden its catalogue by launching them into manufacturing acoustic drum kits. Today, Ddrum offers a respectable variety of acoustic drum kits. Each of the Ddrum series features distinctive construction and sound, providing a quality palette for all types of tastes, budgets, and musical styles.

The Ddrum Reflex is one of the newer drum kit series released by the company. Like all the other series, Reflex also comes with unique features that help characterize not only its sound, but also its market value. Reflex represents Ddrum’s intention of delivering a high-end drum kit with a much more digestible price tag for the masses.

Defying Standards

Some of the features that the user will find on Reflex will certainly not reflect the same standards of the majority of kits out there. Take for instance its bass drum. An unusual and impressive 22” x 20” size brings edge to both its look and sound. The bass drum, as well as its snare, features 8-ply shells enhancing sonic quality. Reflex comes with 10” and 12” rack toms and a 16” floor tom. One might argue about the disparity of jumping from 12” to 16” and avoiding the traditional 14” rack tom. That, once again, is Ddrum’s way of further pushing the limits of conformity in the drum kit market, making their series stand out from the rest.

But the feature that really gives the Reflex kit its uniqueness is the wood from which is it constructed. Apparently Ddrum is the first company ever to use Alder wood (Alnus Rubra) as the prime matter for a drum kit. Commonly used on guitar bodies (and frequently found in furniture) Alder wood resonates a rich tone while simultaneously being lightweight. It is also abundant in the environment, allowing for a more affordable market value when compared to more traditional woods used in drum kits such as maple for example. Interestingly, Fender has used Alder wood for over 50 years

for the bodies of their legendary guitars.

Reflex also comes with a few of the more commonly found features such as the Face-Off Lugs, standard tom arms and clamps and single-ply stock drumheads. This series also offers an assortment of interesting and attractive finishes to choose from.  Chrome and White Bubble Wrap are certainly eye catchers.

Sonic Distinctiveness

When evaluating its sonic qualities one starts to better understand more about the construction choices made by Ddrum for the Reflex series. Overall, the kit projects a well-defined attack with the right amount of warmth, just enough to give fullness to its bright presence. When analyzing the kit in parts, one can more accurately see how each segment of the kit supports and complements the other. The elongated bass drum produces an impressive clear attack, especially when taking into account its enormous body, which emanates plenty of low frequencies as well. Much like the bass drum, the snare also produces a sharp response accompanied by a fat quality that one can sometimes only find in more expensive snare brands. The Reflex’s toms are, at least in my point opinion, the elements that give the extra sonic edge to this kit. These short toms, especially the rack ones, project such a defined attack that bears the sonic qualities of a timbale. Think Neil Perts’ kit on Rush’s R30. The floor tom, although sharing certain sonic aspects of the rack toms, it also produces a well-balanced sound like the bass drum, with nice attack and not overwhelming “boomingness”. Although I could certainly see the Reflex kit being used in many different types of music, I believe it would be a perfect match for jazz, funk, R’n’B, Drum’N’Bass, and Pop Rock drummers.

On the Bright Side…

Ddrum’s Reflex is certainly not the usual $500 drum kit that envisions imitating some type of more expensive one. It’s definitely a drum kit apart from the rest. The very characteristic of being sonically and visually different from its counterparts makes Reflex a drum kit to be sought out. And on top of that, its affordable price makes it a great investment for any type of drummer, be he/she a beginner or a professional. Reflex definitely sounds like reflex and nothing else. And one has to appreciate that. It’s in the details like the elongated bass drum, the choice of wood, and the uncommon array of tom sizes that the appeal for kit is built upon and where the consumer will find its value.

Yet another good side of this kit is that it comes with something that many other brands have attempted but failed to accomplish. Good sounding stock drumheads. Reflex features single-ply Ddrum-brand drumheads. Their durability, as anyone might guess, are definitely not their strong selling point as they will wear out quite quickly, especially for hard hitters. But sonically, they sound really great. It makes the kit very exciting to play one you first set it up. It also works as confidence booster since it makes one feel that he/she made the right purchase choice. Definitely another bit of evidence that whoever came up with Reflex’s package had put some good and hard thought into it.

