Drum Kit – Review

Our rating:

By: CrimsonJet LLC

Version #: 1.0

Date Released: 2008-07-16

Developer:

Price: 1.99

User Rating:

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As a professional drummer in the NY area for over 50 years, I’m always intrigued when a programmer writes drum applications to see what they come up with. Many miss the mark, some get part way there. Drum Kit is in this category.

When you boot up this app. you see a very nice top view of a very nice 6 piece Hayman/Camco/DW drum kit.

Included for you to play on are a snare, 4 tom toms, a bass drum, hihat, left crash cymbal, right ride cymbal and a splash cymbal to complete the set. There is also a double bass drum pedal attached to the bass drum with the additional pedal visible on the left of the hihat pedal.

As you touch each instrument on this set, a nicely digitally recorded sample will sound matching the sound to the instrument. To simulate the double bass drum pedal shown, you have the entire top of the bass drum with which you can play with two fingers. Another nice touch is that you will also see a "highlight" feature verifying the instrument you just played. To this point, I’m very pleased with the Drum Kit.

You can play around the set with your fingers and get a fairly representative sounding feel. Unfortunately real drums, even electronic drums, are BIG and SPREAD OUT so trying to duplicate how that feels with fingers on a 3 inch screen is a nearly insurmountable task.

My suggestion to the creators of this very nice application is to add a recording function to it. It would have to include a tempo control and (if you want to really get fancy and charge more money for the program) add a quantization (error correction) function so that the final performance could sound pretty damn good!
That way, the player amateur or professional could create a basic beat that he/she likes and then add to it with either more rhythmic figures, tom tom fills, bass drum licks or cymbal crashes! Once he/she’s happy with the performance, except for a few little "out of tempo" hits, they could hit the (quantize function) and sound like a real PRO!)

Having a few different sounding kits would also enhance the value of this program.

It would then be a lot of fun to while away hours of creative energy, yet not disturbing anyone near you at all. Just you, your Apple iPhone/Touch, those great earphones, DRUM KIT and you’re on your way to creating innovative great great sounding drum patterns

This is an excellent start to what could be a very exciting drum program! With the added features I’ve respectfully suggested they would have a "home run" for sure.

Quick Take:

For those who just like to make drums sounds for fun, this is a very nice entry into this iPhone/Touch market. For those who are serious players and want to use this as a tool to develop various interesting drum patterns, it’s lacking any recording capabilities which would preclude the serious players from considering this application.

Value: good as an entry product.
Would I Buy Again: For a serious player I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone wishing to use it to actually create patterns and fills. If it could assist the serious player with developing drum fills and patterns while sitting on a plane, train or bus I would highly recommend this program!
Learning Curve: almost none. Just hit the instruments that you see and the digital sounds will be heard. With the recording feature added I would say that you could be developing drum patterns and fills in a day or two.
Who is it for: In it’s current configuration, anyone who likes to play around with drums and make drum sounds.
What I like: The picture is very nice and the selection of the Hayman/Camco/DW drumset shows that the creator knows a bit about quality drums. All the digital samples are fine. The touch function is pretty good although the user will occasionally hit the wrong instrument (as in real life) so accuracy will be something to learn.
What I Don’t like: This program is like going to a fine restaurant, enjoying a delicious meal and then discovering that there’s no dessert!!! It has a very nice looking and sounding drumset for the customer to enjoy, BUT without the ability to create something interesting with those sounds the "meal" isn’t complete! It serves only a very limited function.

Final Statement: I always admire programmers who are striving to excite customers to buy their products. Musical applications pose a particular problem though. This device only allows a limited interaction with the user because of it’s size. That doesn’t mean that the programmer can’t make the most use of the capabilites of the Apple iPhone/Touch to accomplish his/her goal of grabbing the customer’s interest.