- It's hard to find a producer or programmer who isn't constantly on the hunt for new and innovative drum sounds, so it's no surprise that new plug-ins continue to surface to cater to these insatiable needs. The latest is Toontrack's Beatstation which combines its capabilities as a drum machine with pitched content for both bass and lead instruments too, to create a plug-in with a similar ethos to a groovebox. Rather than targeting Beatstation at a specific group of producers within a given musical genre, the plug-in is instead advertised as being "what you want it to be." So, does this make it a genuine jack of all trades or more of a master of none?
Beatstation provides content in its own new formatïBTXTand its internal library contains sounds in three categories: LowBit, Organic and Synthetix, with generous amounts of content provided in each. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised by how large a range of sounds is offered here, with the Organic drop-down menu laden with kick sounds from classic kits such as the Gretsch 1987 Maple, Ludwig 1965 Super Classic and Pearl Reference Series, and a similarly tasty collection for other kit parts too. Beyond the BTX library, Beatstation will happily import sounds in a variety of formats including WAV and mp3 and as well as single hit playback via the pads, there are built-in players for both MIDI and REX files, which can either trigger independently of the pads, or sync together to play back a full arrangement. Again, Beatstation provides internal MIDI and REX content which can be supplemented by any other files dragged and dropped from elsewhere on your system. Slices from REX files can also be dragged to individual pads, which is a useful way to chop a loop into its key components and then assign these to kick, snare and hat pads, for instance.
Drop-down folders also lie in wait to provide instant access to content from any other Toontrack instrument libraries you have installed on your system, including content in EZX and SDX formats from EZ Drummer. Lastly, you can record brand new content for Beatstation without having to rely on another host program to actually capture content for you. The standalone version of the program contains its own Sample Recorder, which you can use to record and trim sounds which can then be dragged and dropped into specific locations on any given pad.
Lead and Bass content is accessed via two playable mini virtual keyboards within Beatstation's GUI, which map to the two octaves below C1 by default for the bass and from middle C upwards for the lead. Again, a huge range of sounds are provided in both categories but one neat touch is that if you're importing samples from elsewhere, when you drag sample content onto either the bass or lead instruments, a Drop Sample box pops up to ask you what note your sample is playing so that you can quickly integrate sounds which are tuned appropriately to the others in your sample set. It's easy to audition Beatstation's full capabilities as a drum machine, file player and generator of bass and lead lines as the Play button will automatically trigger everything currently loaded, though as the standalone version doesn't contain its own sequencer, you'll need to run it as a plug-in if you want to program your own patterns for it.
Beatstation's drum pads can be added, removed or customized in appearance from square to one of three sizes of oval, while control-clicking a pad brings up the Pad Properties dialogue, which allows you to set an overall volume for any pad, fix levels for its sends to either or both of the auxiliary effects, engage solo or mute functions, set up Mute Groups and pick one dedicated insert effect for the current Pad. Beatstation really comes alive in the bottom section of the Pad Properties dialogue, however, as here you can drag and drop five sound sources to the same pad to layer up multiple sounds. Each layer features individual volume, pan and pitch settings, a checkbox to reverse individual samples within your stack and even the capacity to assign an envelope shape to each so that, in theory, you could prioritise the attack of one sound before allowing the release of another take over. Working this way soon produces wonderfully monstrous sounds which trigger back from a single pad; the system is considerably more flexible than initially meets the eye.
Effects are provided by Overloud and in addition to each pad featuring its own Insert effect, two auxiliaries and an additional master effect can be accessed by all pads, with drop-down menus for effects selection. Effects types include Bitcrushing, Chorus, Compression, Delay, Distortion, EQ, Gate, Multi Echo and Reverb. Also in the drop-down are presets for both the insert and master stages which contain bespoke presets for particular instruments in the case of the former and overall effects such as Drum Bus or dynamically maximized treatments in the case of the latter. It isn't possible to edit specific parameters within the effects you choose, as simple Amount dials are the only controls provided in this area. This becomes significant: It's also impossible to route specific pads and instruments through different outputs of your DAW, so there's no easy way to complement Beatstation's effects with your sequencer's own, without affecting every sound Beatstation produces.
Despite these limitations, Beatstation surpassed my expectations. These were lowered partly because Toontrack play up the fact that Beatstation's Skin is customizable to the designs and colours of your choice and while this is no bad thing, it doesn't affect the noises Beatstation makes and therefore seems a touch novelty. Also, I was concerned that in trying to be all things to all people, Beatstation would fall short of providing a feature set of use to serious music makers. However, aspects of the program's openness and flexibility impressed me. The internal sound sources are good but the ease of dragging and dropping files from elsewhere into Beatstation is better still, and the capacity to layer and tweak multiple sound sources to the same pad for stacked playback is the cherry on top. There are limitations here but for the price, Beatstation certainly deserves your attention. It's not as fully-fledged as other drum machines, but it goes a little further into uncharted territory than some too.
Ratings:
COST: 4/5
VERSATILITY: 4/5
SOUND: 3.5
EASE OF USE: 3.5/5