Toontrack Progressive Foundry SDX Expansion Reviews

This expansion will round out just about any collection of kits on your SD3 journey. Near Perfect tones that can mix/match with almost anything. It has some great sounding kits on it's own, but what I love is using the samples from Progressive to layer in with other kits in my collection, giving some my more creative percussion an edge that is still easy to work with. Overall an amazing sounding expansion with lots of versatility - It wasn't high on my list when I first started investing in SD3 libraries, but once I got my initial set of expansions out of the way (rooms, D&D, indie) I started looking around to see what else is out there. Progressive Foundry came highly recommended and as it turns out, for good reason. It's punchy, clean, and still interesting. Probably going to become a go-to for concept work going forward, maybe something more if the right project comes along.

I really like this expansion. I feel like it is a great natural sounding library that gives plenty of options. My current go to "natural" drum sounds with my V-Drum Kit.

So far my favorite SDX for Superior.

I recently purchased SD3 secondhand on Reverb from a kind fellow who gave me SD3 plus all three foundry sdx's, and new york avatar sdx...

I originally planned to just purchase SD3 as i figured the stock 230gb of sounds would be more than enough. The stock sounds are great but after messing around with all the expansion packs i think this one trumps all INCLUDING the stock sounds recorded by George Massenburg. All the kits sound absolutely enormous, and it's hard to make custom ones because its tough to choose between so many amazing sounds. The snares and toms are sooo PHAT. The brent's kit preset is my personal favorite.

I'm very glad I got this SDX as a bonus with my purchase, and If i were considering buying SD3 as a first time buyer from sweetwater, I would say this is the only "must have" expansion to buy with it, unless you only make folk music and dont like HUGE drum sounds :) I am a big fan of Karnivool/other prog bands but think these sounds could serve any genre of music. Having an absolute blast playing them with my Roland TD-17KVX!!!

As someone who's used Steven Slate Drums, Addictive Drums, Native Instruments Studio Drummer & Abbey Road Drums, SD3 beats all hands down.

I recently purchased SD3 and thought the supplied kits sounded very good...then I picked up Progressive Foundry and I haven't looked back (except to listen and compare the package drums only to find that I made the correct choice)!! The drums from this pack are just what I am hearing in my head. The midi drum performances for this pack are also over the top killer for my taste. When I tap to find I'm always looking to PF first. I'm guessing with parameter adjustments and processing I can get SD3 stock sounds I would like as the raw drums are very real...but the Progressive Foundry drums really hit it out of the park for me.

I upgraded from Superior 2 to 3 about 1-2 years ago and I was blown away by how amazing the changes were. I had gotten Superior 2 with the Metal Foundry SDX and Ill be honest the Metal Foundry felt underwhelming and most samples didnt really work for anything involving modern progressive metal. I just recently took the risk and got the Progressive Foundry SDX since it was more tailored to the sound I was looking for and honestly I was blown away yet again just like I was when I upgraded to Superior 3. You can make any kind of drums for any kind of genre too. You get this unique character with all of these samples, its amazing.

I have a lot of EZX and SDX libraries, and this might be the best sounding one of them all. It doesn't matter what genre of music you are making, this library just sounds good. The presets (if you use those) just fit in a mix. The kick and snares sound beefy, the toms are tight, and the cymbals are not too crisp or obnoxious.

The raw sounds are recorded very well. You can do a jazz or folk song using those. After all, drums are not a genre thing. A well recorded set of drums can be used for anything. I like the Superior Drummer 3 core library, I have the Bob Rock one as well, but I am finding I am using this one more, and will continue to use this one over those for the foreseeable future.

Blessed Assurance!
Thank you Toontrak!

Great drums sounds.. not over processed!!

I use SD3 mostly for its instruments and try to do as much mixing and editing in my DAW as I can. With that purpose in mind, stock SD3 has some pretty bewildering choices: stereo snare bottom mics, no dedicated ride mic, limited kick drum mic options, and having more area mics than close mics just to name a few. While the samples in stock SD3 all sound very good, the decision to use some very rare mics to capture them means that even seasoned professionals may not have a reference for how these mics behave in the real world, or how much processing went into getting the sounds we hear in the program.

The prog foundry solves all of these issues. The use of a mono snare bottom mic is deeply appreciated because it frees up one more of SD's outputs to my DAW. I chose this SDX in part because of the dedicated ride mic, and its expanded kick drum mics makes a huge difference for me personally. Its inclusion of more close mics gives me a lot more flexibility to change my drum tones and make mix decisions. Finally, I personally very much appreciate that the mics that were used to record these samples are much more widely available than the mics used in the original. Because I am familiar with most of these mics, I feel like I understand why the samples sound the way they do much better.

It's not perfect, it's still limited by SD3's limited output channels, thus making you sub mix in SD3 rather than using your DAW, but it's head and shoulders above stock SD3.

I bought this for the cymbal selection and I was not let down at all. There is a cymbal for every situation. Great first expansion for new owners of Superior Drummer 3.