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.
