collaboration/beats

I have a x1-driven home studio that I have been running about 2-1/2 years. In addition to session drummer and other stuff in X1, I have a Korg padkontrol, BFD 2, Propellerhead Record with Kong, and a bunch of samples and midi drum loops. In other words, all the equipment I need to create excellent drum parts. And I keep keep keep wanting to be a good boy and create really good beats for my songs. And for one or two of my songs, I have put in the work and created drum parts I'm happy with. But it's always W-O-R-K and the rest of my music is play. The upshot is that I am continuously bogged down in the production process by creating beats. And some of my best work has nothing for drums but some looped groove that goes the whole length and cuts off at the end. Has anybody worked in a collaboration where one person creates the beats for somebody else? Because I would just dearly love to find somebody to do this WORK for me. Any tips on where and how I might find a compatible partner online? I feel I'm starting to create some decent stuff and if I could just somehow free myself from the WORK I could be pretty productive. Just to be clear, I am definitely not offering to pay anybody. But of course I'll be fair with credit, for whatever that's worth.

Thanks. While I had collaboration in mind, some easy-to-use software would maybe be even better. Still interested in collaboration tips, tho.

Guitarhacker, you are doing my right. My current plan is to comply with all your suggestions.

Part of the WORK may be in your methodology. There is definitely a HARD way to do drums (several, actually).

There's nothin wrong with loopin grooves, as long as they FIT the tune. When you think about it, most drum tracks in tunes are several sections of the same beat strung together, with the occasional fills/riffs/turnarounds, interspersed with modified beats in other sections of the tune. Loops are great as a basic starter for a midi line, I use em all the time. Once the meat of the tune is laid down (I almost always concentrate on drums last), its easy to go back and modify things where they need to be modified.....need a crash at the end of this measure, a nice roll into the chorus, whatever. Modifying a long series of cleverly constructed midi drum loops is much easier than mousin a whole drum track, and you can still achieve good results if your kit is sounding the way it should. You can even break up the midi notes (via cal file, template, whatever) and tweek the drums separately (highly recommended). As with any other aspect of recording/songwriting, it gets easier with practice.

So, I wouldn't get toooo far from the idea of makin yer own drum tracks. Once ya get a grip on it, it can be quite satisfying.

[NOTE: for some reason, this forum isn't excepting any formatting from me, including returns, so my apologies for this block of text.] I think it's a mental block. I definitely have the quality sounds at my disposal, and some idea about how to use them in a song. And I don't have any trouble finding a basic loop that gives me the sound I want as the foundation for whatever I'm working on. But when it comes time to create the fills and bridges and tweak the verses for variation--I don't know. It's not that it seems impossible at all. I just always find myself wanting to watch a movie or go for a walk or play a computer game or take a nap or stick hot needles in my eyes or something. Even though I fully understand the importance of the beat: I do a lot of different kinds of music, but it's all rhythmic. Hoping Jamstix might do it for me: it looks really cool. Also I have signed up at musicianscollaboration.com, and will probably be putting a couple of songs up here as well, soon.

Very happy with jamstix so far.  It's basically a drummer simulation, and almost like playing a computer game, which makes it my cup of tea.  I can come up with drum parts that sound pretty decent, are not monotonous, are not terribly hard to create, and do not make my brain hurt.

One note: I had a helluva time getting the "Song Builder" going, because you're supposed to type a bunch of letters into a box to designate your song structure.  Whenever I typed in the box, though, nothing appeared, and instead Sonar interpreted the keystrokes as a command!  Turns out there is a "Pass Keystrokes to Plug-In" icon on the upper right of the Jamstix GUI.  (Not quite sure what the point of this icon is, other than to make Jamstix unusuable if you don't pres it. . . .)