Gear Review: NDS-1 House Music Sample Pack
Written by Youri Jozee
Wednesday, 15 June 2011 08:48
Gear - No Dough Music, the online community for creative musical minds, releases their first premium sample pack for producers . Here’s our judgment…
No Dough Music has established itself as a very valuable source for both rookie as professional producers who are looking for new ways to get their music across. Aside from getting to know the technique behind music production, one of the barriers many a producer will come across is finding the right sounds whilst not going flat broke in the process. Enter NDS-1 House Music Sample Pack, an astonishingly extensive bundle of kicks, drums, percussions, bass and synths for under GBP 40…
The full bundle includes three libraries including over 4000 drum sounds sampled through 2 classic tape machines and a crunchy MPC, 250 bass and synth loops (in WAV, ReCycle and MIDI format), and 53 multi-sampled instruments including extracts from Juno60, AlphaJuno, Jx3p and Oberheims. That’s pretty heavy indeed. 1.4 Gigabytes, or over 7000 sounds, to be exact. We tested the sample pack using Ableton Live 7, the Battery 3 drum machine plugin, and a bunch of other synths and VSTs on the side for combination purposes.
A. Drums & Percussions.
The first thing that becomes noticeable is the high quality, crisp clear sound of the drums & percussion bits. And there’s a lot to choose from here. The kick drums, hi-hats, clap, snares, fx etc. are subdivided into folders named after the drum machine they’re from, and they all sound incredibly useful and, even more importantly, professional. Within seconds and without the use of additional audio effects, one is able to create a very credible big room rhythm pattern. In fact, your reviewer has collected quite an extensive range of plug-ins, samples, and what not over the years, but this pack definitely ranks high among the best in his studio. Don’t expect any otherworldly or experimental beats and drums. What you get is a fairly big collection of some of the most used and most useful sounds in electronic music today.
B. Loops & Progressions.
The second folder is divided into three subfolders: Bass Loops, Synth Loops and MIDI Patterns. Ableton automatically adjusts these audio files into workable loops cut down to the millisecond to prevent moments of silence. The Bass Loops section offers a handful of crispy patterns ranging from electro to dubstep and from house to growling acidy material, all of which come in handy to create a filthy menacing bass background to your productions. The Synth Loops goes even beyond just that, offering some very nice stuff if you’re into more progressive or trancier stuff including REX files to use in Propellerheads ReCycle. Last up is the MIDI folder, which includes a fine array of pre-made arrangements to use with your softsynths. Impressive.
C. Synths & Bass
This section offers a variety of sampler-friendly SoundFont-coated bass, strings, synth, piano and loads for seamless integration with Kontakt4, EXS24, NNXT, and Ableton’s Sampler. Again, very easy to import, playback, and reshape.
Our verdict:
We’re impressed. NDS-1 House Music Sample Pack offers high value for money to both professional artists as rookie producers on a limited budget. This bundle offers just about anything you need to ‘get your groove on’, while also offering a wide range of very usable bass and synth sounds. And it won’t condemn you to eating cans of beans for the rest of the month too…
Overall rating: 8.6/10
Suggested retail price: GBP 39,95
Availability: Out now. Click here to purchase.
Full specs:
7045 24Bit Wavs - Recorded and edited with the highest quality equipment and packed into 3 sections covering the main areas needed by modern producers:Section A - Drums & Percussion - Single Shot Sounds & Kits
Section A - Drums & Percussions
- over 4000 samples split down to include:
Kick Drums
Claps
Snares
Hats & Cymbals
Drums & Percussion
FXEach sound has been provided with 2 ANALOGUE TAPE Variations and a classic MPC flavour right out of the box. All samples are processed through chains of high-end outboard and a classic STUDER A800 tape machine, and a STUDER REVOX machine. Each chain offering a warmth and tonal colour much sought-after today. Each section comes with a full complement of custom Kontakt4 instruments, so you can get to work tweaking and using the right tools for each sound with zero set-up time in your sampler.Sampler Patches for Logics EXS24, Reasons NNXT and Drum-kit patches for Battery are also included.
Section B - Loops & Progressions - Loops + MIDI
- over 250 loops in 3 categories:
1. Bass-line Loops
62 Groovy and rolling bass-line loops – Perfect for Disco / House / Tech-House / Techno
2. Synth Loops - 116 Inspirational synthesizer, pad, chord progression and melody loops – Characterful song starters useful for all style of music.
3. MIDI Files - where possible for each composition, we include the MIDI notation for you to use in your production. So if you find the idea you were looking for but wanted to change it slightly, or change the sound that’s no problem.
REX 2 Files - included for all loops.
Each loop is logically named, with its BPM and its Root note for ease of use.
Section C - Synth & Bass Instruments
– multi-sampled Instruments Kontakt4 / EXS24 / NNXT / SoundFont53 Multi-sampled Instruments from various analogue studio sound sources & synthesisers including:Juno60 / Alpha Juno / Jx3p / Oberhiem's, and many more hybrid & digital sound sources.Each patch has been recorded through a chain of high-end studio equipment using the best A/D Conversion and top-notch pre-amps to give you a production-ready up-front and powerful sound ready to use in your tracks. All samples are completely royalty free for those who own the product. So you can get work, concentrating on what’s important.
