Which EZ Drummer expansions would you recommend for Death Metal?

[GalacticDeath]

I mainly play death metal and plan to buy the EZ Drummer 2 bundle that let's you choose 2 expansions. The Death Metal EZX seems like an obvious choice, but which other expansions would you guys recommend?

Is the Dark Matter EZX good for death metal as well? I'm choosing between that one, Metal Machine EZX, and Metal! EZX. Mainly because I've heard people recommend those expansions in a few threads here, and I've also liked the demos I've heard on Youtube.

Any input or advice would be appreciated, thanks!

 

[Aewrik]

If you hold your wallet until may 3rd, they're releasing EZdrummer 3 with scalable UI. I'm sure the core libraries in there will work well with metal, too.

Edit: Your timing is almost sales tactic-perfect...

 

[GalacticDeath]

If you hold your wallet until may 3rd, they're releasing EZdrummer 3 with scalable UI. I'm sure the core libraries in there will work well with metal, too.

Edit: Your timing is almost sales tactic-perfect...

Thanks, that's actually why I'm thinking about buying it before May 3rd. They have a presale going if you buy EZ Drummer 2, you get free upgrade to 3 when it comes out.
I might end up using EZ Drummer 3 more than EZD 2, but just figured I'd add both of them to my arsenal.

I didn't know the EZD 3 walkthrough was up yet, thanks for sharing that.

 

[Aewrik]

Modern Metal and Death Metal would probably be your safest bets, but I haven't tried the Duality expansions yet. Beyond that, there's Youtube and soundcloud to listen to, in addition to the product demos... everything from toontrack is only mix ready, not ready-mixed. You always need to tweak it to fit the rest of the mix, so most of the time the song demos only give you an idea of what's possible, not what you get out of the box.

 

[AMOS]

Modern Metal and Death Metal would probably be your safest bets, but I haven't tried the Duality expansions yet. Beyond that, there's Youtube and soundcloud to listen to, in addition to the product demos... everything from toontrack is only mix ready, not ready-mixed. You always need to tweak it to fit the rest of the mix, so most of the time the song demos only give you an idea of what's possible, not what you get out of the box.

I have Duality I, some of it would be useful for Death Metal

 

[CanserDYI]

Damn dude, have no experience with the ez drummer expansions, but holy shit your latest track fuckin BANGS. If you ever wanna jam, send me a PM I'm local.

 

[Aewrik]

I have Duality I, some of it would be useful for Death Metal

Good to know! I like how it sounds in the demos.

It makes me think what library isn't good for metal, though... Many of them would work with the DI presets if you want to put in the work of mixing them from scratch.

In that case, the drummer becomes quite important. From that perspective, Norman Garshke has an important edge over the other drummers, in that he's recorded many libraries. The Legacy of Rock SDX was an amazing performance, I love all the articulations in that library. He's the drummer for EZdrummer 3, too, but I don't know if they're reusing the Hansa SDX recording, or if they had a second session there.

 

[AMOS]

Good to know! I like how it sounds in the demos.

It makes me think what library isn't good for metal, though... Many of them would work with the DI presets if you want to put in the work of mixing them from scratch.

In that case, the drummer becomes quite important. From that perspective, Norman Garshke has an important edge over the other drummers, in that he's recorded many libraries. The Legacy of Rock SDX was an amazing performance, I love all the articulations in that library. He's the drummer for EZdrummer 3, too, but I don't know if they're reusing the Hansa SDX recording, or if they had a second session there.

Progressive will work too

 

[Aewrik]

Progressive will work too

Yes, it has the Simpleboi preset
The Progressive Foundry SDX is amazing too.

https://r4t3n2z9.ssl.hwcdn.net/mp3/1_Progressive_EZX_-_Karnivool_-_Simple_Boy.mp3

I need to stop now, or I'll develop another drum sample acquisition syndrome...

 

[GalacticDeath]

Modern Metal and Death Metal would probably be your safest bets, but I haven't tried the Duality expansions yet. Beyond that, there's Youtube and soundcloud to listen to, in addition to the product demos... everything from toontrack is only mix ready, not ready-mixed. You always need to tweak it to fit the rest of the mix, so most of the time the song demos only give you an idea of what's possible, not what you get out of the box.

