Free Ableton Live Pack Inspired By Iconic Prince Drum Sounds

symplesound-purple-drumsSymplesound has released PurpleDrums – a free sample library, inspired by iconic Prince drum sounds.

Symplesound’s Francis Preve has developed a free educational Ableton Live 9.5 project, based on a re-creation of his production process. The project includes a drum rack based on sounds samples both the Linn LM-1 and LinnDrum, processed in Prince’s unique style – and 10 royalty-free MIDI loops, inspired by Prince’s approach to groove programming.

Here’s an audio preview:

PurpleDrums Features:

  • Custom Drum Rack w/integrated effects
  • Eight Macros tailored to the “Minneapolis Sound”
  • 10 royalty-free original MIDI drum loops
  • 16 Linn LM-1 and LinnDrum samples
  • Interactive manual explaining Prince’s approach to drum production
  • Compatible with Live 9.5 and higher
  • Full Push Compatibility

It’s a free download from the Symplesound site.

14 thoughts on “Free Ableton Live Pack Inspired By Iconic Prince Drum Sounds

    1. More like “inspired by” – Francis was a superfan, take a look at the about page: http://www.symplesound.com/blog/2016/4/29/purpledrums

      “So, after being thoroughly gutted by grief for the past week, I looked for a way to honor Prince’s legacy without ripping him off. I wanted to give musicians a way to learn how he created some of his most influential sounds – without infringing his notes or beats or anything else that could be copyrighted, because we ALL know how he felt about that (and as a fellow musician and business owner, piracy and theft are enemies of mine too).”

      Okay, okay, I KNOW – haters gonna hate. But maybe someone else might see this and not take the hate at face value?

  1. here is the same thing i posted on cdm about there prince offerings:

    itchy • 2 hours ago

    lame , honor the man when he is alive not after he is dead – by trying to emulate his sound.
    i understand it is not coming from a bad place but just seems way tacky
    buy his music if you want to honor him.

  2. Sorry, but complaining about something that is being given away for free, for educational purposes, and calling it a ‘rip-off’ is pretty lame.

    This sounds great and very authentic. Thanks for sharing, Francis!

  3. bash others who are inspired/influenced to create and give in his honor. awesome.

    its free, and an homage.
    no interest, but i respect prince and the creator of this pack. to “rip off” means to gain from said original work (imo), but theres no charge. dont like? dont click. better yet dont type, or post (multiple places).

    funny how free stuff generates negative response. not just in this example obviously.

    rip prince, ty to francis for the free material.

  4. Prince said he would have like to have taught , so In respect of that , thank you for the education pack , I will dance my tacky ass off as I play process , learn something new and create ….now that’s peaked my interest about the linndrum , what’s to hate ?
    Greatfully received

    1. Synthmanimus,

      This is actually a very standard license agreement. Check out any other sample library provider and you’ll find almost identical language. (Or look at your iTunes license, or iPhone OS agreement, Windows 10, etc). The license is broad because it also has to cover all of the other products we actually sell.

      Here’s the most important section to review:

      “You are entitled to use these products for the sole purpose of music creation and/or productions only.

      The audio and MIDI loops included in our products – both purchased and free – can be used for music production, royalty-free, but cannot be redistributed, reproduced, or resold in any manner without express permission from Symplesound.”

      That is, you can compose and release all the music you want with the pack, but you can’t take PurpleDrums and say “I created these tutorials and loops.”

      I would also strongly discourage using the package to exactly copy Prince’s own drum patterns and use them in your recorded tracks – though I’m certain that some artists will use the package in that manner for live cover bands and such. With all of the Prince tribute performances happening right now, that would seem to be a legitimate use for the pack.

      As for the terms and conditions for other products, here are a few links:

      The license agreement for Logic Pro:
      http://images.apple.com/legal/sla/docs/LogicPro.pdf

      The full license agreement for Prime Loops (ours is much shorter, incidentally):
      https://primeloops.com/terms-and-conditions/

      And finally, the License agreement from Ableton Live itself:
      https://www.ableton.com/en/eula/

      Really glad that (almost) everyone is enjoying this tribute, btw! I’ve already seen some amazing YouTube screen vids of artists working with the package 🙂 This was the whole point, after all: To give musicians a way to honor Prince by learning his approach to the Linn LM-1 and groove making, just as he was inspired by his own musical influences. And above all, have fun with it!

      Cheers,
      Francis

  5. Not sure on why there are people ranting here…

    simply put : you have one prince dying, lots of people mourning, some people trying to give a proper last salute to the prince through their music, and one man kind enought to give us (it’s free, people, free ! where is the ripoff ?) a few samples to play with and experiment our music based on the sound of a genius. We are given the once in a lifetime opportunity to make new songs a la prince and give him perhaps the best tribute that we can dream of, through our music. And you guys are debating whether the intent was honest or not ?

    Come one ! Wake up, open a Live session, get your raspberry beret and your cloud guitar, and rock on guys !

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