Loopmasters launch Niche Audio label

Niche Audio is the label for producers looking for top flight mix ingredients and perfectly processed Maschine and Ableton Live expansion packs in contemporary styles and genres, mixed and engineered with precision, allowing you total flexibility and inspiration to take your music to the next level! Focusing on one shot drums, bass, music and fx packs – Niche Audio delivers custom built kits within each native software instrument, including project files, patterns and the one shot samples themselves to give you perfect flexibility and inspiration every time.

Our royalty free samples have been carefully selected for maximum authenticity and we use only the very best  studio equipment and seasoned producers and audio engineers for our projects.

Deep Tone

Niche Audio  present “Deep Tone” –  a fresh and exciting  collection of 15 perfectly engineered authentic Deep House kits inspired by the classic and current Deep House scene.

Deep Tone has plenty of Fat Kicks, Crisp Snares, Cool Chords, Glitched Vocals, Sub Tones, and Smooth Pads within its 13 perfectly mixed Kits, and also includes 1 Special FX kit, and an additional Synth Kit. Each Kit has been created from scratch in both Maschine and Ableton Live formats to maximize the use of onboard effects, compression and usability, creating some of the most flexible and inspiring expansions for these DAW¹s yet to be heard. Expect to find 13 Kits with 16 samples in each, including Cool processed Drums, Omni  Percussion, Smooth  Pads and Chords, Subsonic Basses, Glitched Vocals and Special  FX, combining to create a unique and involving sound palette which inspires and excites.

Also included are 2 additional special kits which feature exquisite Synth Tones and Special Fx samples for additional sample layering. Project files are included with patterns for each kit demonstrating the balance and combination of sounds that can be achieved, and to act as a starting point for your productions. Each Kit features subtle mix and fx customization to maximize its playability whilst maintaining its balance in the mix and will work perfectly with other external ingredients to create a fantastic track.

Inspiration for Naked Techno includes artists such as Dusky,  Groove Armada, Joris Voorn, Detroit Swindle, Hot Since 82, and the Classic Deep House artists from the 1990s. 

Naked Techno

Niche reveal  “Naked Techno” –  an authentic collection of 15 professionally engineered, mixed and produced Techno kits inspired by three decades of the best melodic Detroit and European Techno.   

Each Kit has been created from scratch in both Maschine and Ableton Live formats to maximize the use of onboard effects, compression and usability, creating some of the most flexible and inspiring expansions for these DAW¹s yet to be heard. Expect to find 13 Kits with 16 samples in each, including Cool processed Drums, Angular Percussion, Dark and Atmospheric Pads and Chords, Subsonic Basses and Ethereal FX, combining to create a unique and involving sound palette which inspires and excites. Also included are 2 additional special kits which feature exquisite Bass and Special Fx samples for additional sample layering.

Project files are included with patterns for each kit demonstrating the balance and combination of sounds that can be achieved, and to act as a starting point for your productions.

Each Kit features subtle mix and fx customization to maximize its playability whilst maintaining its balance in the mix and will work perfectly with other external ingredients to create a fantastic track. 

Inspiration for Naked Techno includes artists and labels such as Jeff Mills, Juan Atkins, Derrick May, Larry Heard,  Trentemoller, Adam Beyer and Carl Craig, R+S, Redplanet, UR, Bellboy, Music Man, Soma, Aquatrax etc.

Beat Machines TR909

Niche Audio are proud to present “Beat Machines TR909” – the only 909 sample collection you will ever need, which has been lovingly processed using boutique studio equipment to create 14 individual and unique versions of this classic instrument, from Pure signal paths and some  more abused versions!

The TR-909 is the standard House and Techno beatbox. Sounds include kick, snare, hand clap, open and closed hi hats, low mid and hi toms, rim shot, ride and crash cymbals. It has a unique and very loveable analog sound that’s all its own! More popular than ever before, the Roland Tr909 is used by artists including 808 State, Air,  Future Sound of London, Moby, Fatboy Slim, Orbital, Hardfloor, Überzone, Underworld, The Prodigy, Faithless, ATB,  Richie Hawtin, A Guy Called Gerald, Astral Projection, Josh Wink, Freddy Fresh, Jean-Michel Jarre, Luke Vibert, the Chemical Brothers, and many more! Each kit has been mixed and mastered for perfect balance and usability within Ableton Live and native Instruments Maschine, and is also compatible with Maschine Studio.  Example patterns are provided for instant feeback and inspiration,.

There are a number of TR909 sample packs available, so why another one?..