…On the Not So Bright

Many of the most respected (and expensive) drum kits do not come with a rack tom mounting system attached to their bass drum. The majority of kits with a lower price tag, just like Reflex, do. But that’s not the case. Such mounting systems, as many drummers out there know, presents advantages and disadvantages. Basically what it does is it affects the tonality of toms and bass drum, because vibrations and overtones directly travel across the tom stand. But on the other hand, it makes the set up of the kit more practical. So this issue is more of a compromise that one that has to do with a design flaw. Reflex is the type where perfection of tone seems to weight more than convenience for set up. Make sure to have a stands or a

drum rack available if you intended to purchase this kit

A second issue that seems to bother, at least this reviewer, is the face-off lugs. The problem here is more aesthetic than mechanical. To my eyes, the face-off lugs give a certain look of cheapness to the kit. They do function great and they can handle a decent amount of tension without ever detuning, but I feel that if Ddrum had invested a bit more into this small detail, the kit would certainly look more professional. But I also understand that simple details like this can play a huge part in a product’s cost.

Conclusion

When analyzing construction, sound, look, and especially price, Ddrum Reflex is a drum kit that is worth every penny invested on. I feel it is very difficult to find a kit in this price range that can offer the professional construction and sonic qualities that this kit does. In a recording environment as well as in a live performance setting, the Reflex drum kit is able to handle both quite well. It projects presence and body into a drumming performance.

For those just begging to drum as well as to seasoned drummers, Ddrum Reflex is a kit worth checking out at the store. If Reflex does not fit all the requirements that one is looking for in a drum kit, I can see it serving as the middle of the road kit for such a person. But I feel would be really hard for one to not like Ddrum Reflex. I’m sure even band mates will be impressed once they discover how much of the budget you used to paid for it. 

Hands-on Review: Alesis DM8 USB Kit

E-kits lovers are sure to find Alesis a home. While boasting a wide variety of models, Alesis is easily considered one of the most recognizable brands on electronic drum kit market. Focusing the delivery of a quality product for those on a tighter budget, Alesis’ e-kits have become the ideal entry-level choice for many players out there.

The company has also been continuously improving their line, constantly releasing new models as well as upgrading the ones already available on the market. For this summer, Alesis unveiled two new kits that, in my opinion, are the link between their more professional (DM10) and their more accessible models (DM6). The newly released DM8 is available in two different options; the DM8 Pro Kit (only differing from the USB kit by offering RealHead drum pads and the StageRack) and the DM8 USB Kit, which I will be focusing on in this article.

First impression and assembling – Coming in a well-packed and well-protected box, the DM8 has proven to be one of the easiest Alesis’ kits I’ve ever assembled. A new addition to Alesis’ e-kits line, the DMRack is a four-legged heavy-duty rack that comes pre-assembled inside the box. All you have to do is to set a desirable height for your rack toms and quickly add the two extra legs and voila’! The rack is ready for drum and cymbal pads. To some, this might not seem like a big issue, but I remember spending at least a couple hours putting together one of the earlier Alesis e-kit racks, and if you plan to take the DM8 on the road, the DMRack is truly a time saver. Although the clamps that hold pads and the rack itself together are made of plastic, they seem sturdy and strong enough to resist intense pounding sessions. One of the best features of the DM8, from an assembly perspective, is that it won’t require the use of a drum kit, aside from the kick drum pad that is attached to its rack with six bolts. Assembly is also made more efficient by the clever combination of all the cables to a DB-25 connector that goes directly in the drum module. Patching is also easy and simple with the labeled cables, and the module can even accommodate two extra add-ons.

Quick Tip: Read the manual (I bet a lot of you won’t) and especially, learn to calibrate the kit. Once you have everything assembled you will be able to turn it on and start playing, which is great, but, if you spend the time to calibrate and learn the kit’s capabilities, you will certainly be able to enjoy and play the DM8 much more.

