Music Tech Review Of S:amplify by Davide Carbone
Australian D&B maestro Davide Carbone’s first samples pack for Loopmasters Drum & Bass masterclass was released a few years back. It’s become a favourite in the MTM office for go-to drum and bass breakbeats, and now the follow-up, S:amplify, aims to repeat that success, offering a fresh collection of loops, beats and sounds.
The pack is available as a download in your choice of WAV and Rex, Apple Loops, Live Pack and Reason Refill formats. You get around 1.5GB of 24-bit audio, which breaks down into 223 loops, 371 hits and one-shots, plus 88 sampler patches for Kontakt, HALion, EXS24, NN-XT and Sfz. It’s a well thought –out collection that covers plenty of musical ground, including drum beat and percussion loops and hits, bass loops and hits, electric pianos, synths, pads, guitars, FX and even saxophone. The samples waver between heavy, distorted sounds and a lighter, more liquid D&B style. The beat loops are spread across 20 different live-sounding and heavily compressed kits, with several variations on each groove to keep things interesting. You also get a massive collection of individual hits from each kit, plus some toe-tapping percussion and shaker loops.
On the bass side , there’s a usable but not mind-blowing selection of filtered rumbles, LFO wobblers and tech stabs. Things get more interesting with the keys, synths and musical loops, though, with the inclusion of some surprisingly deep, beautiful electric paino progessions, heavy rock guitar and good, if a little cheesy, sax riffs. To round things off there are some deep evolving multi-sampled pads and a small selection of built-in FX.
This is an eclectic pack with just the right amount of repetition and variation. There are plenty of deep sounds for those writing more musical D&B, but also some meaty basses and superb breaks for heavier-sounding tracks.