Aside from tape smeared 909 samples the others are generally unprocessed 909 samples. Here at Niche we have a lot of expensive studio equipment  at our disposal and thought it time to create a pack using all that equipment,  and pass on the sound to users  who don’t  necessarily have access to such high end hardware. 

The brief was simple. Use the high end gear available to us and process the hell out of that 909!  What we have here is 14 processed TR909 kits and one ‘Pure Kit’ straight DI to convertor with nothing added. We decided not to go crazy with outboard processors and destroy the essence of the 909 sound. You can of course go to town with your own plugins and create your own monster 909 kit. The pure kit is a good place to start for that.

Every TR909  drum hit was separately processed using a bunch of high end gear including an SSL AWS 900 Console, Original UA1176’s, API2500, Summit Audio TLA 100A, Distressors, Moog Filters and much more.  All recording and processing was done at 24/96khz and only the best sample rate convertors available were used for down sampling.

Below we explain the kits that you will find in Niche Audio¹s Beat Machines TR909 sample pack.

Zeds Dead – Medium saturated kit with various sounds processed through a Mooger Fooger, Summit Audio TLA-50 Tube Leveling Amplifier, ZEDR 16 EQ,  Styromon Blue Sky Reverb, and a Moog Voyager Filter section.

Drum The Beat – Medium driven kit processed through a Mooger Fooger, Sequential Circuits Pro One filter, Summit Audio TLA-50 Leveling Tube Amplifier, ZEDR16 EQ, Strymon Blue Sky Reverb and El Capistan Delay, and an Oto Machines Biscuit.

Tape Driven – Well, not quite. We recorded a kit using a Revox B77 quarter inch tape machine but we scrapped it in favour of the much better sounding UHE Satin plugin which seems to have been made for the 909!.  Some drums were driven hard, others moderately.  Some of the drum sounds also received additional processing via high quality EQ plugins as well as a Focurite ISA 430  

Drum Step – A simple but punchy 909 kit suitable for many genres including Drum N Bass and Dub Step, House and Techno. Processing on some of the sounds includes a Summit Audio TLA-100A, and the EQ section of a  Mind Print Dual Channel. 

Classic One – Very subtle processing on all drum sounds via an API 2500 compressor just to add a little depth. A set of the hats and one of the claps were processed via an Avalaon U5 DI box.  Almost a pure untreated 909 kit.

Solid State – Kit EQ’ed through an SSL AWS 900. Clap 2 was completely squashed by the onboard compressor to add a different flavour one of the claps. A simple but effective 909 kit suitable for almost any genre of dance music. 

State Solid – A Variation of Solid State. Again the entire kit was processed and EQ’ed through an SSL AWS 900s. 

XOXO – We don’t discriminate against equipment, its all about vibe!.  Inexpensive gear was the staple of the majority of  dance music producers during the 90’s. Of course the TR909 was popular but so was equipment like Macke mixers. 

This kit  re-creates the 90’s TR909 and Mackie VLZ Pro mixer sound popular with dance producers during the 90’s. All drum were processed via the mixers EQ. The Kik, Snare, and Toms were driven hard to achieve the gritty overloaded sound. We also added a touch of reverb on some of the drum sounds via an Ensoniq DP4. Basic gear, but many thousands of dance records were produced with this combination of equipment during the 90s.

Generation X – Classic 90’s grungy driven kit.  Ideal starting point for any Deep House, Detroit Techno, House, and Tech House Producers. For this one we set up an Avalon U5 DI, TLA 100A, and a Mooger Fooger LPF.  An Oto Biscuit was also used to create variations for the Clap, Hats, and Cymbals. No EQ processing was used on this kit.

Generation Y – This one uses the exact same signal path and hardware as Generation X but all settings including those on the 909 were adjusted.

Pure – Simply pure untreated 909. All sounds DI’ed through an Avalon U5 in passive mode then straight to the convertor. If you need a high quality untreated 909 kit this one is very good place to start.

Face Off – An in your face, tough 909 kit heavily processed through an array of equipment including the SSL AWS900 channel EQs and Buss Compressor,  Original UA 1176 Compressor(s), DBX 165 Compressor(s), Distressor(s) and focusrite EQ.

Face On – A much tamer version of Face Off  using the exact same hardware. All console, hardware and 909 settings were adjusted. 

Vegas – Even though we have lots of outboard stuff we love plugins to. for this kit we recorded the TR909 straight through the Avalon and in to the convertor. Then we transferred the sounds to Xfer Nerve drum machine to use some of direct wav manipulating and filter features. Then we piled a heap of hi quality EQ and compression plugs fro create a kit which has a Deep House,  2 Step feel