So the time has come for me to review the three latest Toontrack releases. One of them is a fairly “standard” drum library while the other two expand into more unusual territories.

The basics

So included in these EZXs are midi files that fit the style of the EZX as well as multi-sampled drum hits. It’s easy to get started, you go into the grooves selector, pick a beat, click’n'drag it to your sequencer and you have it there in MIDI form, which you of course then can edit however you want. EZ Drummer also have a built in mixer as well as a humanize button, a velocity knob and the possibility to send the specific channels to separate channels in your DAW.

One major downer that I forgot to mention in the previews post on EZXs is that you can only install them on the system drive. Not so bad when one EZX just takes up around 1.2 GB you might think. But if you have all six of them (and consider that more will probably be released) it gets pretty bad, at least if you like me always have to struggle to keep the system drive clean enough.

On to the kits…

Nashville

I’ve been looking forward to a country styled EZX so I was happy to see it when it was finally released. However, Toontrack have been quick to note that Nashville isn’t just about country and folk, it’s also about hiphop and electronics. That might be so, and while people interested in those styles might find valuable sounds and grooves in Nashville, I’m sure that it will be mostly country and folk interested people like myself who grabs this.

First things first, the kit looks great! The styles are divided into two main categories: sticks and brushes. Makes perfect sense. Both categories features grooves for Trainbeats, 2beats, Additional shuffles as well as 3/4 and 6/8. Sticks have a couple of more categories as well, such as Straight, Ballads, Country breakbeats and Halftime. New in this kit compared to the older ones is that the grooves is now also divided under intro, verse, bridge, chorus and fill – I guess to make it easier for the unexperienced composers.

The sound is especially good for modern country, rock and pop but I would’ve liked to see (or hear) a little dirtier recordings in this kit as well. With that said, this is one of my favorite EZXs out there.

Claustrophobic

(The picture at the top of this post is the Claustrophobic kit)

I expected sort of an R&B/hiphop type kit with this one, and in a way my expectations was both right and wrong. Yes, Claustrophobic will work very well for R&B and hip hop, both when it comes to the sounds and the grooves, but there’s a whole lot more to it in my opinion. You can easily find good rhythms for rock, more upbeat jazz, funk and a whole lot more here.

The grooves are not ordered as structural as many of the other EZXs. It consists of two main categories with several subcategories each. The first category immediately sets the Claustrophobic kit apart from all the other EZXs, it’s called Extended kit grooves and the sub categories are labeled after BPM (which of course still adapts to the tempo in your DAW). These extended kit grooves are longer than most other grooves in the EZ Drummer lineup, and there are a lot of cool variations.

The second main category is Basic kit grooves. This is more of the type we’ve grown used to with EZ Drummer. The sub categories here are labeled after style, such as pocket, funk, hip hop, latin hybrid, rock, pop, rudaments (no, not a typo), swing, breaks and fills. There are a lot of sweet beats in these categories but I don’t like the way they are categorized. Well, the subcategories are OK, but the rhythms are just called “variation 1″ or “variation 2″, sort of like the older EZXs. On top of that it lacks what was useful in the older EZXs, namely that you could choose a rhythm and then choose what that variation would contain, like playing on open hats, or cymbals or whatever. It’s a shame that the same option isn’t available here.

A huge plus with this kit is that FINALLY Toontrack have taken the time to really add a set of useful presets! This is even more greatly appreciated because of the effects that are available in this kit. Oh yes, we’ve finally gotten proper effects!

Twisted Kit

Now here’s an odd one (surprise, surprise!). Or how about using a drawer, a pot or body sounds instead of drums? There are some really messy sounds in here, just look at the picture of the kit. This results in two things:

1) It’s damn hard for me to say anything about the sound other than “it’s weird as hell”. and

2) Unless you make very odd music this probably won’t be a regular in your sessions.

Number two doesn’t mean it’s bad and useless. In fact it can be quite refreshing to open the kit in a session and just go nuts with it. The Twisted kit contains a lot of strange percussion but the grooves are actually rather orthodox. There are rhythms for train songs, blues, rock and so on.

Conclusion

The latest three EZXs really show where Toontrack is heading. It’s obvious that their EZ Drummer is not just for rockers anymore. With the Claustrophobic kit they have opened the gates for hiphop and other urban styles, and with the Twisted kit they have opened the gate for people belonging in a circus. The more traditional Nashville kit is of course more aimed towards people that enjoy country, rock and pop. Again I must say that the EZXs sets EZ Drummer aside from the other drum plug-ins on the market. It’s hard to imagine a better song writing tool for drums.

Toontrack