Minimal Instruments has announced the release of Kick-n-Snare, a freeware sample-based drum virtual instrument in VST and AU plugin formats for PC and Mac.
Kick-n-Snare is a plugin that stays true to Minimal Instruments’ name by being, well, very minimal indeed. A sample-based tool made with Maize Sampler, this simple drum rompler offers seven octaves worth of electronic kick drum and snare sounds. The samples can’t be substituted with external sounds. Each included drum sound is assigned to a different note so that you can quickly access different samples without having to drive through menus.
See also: Free Drum Machine VST/AU Plugin By 99Sounds!The samples can be pitched up or down using the provided pitch control, although this results in clearly audible artifacts which degrade the sound considerably. The plugin also features a multi-mode filter (high-pass and low-pass) and a built-in reverb effect. As for the envelope, the impact can be softened with the attack control parameter, but the knob is very badly calibrated (a drawback shared across all instruments made with Maize Sampler). One tiny push to the right and the sample will become almost completely inaudible.
As for the quality of the included samples, it is fine but nothing more than that. The provided kicks and snares will work best in an EDM track, yet they’re certainly nowhere near being top notch for this purpose. One thing worth noting is that the majority of the snares are rather quiet, probably because they’re meant for layering on top of a kick in your typical four on the floor beat. It is not possible to control the volume of the different samples separately apart from playing them at a different velocity.
In conclusion, Kick-n-Snare is a virtual instrument you’ll probably want to skip and stick to using your favorite drum samples instead. If you still want to give it a shot, keep in mind that the download process is quite bizarre. It seems that Minimal Instruments is using a ticket sales platform for managing their downloads which, although admittedly inventive, can be confusing for the user. After signing up for your free Minimal Instruments user account and completing the checkout process, you will receive an “even ticket” which doesn’t really serve any purpose. However, the download link will be delivered to the email address provided when signing up. A flawed process and unnecessarily perplexing.
Kick-n-Snare is available for free download via Minimal Instruments (9.46 MB download size, ZIP archive, 32-bit & 64-bit VST/AU plugin format for Windows & MacOS).
