Plugin Boutique offers Steinberg’s Backbone drum designer (normally €149) for free with any purchase in February 2025.
Backbone is a 64-bit-only release for macOS (VST3, AU, AAX) and Windows (VST3, AAX).
The plugin is free with any paid purchase on Plugin Boutique, but free products don’t count for the giveaway. The promo ends on March 2, 2025.
Steinberg initially dropped Backbone in May 2020. The plugin is made to design snares, kicks, percussion, risers, hits, and more.

Backbone allows you to layer up to eight samples and alter them with subtractive synthesis.
You can also decompose samples into noise and tonal elements, resynthesize sounds to manipulate them, as well as apply the eight effects with two routable buses.
In 2022, Steinberg integrated Sony’s DrumGAN drum generator AI with the release of Backbone 1.5.

DrumGAN can rapidly create snare, kick, and cymbal sounds from scratch. It can also analyze and recreate samples and create variations.
The 1.5 release also introduced 250 new presets covering various percussive instruments.
Upon release, Steinberg uploaded a nine-minute video to show off what Backbone 1.5 and DrumGAN can do.

I can see that the DrumGAN AI can indeed very quickly generate snare, kick, and cymbal samples.
There are three sliders to work with for these three types of percussion, and you can create sounds of different intensities with the slider.
Once you have a good starting point, you can tweak the numerous parameters to take it in any direction you prefer.
An interesting feature is that the three sliders interact, allowing you to quickly layer kicks, snares, and cymbals to create new sounds.
Plugin Boutique detailed the six-step process for claiming the freebie at the bottom of the announcement page for the Steinberg Backbone giveaway,
However, you should note that after accessing the freebie, you’ll also need to complete Steinberg’s license activation for Backbone, in addition to the installer download and an account sign-up and product registration. Yippee!
I think Backbone would be a handy tool to quickly create unique sounds for productions instead of using premade samples that people may have already heard on other tracks.
Additionally, if you have pre-made samples that you like, Backbone is a fast way to improve and customize them to really make them your own.
Check out the deal: Backbone (FREE with any paid purchase in February @ Plugin Boutique)
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14 Comments
xyz
onfull bucket music released paralogy,
a free crumar synth emulation
fullbucket.de/music/paralogy.html
alex
onNice! Thx!
Ho Shui
onBackbone sounds good!
but after installed it you got four programs in your computer too.
eLicenser Control Center
Activation Manager
Steinberg Library Manager
Steinberg Download Assistant
a bit too much if you use only one Steinberg product…
El°HYM
onCan you just uninstall those after the Installation went through?
Numanoid
onI wouldn’t recommend that…
El°HYM
onIf those all need to run, just to run the plugin, thats indeed a bit too bloaty.
Numanoid
onYes, too much
But beyond Backbone, I would recommend to get Halion Sonic 7, which is free, and then with two Steinberg plugs, the bloat gets easier to stomach :-D
JB
onAgree – as a full Steinberg and Cubase user this is of course fine by me. Come march 25th 2025 they will decomission the elicenser control center and you will be one program lighter as they transition to Steinberg activation instead. Just fyi
Michal Ochedowski
onFrom Steinberg’s website: The end of the eLicenser service is scheduled for May 2025.
Jay K
onYeah seems a nice gift but comes with bloat
Autopsy Turvy
onThey’re very low footprint, and they don’t launch at start up. Just delete the shortcuts that get installed and you wont even notice they’re there.
Rave Sbor
onWhat is the lowest price for any product on PB in order to get Backbone for the cheapest
Tomislav Zlatic
onThese two are both great plugins and only $10 on sale:
https://www.pluginboutique.com/product/1-Instruments/64-Virtual-Instrument/4412-Bass-Master-
https://www.pluginboutique.com/product/1-Instruments/64-Virtual-Instrument/4998-KHORDS
Rave Sbor
onThanks