Clavia Nord Drum 3P

I bought this as I was embarking on a new electronic project where usually I played exclusively acoustic drums. I had no previous experience with any electrical instruments at all.
Was a toss up between this and a Yamaha DTX-12 Multipad, I was extremely close to ordering the Yamaha but switched to the Nord last minute on a friends advice.

All I can say is my mind is blown. This is unlike any other pad out there in the sense that it is a drum synth. Each pad can be modded, each sound bent and twisted like you wouldn't think possible. You can record patterns in midi, quantize them, then play them back and drag them to within an inch of their life.

The preset kits go from somewhat standard to incredibly experimental, I spent the first few weeks coming to terms with them before even thinking of building my own, although I have found that immensely satisfying.

The "only" thing it can't due is capture an "authentic" drum sound, but if you want to play a standard rock beat to folk music you shouldn't be getting this anyway. If you are in anyway into both drums and electronic music, buy the Nord Drum 3p, buy it now! Quick!!!

I was looking for a drum machine and a drum pad to practice on. The Nord Drum ticked all the boxes for me, being a great drum machine sequenced through the nord beat app on ipad and also really fun to play on with drum sticks.

With this machine you can create all kinds of percussive and synth sounds that are really unique and the fact that those are dynamically controlled takes it to another level.

It is easy to use, although it takes some time to get used to how it works, but once you figure it out you can change parameters pretty fast. The only drawback for me is the fact that it doesn't have a hi hat controller input. It would have made it a perfect kit to practice on.

All in all, given the sounds it can produce and the way you interact with it makes it an amazing machine. The build quality is also really good and the size makes it portable.

I highly recommend the Nord Drum to everyone who wants an alternative to playing a synth with a keyboard (you can also do that with midi) and to programming drums, as you can also use it as a midi controller with a midi interface.

Love it for very interesting sound synthesis. It transforms layers of sound differently depending on hit velocity and percussion type.

Pad sensitivity is outstanding. Very dynamic sound can be achieved.
Controlling is easy and quick, sound design is pure fun.

My point on "noisy outputs" problem - it's insignificant. It's audible only when reverb is active and played solo loud. Without reverb it's super clean. (Headphone output is much more noisier than main outputs which has much lower noise floor). It's inaudible for me in the mix and reverb itself is great.

MIDI implementation is superb, no problems in communication with the DAW. Very happy with it, great instrument.

Nord Drum 3p is fantastic electronic drum pad with great variety of sounds and even greater possibility to tweak and create your own sounds - but you need to take time for that, break a particular sound down and play with it to find sounds that you really dig and want to have in one of your e-kits that you can create.

I don't need to bore you with basic information about the instrument as this info is widely available, including in the Nord Drum Youtube tutorials. But I do want to add that the playing feel and the dynamic range of the pads is also very very good. While the pads are somewhat smaller than those on the Roland or Yamaha multipads, with some practice the playing on them becomes very intuitive and effective. Plus, the freedom to create your own synthetic sounds is much greater here than on any other drum multipad available!

I normally use it with Roland KT 10 Kick Trigger pedal and together it works like magic.

Highly recommended!

Seems like Nord like to make bullet-proof industrial grade products ;-)

Small but extremely sturdy and well built. This unit looks slightly complex initially but after watching the Youtube tutorials a few times you will quickly get the hang of this and I congratulate Nord for making this product so incredibly easy to use.

The range of in-built sounds are very good but if you're not happy with this simply use this as a MIDI controller to play your own samples.

It's been a long time dream to own a drum pad to add that 'live' feel to my drum programming. I've studied the competition but glad I held back until I got the best which in my opinion this unit is. Effortlessly.

Highly recommended.

First of all, I'm not a drummer, I compose electronic music: please take my words with a pinch of salt.

After years spent programming beats, I began to feel tired and... bored! So I decided to look for a drum synth.

Unfortunately, I soon found out that the list was extremely short. It seems there's just one real modelling drum synth on the market today, and that's the Nord Drum. I'm a happy owner of a Nord Stage 2, so the news wasn't that disappointing: I decided to buy it right


So, here's what I noticed.


Pros:

As for the others 'handmade in Sweden' products by Clavia, the Nord Drum is a solid piece of gear. It's well assembled, it's small, but relatively heavy. You know from the beginning that you're not in front of a toy.

The control panel is very straightforward. The modelling process is literally written on the panel, right in front of your eyes. Also, the knobs feel great.

Although the sounds you can get from it are numberless, creating them is not time-consuming and it's easy.

The pads are pretty solid and feel very good when beaten.


Cons:

There are not samples and there can't be. Don't expect to find a selection of real drum kits (as in the Kork wavedrum): it's just a modelling drum synth. I have to say that it would be great if there were some. If you buy a Nord Stage, you're getting a synth and a huge number of sampled instruments. I think they could have done something similar and create a complete electronic drum pad.


In the end, I highly recommend this product if you're looking for a unique drum synth that allows you to create a huge selection of electronic drum kits. It's great for electronic music, but I also think it would be perfect as a companion for an acoustic kit!

I haven't been using it for a long time and I didn't get the time to really explore it, so I will update my review after a while but for now I'll just post a first impression review.

So it's a wonderful instrument and although it's really light it seems very well-built.
The pads are great but a bit loud. I haven't made a recording using it with an acoustic kit, so I don't know if the mics will pick up the noise that the pads are making yet, but unfortunately it seems like they will (if you are not a heavy hitter).
The sound quality is truly amazing, but that is something expected from Nord.
There are a lot of presets, from a variety of acoustic to a more experimental sounds, and they are all fascinating .
You can also connect a sequencer or a drum machine as a sequencer via midi and program it so that you can occupy your hands with other instruments.

The cons I personally found so far is that you can only connect a bass drum pedal and not a second pedal for hi hat, the lack of knobs and the ability to tweak with the sounds live like other synths.