Re: Anyone use BFD for drums?
Is it BFD 1 Lite or BFD 2 Lite?
BFD 2 is much easier to use than BFD 1. I found BFD 1 to be a bit more like a sequencer/geek machine than geetarist-friendly, but BFD 2 has a more simple layout (to me, anyway).
The sound quality of the samples is very high. Read all about them at FXPansion.com - what mics they used, what drums they used, etc etc.
Lots of tweakability IMO for each kit piece's tone within the program itself. As well, BFD 2 can use BFD 1's data/audio files, so if you upgrade to 2, you can keep all the stuff from 1. I did like some of the patterns in 1 more than 2, but 2 does have a slightly larger variety.
The only things I really don't like about BFD:
1: the emphasis on "vintage, you-can't-afford-this" gear. I don't care if it was Keith Moon's kick or Ginger Baker's high tom or Lars' piccolo snare or Buddy Rich's sticks. Really, I don't. I'm not a drummer. Having realistic samples of someone else's gear is inconsequential to me as a guitarist. Drums made today are just as good if not better than they were 50 years ago. They're also less expensive and thus that savings can be passed down to me.
2: the preset patterns sound a bit cliche` and lifeless. I got a million songs out of the patterns in my old Alesis SR-16. Change the tempo and it's a new song entirely; a whole new groove. Change the tempo in BFD's patterns and it's the same song, only slower. I don't know who they got to record them, but frankly I think most of what he played was not his style. Granted this was intended more for the Edumacated Studio Professional than some shlep with more money than brains....
3: while I'm sure the blastbeat death metal patterns are correct for the genre, they still suck, and there's just waaaaay too many variations of them. But that's a personal preference (as much as scientific fact that blastbeats are akin to unleashing a room full of crackhead chimps after too much 5-hour energy on a defenseless drum kit can be considered personal preference).
On the other hand, I did not like the demo version of DKFH Superior because I could hear hardware rattle in fast double-kick sections. I recorded a 13-piece kit with a basic set of mics into a 2-track cassette deck through an off-the-shelf Peavey mixer in some guy's house and got zero hardware rattle, even on the fastest/loudest double-kick speed metal passages, and they can't manage that in a studio with a pro drummer and pro gear? I didn't even get the guy's hyper-active screeching kids on tape, and was not using a noise gate.
That's what led me to BFD in the first place. Their sample demos were quiet and clear.
