Drum Machine vs Plug-ins (Hardware vs Software)

[drbluezz]

What would be the best way to add drums to my Protools recordings? I'm currently using an Alesis SR-16 drum machine that gives me great sounds, but it's a lot of work to either program the machine or play tracks live. When I track live I lay down the kick drum track first, then the cymbal and snare track, then the crash cymbal and accents, then fills, then subtlties such as a double back beat snare on shuffles. You get the idea...lots of work and time consuming. The results sound good but it's kind of a pain doing it this way. And the factory presets are not very useable for my style of music.
For a little background, I play blues and jazz so I don't use a lot of complicated beats. Mostly 4/4 ("four on the floor") shuffles and swings, with an occasional New Orleans style rhumba, slow, medium, or fast rock 4/4, and (rarely) a "boogaloo" style beat. I'm a guitar player that can play drums, therefore, the live tracking.
I have a Roland GR-33 guitar synth. Can I use it to trigger a plug-in style drum machine or do I need a keyboard synth?
I guess my main question is...is there a better and easier way? It's not that I mind all that much doing it the way I do. It's just the time it takes. I can easily spend an entire day (or days) just getting the drum tracks right and since I work full time it is difficult to find the time needed to complete an entire song.
Anyway, is there a better way? Thank you.

Tom

[michaelhoddy]

Sounds like a lot of work. I'd hire a drummer onto the session. Seriously. I'm not trying to be smart. Sounds like you're spending a lot of time and creative energy doing what you could pay a good drummer a couple hundred bucks to do in a few hours, and end up less spent and with a better piece of music at the end of the day.

There are any number of drum and percussion virtual instruments available which will give you better sounds than the Alesis, but you would still need to program the parts in. These will generally sound better than any keyboard-based percussion stuff, and be easier to use, edit, and integrate.

You could also use one of the groove-based instruments (such as Stylus RMX, but there are many others as well which specialize in different styles and sounds). These would give you less creative control over the part, but would be way less time-consuming to set up, and have the built-in advantage of having been laid down by some pretty great drummers and percussionists, so the feel is already really good.

But if it were me, I'd go find a a good drummer. Between being a songwriter, guitar player, engineer, and having a full-time job, it sounds like your plate is already quite full.

[drbluezz]

Michael,

Thanks for the suggestions. I just do this out of my family room so I don't have the time (or finances) to hire a drummer, so it's just the drum machine and me. But I've found that (like anything else) if I spend the time to "do it right" I can get a pretty believable result. But it IS time consuming. I was just wondering if there's an easier way. Thanks again.

Tom

[web01169]

again.... what would be best is to pu the alesis in to playback mode and use the alesis as a sound modual and your sequencing program as the sequencer...program the drum parts or record them as you play but thats the easiest way to do it.....i use a boss dr 550 with nuendo i never use the onboard sequencer of the boss i just use the sounds of it cause the kick sounds almost as good as the dm5 but i program using the sequencer in nuendo