Pros – To my eyes (and ears) the very best thing about the DM8 is the high-end sonic quality of the module’s kits. You get 100 different preset kits that can cover an array of styles, from rock to jazz to electronic to Latin; plus, it allows you to manipulate and save its samples to your own customized kits. Once you better familiarize yourself with the drum module capabilities, you will start to see all the goodies it has to offer. Effects, such as compression and reverb, that can be applied directly to one sample, or on the overall sound of a kit; the ability to optimize the kit to your playing style through tweaking velocity, curve velocity and cross talking, and much more. Another great feature of the drum module, like the DM10’s, is that it comes with 75 accompaniment tracks that you can use for practicing as well as to test the kit’s capabilities. It will also let you record and (even quantize) your performance. The module also comes with USB connectivity so you can use samples from your favorite drum software and also record MIDI performances directly on your DAW. Just remember to lower the buffer size to bring latency to a minimum.

Cons – One of the greatest challenges throughout the history for e-kits manufacturers has been the issue of how to emulate the feel and articulation of a pad to a point that it feels and sound like a real drumhead. In the case of the DM8 USB Kit, I should warn you not to expect anything close to that. Although the pads are certainly better than many drum pads out there (they are softer, hence giving the sticks more bounce), they are still pretty much practice pads. If you are not comfortable with playing on practice pads, chances are you will detest this kit, or, at least, it will take some time for you to get use to it and learn to tolerate it. In the end, it will actually become more a matter of technique than quality. To maximize the articulation of the kit, I strongly suggest optimizing its retriggering settings, especially for those that play fast, so that you won’t be missing any notes during your performance. The good side of this type of drum pads is that, with the help of the quality-built DM Rack, they eliminate cross talking fairly well (a serious issue that I’ve consistently found in the DM10).

Unfortunately, I encountered two very bad problems with the DM8 USB Kit that has more to do with wearing than design. First, the rubber that should help to hold my kick pedal attached to the kick drum pad just came off during playing. I guess Alesis needs stronger glue for this essential, but overlooked piece of the kit. I tried to attach my pedal without it, but still it’s not 100% great. Once in a while I have to adjust the pedal position, which is quite annoying, especially if you are in the middle of a performance. The second big issue that I encountered was with the Ride Cymbal Pad. After a couple of hours of playing, it seems that the rubber pad came slightly off and the bell’s triggering became defective.



What the author wants to see – I believe this kit is almost there. Reasonably priced considering its great module and rack, and somewhat decent pads. Some further testing for wear and tear may need to be conducted by the manufacturer. Who wants to buy a product that will start falling apart only after a couple hours of playing? I also would love to see capabilities for importing samples on the drum modules. Built-in libraries are great, but the musician of the digital age is now looking for originality more than ever. No one wants to sound like someone else. And no one wants to bring a computer everywhere just so your own samples can be played.

Who will like the DM8 – In my opinion the DM8 makes a really great practicing kit. It can also be very useful for smaller gigs where the loudness of a real drum kit can be an issue (churches for instance). It is great for project studios where you might need to quickly record a beat into your DAW and it’s good for small sampling applications during a gig. The DM8 also makes a really great kit for kids that want to graduate from Rock Band.

Who won’t – Professional drummers that look for a reliable, consistent and durable kit for recordings and performances. Drummers who are not used to playing on practice pads, or that love the sonic complexity of an acoustic drum kit and especially, heavy hitters – they will just tear the DM8 apart. 

Photos 

  


Specifications

Built-in sounds: Over 750

Kits: 100 preset, 100 user

Accompaniment patterns: 75 preset, 75 user

8” Dual-zone snare with rimshot

Three 8" single-zone toms

Large kick pad for single and double pedals

14” Dual-zone ride with bell and bow

12” Crash with choke

8’ Hi-Hat with continuous-control pedal

DMRack with four-post design, wingbolt-adjustable clamps, and mini-boom cymbal arms

Mix input for practicing with external music players

USB-enabled for tracking and programming with music software

Price = $699