Steinberg has released the latest version of Groove Agent, which adds new sounds, new kits and new tools with the Absolute 7 instrument collection.
Groove Agent 6 will add layering and replacement features for kicks, snares and toms in Acoustic Agent. It will also include 47 new acoustic kit pieces - 24 snares, 15 kicks and eight toms in various sizes and materials.
The new Punch Kit includes 24 new presets, recorded by a professional session drummer with intros, outros and multiple groove variations, each with its own mix and MIDI styles.
Colour Punch provides a selection of kicks, snares, hi-hats and percussion especially chosen to blend with synths, basslines and vocal hooks, designed for modern pop production.
A new pattern editor is also included. Each pad is assigned to its own dedicated lane, with in-built random and Euclidean step generators also included.
The Mixer panel has been redesigned to integrate into the lower section of the interface. It can alternatively be undocke d or opened in its own window. Kits and mixer settings can be edited side by side, while a unified mixer and effects editor is provided across all Agent types for straightforward fine-tuning. As well as this, the updated MediaBay now automatically filters results based on the individual workflow
The redesigned user interface is scalable from -50% to +100% and designed for single-slot usage. It makes Groove agent more adaptable to personal workflows, with larger Acoustic Agent interfaces, and improved edit section and customizable toolbars.
“With Groove Agent 6, we focused on simplicity, amazing sounds and flexibility,” said Florian Haack, senior marketing manager for instruments at Steinberg Media Technologies. “Users can now customise their acoustic kicks, snares or toms, which gives them so much more options for sound design.”
A shaper mode with brush, pen and eraser tools for drawing and refining envelope curves is also included. Groove Agent 6 also comes with five new effects: auto gain compressor, fuzz distortion, bit crusher, clipper and studio EQ 24. The pitch of drum samples can now be checked with a click and then tuned to match the key of the song, and a new spectral algorithm in Warp Mode allows drum or melodic samples to be played in sync with the project tempo or beats.
Every kit preset now includes a preview, which is automatically adjusted to the track's tempo, and Groove Agent 6 also provides hardware mapping for e-drum kits, with presets for multiple manufacturers.