Version 5.00
The largest update the app has had. Here it is grouped by what it means for you, rather than in the order it was built.
The headline
Funk Drummer loads as an Audio Unit inside Logic Pro, GarageBand, AUM and every major iOS DAW. Tempo and transport follow the host, several instances can run at once, and what you set up is saved inside the project.
How it works in a DAWLumbeat: Funk Drummer (MIDI) generates the same grooves but loads no sounds, so it costs a fraction of the CPU and memory and plays your own instruments instead.
Picking the right oneThe full Settings panel is now available in the Audio Unit too, not only in the app.
Your pads and the play lock travel inside the DAW project, so a session reopens the way you left it.
The second big one
Funk Drummer can now send and receive grooves, Live Pad Sets and Songs with every other Lumbeat Drummer and with iBassist, standalone and as a plugin. When something arrives you choose which bank to keep it in, or create a new one named after what came in.
It also shares by file. The share button produces a real file that travels by AirDrop, Mail, Messages or Files, to another device or to another person. No Apple ID, no account, nothing to sign into: they tap the file and the app opens with it ready to play.
And the kit became a sampler
The drum kit can be played as a velocity-sensitive MIDI sound module, standalone or inside your DAW: the pattern stops generating and the kit answers to incoming notes, with the velocity choosing between ghost, accent and special hits.
Already own it? 5.00 is a free update. Get Funk Drummer
What you see
A visual overview of the whole kit, redesigned. Its animations can be switched off in Settings if you prefer it still.
A new Song Mode view, and loop settings are now remembered per song instead of globally.
The pad waiting to play fills with a bar showing exactly how long is left before the change, so you can see the moment coming instead of guessing it.
Create as many banks of your own as you like and organize your rhythms the way you actually play.
A dedicated portrait layout, rather than a scaled-down version of the tablet one.
Space plays and stops, Enter fires a fill, and the arrow keys move the tempo.
Under the hood
MIDI Setup gained a lot: octave naming you can match to your own gear, independent MIDI Clock in and out on a dedicated endpoint, tempo controllable over MIDI with a fader, a fine control or an encoder, and maps that can be exported and imported. It also gained separate Start and Stop commands, plus a fill version of each, for loopers and DAW scenes that need to say start without risking a stop. They are in the MIDI map.
On the sound side, each track now has its own reverb send, and exports can include the effects rather than only the dry mix.
And two changes you will feel rather than see: playback timing is more accurate at high tempos, and the AUv3 is more stable across third-party hosts.
Two new switches worth finding
Settings now lets you decide whether a manual fill, or a rhythm change, restarts the bars to fill count. Both were fixed behaviours before, and which one you want depends entirely on how you play live.
A rhythm picked while playing can enter on the next bar or right away, whichever suits you.
And the way you get it
Funk Drummer is now free to download with a 7-day trial, and the full version is an in-app purchase. Everything on this page is part of version 5.00, and nothing on this page is a roadmap promise.
If you already own the app, this is an update: nothing to buy again.
Download Funk Drummer free and try it for 7 days.
Free to try, 7-day trial. In-App full version.
More from Lumbeat
Funk Drummer now shares grooves, Live Pad Sets and Songs with these Lumbeat instruments.
