In your DAW

Funk Drummer in AUM

AUM is where most iOS live rigs end up, and it is where the two Audio Units of Funk Drummer start to matter.

In AUM, the same app appears in two different lists, and only one of them tells you which version you are about to load. This page is mostly about that.

Funk Drummer loaded as an Audio Unit inside AUM on iPhone, with the host transport above the plugin — Running inside AUM on iPhone. AUM keeps the transport and the tempo at the top; everything below the title bar is Funk Drummer, here with the Drum Kit View open.

The wrinkle

Two lists, two different answers

Tap + on a MIDI channel in AUM and you are offered two ways to fill it:

Audio Unit MIDI Processor lists only plugins that declare themselves as MIDI plugins. Funk Drummer appears here exactly once, as the (MIDI) version. This is the direct route and the one you want.

Audio Unit Extension lists every Audio Unit installed, instruments included. Both versions of Funk Drummer show up here, so it is perfectly possible to load the full instrument into a MIDI slot by mistake.

Loading the full instrument there is not an error AUM will warn you about. It works. But the host gives it no audio output in that slot, so you have paid for the whole sample library, in CPU and in memory, to use it as a note generator. The (MIDI) version does the same job and loads no samples at all.

The rule is the same in any host: in a MIDI slot, pick the entry with (MIDI) in the name.

What each one is for

Lumbeat: Funk Drummer on an audio channel, when you want to hear the app's own kit. It can still send MIDI out at the same time.

Lumbeat: Funk Drummer (MIDI) on a MIDI channel, when the groove should play something else: another drum sampler, a synth, a drum machine over Bluetooth or USB. MIDI is always sent from this one, there is no switch to turn on, and the note mapping is identical to the full instrument, so the receiving device hears the notes you expect.

Everything else is the same in both: grooves, jam, intensity, swing, Live Pads, songs and fills. The mixer inside the (MIDI) version affects nothing, because there is no audio to mix.

Which note is which

Funk Drummer's Live Pads open inside AUM on iPhone, with eight named pads each showing its own jam and intensity values — The Live Pads, inside AUM. Each pad carries its own groove, jam and intensity, so one tap moves the section, and the same tap can move every other app in the rig.

The rig

One tap, and the whole band changes section

Because a pad change is both sent and understood as a MIDI message, one app can lead and the others follow. Point the leader's MIDI out at the followers' MIDI in, tap a pad on the leader, and every app switches to the pad in the same position, each playing its own saved content.

So Funk Drummer moves to its chorus pad, AfroLatin moves to its chorus pad, iBassist moves to its chorus bass line, and none of them had to know what the others hold. Inside AUM that routing is a couple of taps, and it works between plugins in the same host as well as between standalone apps.

Out of the box there is nothing to configure: every app ships sending, listening, and set to channel 10, the General MIDI drum channel. You only touch settings if you moved an app off channel 10, or if you want one that follows but does not lead.

If a host or a setlist app is doing the driving instead, bind Pads 1 to 8 to a control change: one controller number covers all eight pads and the value picks which one. AUM, Loopy Pro and setlist apps can send any value you type.

Channel 10 out of the box, nothing to configure. Try it free for 7 days

Recording

Capturing what you actually played

Recording the plugin's output in AUM captures the effects and, more to the point, captures everything you changed live while it played: the jam slider you pushed in the second chorus, the fill you fired by hand, the pad you switched to a bar early.

That is the difference between recording the drummer and exporting the rhythm. The export inside the app gives you a clean multi-track bounce of a fixed arrangement; recording in AUM gives you the take.

And if the plugin arrives after the session is already rolling, it waits: Play shows off, nothing sounds, and it joins on the next bar line once you tap Play. Meanwhile you can pick the rhythm and the kit without anyone hearing you decide.

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