The Infinity Kit Vol 2 is the topic of discussion today. As mentioned in the release announcement back in September of 2012 the Infinity Kit Vol 2 “contains 48 snares, 48 kick, 48 hats and 48 claps, and also contains 8 ready-made layered programs providing an additional 512 layered drums. Additionally, all the drums from ‘Infinity Kit Volume 1’ are fully compatible with this new volume, giving a total of 384 drum sounds all 100% guaranteed to layer perfectly together.”

One of the things that is well known about layering, especially in certain models of the MPC line, is that phasing becomes your worst enemy at some point. Phasing is indeed something that you do not want to happen in your beat making process. So what is phasing? Simply put by my man Andy Avgousti, in his article “Drum Layering On the Akai MPC 5000“, phasing involves “frequency clashes, nasty artifacts and gain boosts.” Well, let me say that whatever Andy did when designing and engineering this mystery set of drums and programs it worked. It worked and it works well.

I started out by auditioning various sounds from the kit. I was pleased with the varied textures of kicks, snares, claps and hats. They range from gritty and rough to nice and clean. One of the keys to layering is having choosing layers that add different characteristics to the overall sound or sample that you are creating. For instance, if you are a creating a fresh snare you may want to have a heavy snare as the base for the sound then you may want to add a clap with a bit of a tail for air and crispiness. Similarly you may want to make a dope kick so you may want to have a kick with a nice smacky attack that may not have a huge low end but it maybe the perfect mid range acoustic sound that would be perfect for layering with a subby kick. The variety in sound included in this kit gives you every bit of those options.

In use, the Infinity Kit Vol 2 was pretty easy to navigate. As mentioned before there a 48 snares, 48 kick, 48 hats, 48 claps, and 8 ready-made layered programs. The programs are perfect leap pads for you to get started with layering as it already has one item layered on the pads. You can easily edit the program and start stacking and layering on each pad until your heart is content.

As I ran through the sounds I quickly spotted sounds I liked and added them to layer one. Then I circled back and added layer two. To tell the truth some of layer two sounds were chosen at random because there was so much to choose from and I wanted to get started making beats. I even circled around again for a third layer on some sounds. To my surprise every layer played nicely together. I know… very technical terms here. But thats the first thing that I thought when I played through the pads with all layers nicely meshed with each of the characteristic sounds blending to make a totally new sound. Nothing seemed to clash. It also didnt seem to just get louder so much as it blended the flavors of each layer together. Than snare on top of that other snare on top of that clap came together as if it was engineered to do so. Well what do you know? Each sound was actually engineered to do just that.

I see why this kit is named the infinity kit. There are infinite possibilities and combinations. Not to mention, volume 2 is compatible with volume one which doubles the possibilities. The automagical engineering process used to create this kit is leagues ahead of most kits simply because it takes real knowledge and skill in sound design to do similar kits on your own. I don’t know about you but when i am ready to make beats I don’t want to have to have the distraction of being a master engineering guru too. Let’s face it not many of us can be a jack of all trades this way. That’s why I have to say that the Infinity Kit Vol 2 (and vol 1 too for that matter) is the answer. If I had a youngster that was interested in beatmaking and had just gotten his first MPC I’d get him this kit knowing that he’d be good to go for a long period of time due to the infinite possibilities in combinations, obvious pun intended.

 

Technical Specifications

  • Samples: 192 drum and percussion – 48 snares, 48 hats, 48 kicks, 48 claps & snaps
  • Format: WAV versions of all sounds (16 bit) + PGMs for loading into MPC1000/2500/5000/500, Akai OS & all JJOS
  • Compatibility: MPC1000, MPC2500, MPC500, MPC4000, MPC5000, MPC Renaissance, JJOS
  • License: Royalty Free
  • Download Size: 7MB
  • Delivery: Download instantly after purchase    
  • Price: $19.99
No more articles