Yeah I was actually looking at the Modern Metal EZX as well, since I think it's one of the more recent expansions. I'll have to check that one out a bit more, I just hadn't heard as much about it. I agree that a lot of the metal expansions could probably be used for death metal with some tweaking, and most of them need more tweaking regardless to fit into a mix. I guess I'm looking for what will get me closest to a final result from the start for death metal. With drum samples I've used in the past, I've run into issues of the samples either not having enough sub frequencies, or having too much sub frequencies. Same thing with presence. Either too much of it or not enough

 

[GalacticDeath]

Damn dude, have no experience with the ez drummer expansions, but holy shit your latest track fuckin BANGS. If you ever wanna jam, send me a PM I'm local.

Thanks man, glad you dig the new track! Been a bit busy lately, but yeah I might be down to jam sometime.

 

[AMOS]

Yes, it has the Simpleboi preset
The Progressive Foundry SDX is amazing too.

https://r4t3n2z9.ssl.hwcdn.net/mp3/1_Progressive_EZX_-_Karnivool_-_Simple_Boy.mp3

I need to stop now, or I'll develop another drum sample acquisition syndrome...

I own 3, and just need one more for Blues

 

[Grindspine]

There are a bunch of sound samples on the ToonTrack website. Listen to all of them and see if one just sounds "right" to your ears.

The Death Metal ezx is amazing and one of my favorites. Drums of Destruction is a close second. I grew up on a lot of nineties death metal and 2000s metalcore, so those libraries just sound like they fit those styles well.

 

[GalacticDeath]

There are a bunch of sound samples on the ToonTrack website. Listen to all of them and see if one just sounds "right" to your ears.

The Death Metal ezx is amazing and one of my favorites. Drums of Destruction is a close second. I grew up on a lot of nineties death metal and 2000s metalcore, so those libraries just sound like they fit those styles well.

Thanks for the input. I didn't realize they had more demos and samples on the website. I originally didn't really like the sound of the samples from Drums of Destruction EZX, but the demos for it on the website sound great.

At the moment I'm thinking I might get the Death Metal and Dark Matter EZX. Then get some more expansions in the future.
The Bathyal Blue kit and the Death Valley kit in the Death Metal EZX sound amazing to my ears. I wish there was also a way to mix and match samples between different expansions, but from what I understand that's not possible within EZ Drummer. I guess that's maybe something that Superior Drummer can do.

 

[MetalheadMC]

I recently got the Modern Metal EZX and its by far the best out of the 5 different ones I have. It has the most control over all the aspects of the drum sound within the mixer including distortion, punch, plate verb, and room reverb that I haven't seen with the others.

 

[GalacticDeath]

I recently got the Modern Metal EZX and its by far the best out of the 5 different ones I have. It has the most control over all the aspects of the drum sound within the mixer including distortion, punch, plate verb, and room reverb that I haven't seen with the others.

That's pretty interesting, I didn't know there were differences in the mix section of the different expansions. But I guess it makes sense since Modern Metal EZX is more recent compared to other expansions. That one sounds pretty great. I think I'll end up getting that one sometime in the future and go with the Death Metal and Dark Matter EZX for now. Thanks

 

[Guitarmiester]

I wish there was also a way to mix and match samples between different expansions, but from what I understand that's not possible within EZ Drummer. I guess that's maybe something that Superior Drummer can do.

This is possible with Ezdrummer 2. You can swap and assign drums from every expansion you own. You can also change the pitch, volume, panning, etc. I do this often to either layer or fit the mix.

There's a little arrow next to each drum that expands a small window containing samples from all of your expansion packs.

 

[GalacticDeath]

This is possible with Ezdrummer 2. You can swap and assign drums from every expansion you own. You can also change the pitch, volume, panning, etc. I do this often to either layer or fit the mix.

There's a little arrow next to each drum that expands a small window containing samples from all of your expansion packs.

Thanks for the clarification. For some reason I thought I had read or heard that EZ Drummer 2 couldn't do that. But that's good to know since I will probably end up mixing and matching expansions.

 

[Grindspine]

Superior Drummer has all of the ambient mic samples and a lot more dry sampling. EZ Drummer is going to have more recording ready sounds. Superior Drummer is more when you want to run the drum bus through your own outboard gear along with having complete control over each sample.

I mostly use Superior Drummer 3 for the MIDI integration so I can finger drum on my Akai MPD 218. Lately I have been using more of the EZX sound libraries than the superior sample libraries just for easier arrangement.

 

[sevenfoxes]

I used the Blue Beauty kit from the Death Metal EZX in this track. I’m overall pretty happy with it. The snare and kick were the main selling points for me.