AI Drums - what does this mean for drum recording?

With the recent upsurge of AI technology in all areas of life, this development is of course affecting the music industry as well. In specific to drum recording, remote drum recording and finishing off music tracks with AI generated drum parts and patterns. Logic Pro X, and many other programs now have the capability to add a drum part to a song almost instantly with the click of a button.

What does this mean for recording drummers like myself? From an artist point of view this is an incredible tool, and also in ways this can be great for me as a drummer too. My personal opinion is that AI is great for making beats, but I can make them come alive! So my take on it is, use it as an initial tool to get those drum ideas down, but then if this can be given to a professional session drummer like myself I can then take these ideas and delivery a performance that makes the AI drums really come alive.

Obviously AI drum patterns are going to work, but there are many nuisances that AI cannot quite deliver, dynamic shifts, ghost notes, slight tempo pushes and pulls and that’s just from a playing aspect. Then we enter the world of the recorded sound of the drums, in a specific space and microphones used and how they interact with the air and space and placement of a room, and the way the drummer strikes and actually plays the drums, and then tuning of the drums. This area is deeply involved and has so many variables that a machine just cannot replicate, so a great drummer, playing great tuned drums in a lovely sounded space with decent microphones and processing cannot be matched.

So in conclusion AI drum making tools are incredible but I want this to be another stage or tool to work with and along side to achieve and reach an even greater and spectacular result delivering the best drum take imaginable. So any artists and bands looking to finish a track with AI drums, should consider then to bring the track to myself a professional remote session drummer to then push those AI drums to the max and make them come alive for real!