Free Roland Drum Machine VST/AU Bundle

Bedroom Producers Blog has released a freeware VST/AU plugin bundle, BPB Cassette Drums, featuring three VST/AU plugins, based on the sounds of Roland’s TR-808, TR-606 and TR-909 drum machines.

Here’s what they have to say about it:

BPB Cassette Drums, a freeware drum machine VST/AU plugin bundle based on our popular Cassette 606, Cassette 808 and Cassette 909 drum sample packs.

BPB Cassette Drums is a freeware VST and AU plugin bundle consisting of three individual plugins: Cassette 606 VST, Cassette 808 VST and Cassette 909 VST. The included plugins are compatible with any PC and Mac based digital audio workstation capable of hosting VST or AU plugins. Both 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems are supported.

Each plugin contains a set of three drum kits: Clean, Warm and Hot. The Clean kits are based on the raw, unprocessed recordings of Roland TR series drum machines, whereas the Warm and Hot kits feature the saturated drum hits that were re-sampled from an audio cassette deck, adding a layer of noise and warmth to the original sounds.

The plugins are available as a free download from the BPB site.

8 thoughts on “Free Roland Drum Machine VST/AU Bundle

  1. I was really needy of another 808/909 sample pack. I believe this one is THE ONE! I just have to compare it with all the other 594534 packs with the same samples.

    Do we really need more 808/909 sample packs? Come on…. At least sample other Roland machine drums or Boss DRs.

    Free or paid, doesn’t matter, if you’re always doing the same thing as others, you won’t bring anything new to the world. Doesn’t add value to your brand. At least bring something new.

    Nonetheless, regards for the ‘gift’.

  2. Just because something is ‘free’ doesn’t mean you can’t complain about it or demand something better. Demanding little of everything and others is the traditional posture of the mediocre. We have always to demand more and better, even if is a ‘free’ thing.

  3. And indeed I have an immediate criticism: no tuning controls. If it isn’t possible to at LEAST tune the kicks (but hey how about toms as well?) then this omission makes these VSTs rather less useful.

    1. These do seem like works-in-progress, as if BPB is hoping to gauge interest with a half-baked free version. Besides the lack of tuning some of the keys trigger surprisingly different sounds at different velocities, and the mapping is near general MIDI but weirdly different in some ways. As is the price is fair, but it’d be nice to see a properly finished version with tuning and panning controls, and dedicated channels for each sound (or some assignable channels).

  4. I reckon we can now Fully expect the obligatory / sarcastic / predictable complaints when it comes to Classic Machines DNA being further distributed.

    1: Thank You to the folks who put this free project together.

    2: Not everything is for everyone: if you don’t need or want these sounds others don’t need or want to know about it.

    3: These sounds survive time for a reason: beyond retro-fetishism a lot of people just dig ’em.

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