Emotive Drum & Bass for Serum 2 by The Tone Foundry beats most of its direct competition on aesthetic coherence, and that's the exact argument this review is going to make. The pack most often mentioned in the same breath is Black Octopus's Imaginate library: broader sound palette, higher preset count, but no genre focus. This one does the opposite. It's 80 presets, one lane, and it commits hard. If liquid DnB is your world, this is the more satisfying buy. If you produce across multiple bass music genres, keep reading before you hit checkout.
The pack is built for producers chasing the Hospital Records and Liquicity sound: melodic, cinematic, warm. Think Hybrid Minds rather than Noisia. It sits at $10 USD currently (intro pricing, was $49), which changes the risk calculus completely.
How It Compares Out of the Box
Pull up Imaginate by Black Octopus alongside this pack and the difference is immediate. Imaginate casts a wide net across bass music, lots of movement, some aggressive content, a broader tonal range. Emotive DnB stays narrow on purpose.
The Tone Foundry's preset breakdown is specific: 20 basses, 20 leads, 20 pads, 5 chords, 5 FX, 4 plucks, 3 arps, 3 keys. That distribution tells you exactly what this pack prioritises. Leads and pads dominate. If you need a neurofunk reese collection, look elsewhere.
We also compared it against generic Serum 2 factory content. Night and day. The factory presets are built to demonstrate the synth. These are built to finish a track in a specific genre. That's a different product entirely.
The closest competitor with genuine educational support is Kulture Samples Vol. 1, which bundles MIDI clips and project files. Emotive DnB doesn't do that. We'll come back to why that actually matters.
Performance Deep Dive
We loaded the pack into the latest Serum 2 build and started with the bass category. Twenty presets is reasonable, but once you sort through the warmth, you'll find most lean toward mid-bass sub stabs and rolling Reese textures. There are three that hit that rich sub-to-mid harmonic relationship you want around 60–180Hz, the kind that lock in under a snare without fighting the kick. The other seventeen are solid but similar in character.
The leads are where this pack earns its money. We ran a soaring lead through a bus with 6dB of gentle air shelf at 12kHz and it cut through a dense pad layer without any carving. The fundamental on most leads sits around 300–500Hz, which means they stay present on smaller speakers.
We loaded four pad presets in parallel on an intro section. Each had its own modulation timing, and none of them fought for the same frequency window. That's either good luck or good design. We think it's the latter.
The macro mapping deserves a specific mention. We grabbed the mod wheel on a pad preset called something in the atmospheric category and the filter cutoff, reverb send, and vibrato rate all moved together in a way that felt musically intentional. Not just "mapped for the sake of it." The rate of change felt composed, not automated. That's satisfying when you're playing live or recording takes in real time.
CPU load is inherited from Serum 2 itself. One instance of Serum 2 with a complex preset sits around 3–6% CPU on a modern machine. These presets are not unusually complex. No issues running 8 instances simultaneously in our test session.
Where It Wins
The aesthetic coherence is the main win. Every preset in this pack belongs to the same world. Load any two together and they don't clash tonally. That's underrated in preset libraries where half the sounds seem smuggled in from a different genre.
We love that the install is dead simple: drag and drop the .serumpack file into Serum 2, click OK, done. No third-party license manager, no iLok activation, no account. It just works.
The macro design on the evolving pads is brilliant. Movement that would take 30 minutes of modulation routing to set up by hand is pre-baked and reassignable. You're not locked in.
The bundle math is also hard to argue with. At $19 for all three DnB packs (Emotive DnB, DnB Roll Out, Late Night DnB) you get 210 presets, that's $0.09 per preset. That's a ridiculous amount of coverage for the price.
Where the Competition Wins
This is where we have to be honest. The educational gap is real and annoying.
Kulture Samples Vol. 1 includes MIDI clips and session templates. You can load the project, hear how presets are used in context, and reverse-engineer the arrangement decisions. Emotive DnB gives you nothing like that. No documentation on the macro assignments, no suggested signal chain, no context for how these presets were built. For experienced producers, not a problem. For someone still learning Serum 2's modulation architecture, it's a missed opportunity.
The bass category also feels thin. Twenty bass presets sounds like a lot until you need a clicky, distorted mid-weight bass for a drop. That's not what this pack does. It's warm, rolling bass territory. Anything more aggressive and you'll be starting from scratch or layering something else in your signal chain.
We'd also wish for a few more plucks. Four is not enough for a genre where plucky melodic lines are everywhere.
Who Should Buy Which
- ✅ Buy if you produce liquid DnB specifically and want a coherent starting palette that sounds finished fast.
- ✅ Buy if you write cinematic intros and euphoric breakdowns and need playable, macro-responsive pads and leads.
- ✅ Buy if you want the full three-pack bundle at $19, 210 presets across three aesthetic flavours of DnB is a legitimate steal.
- ❌ Skip if you produce neurofunk, techstep, or jump-up and need aggressive, heavily processed bass tones.
- ❌ Skip if you want embedded project files, MIDI clips, or educational documentation alongside your presets.
- ❌ Skip if you don't yet own or run the latest version of Serum 2, there's no backwards compatibility with original Serum.
Score Breakdown
| Category | Score | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Sound Quality | 4.5/5 | Leads and pads are genuinely excellent; bass category is competent but narrow in tone |
| Value for Money | 5.0/5 | $10 for 80 presets, $19 for 210 via bundle, hard to argue with |
| Ease of Use | 4.5/5 | Drag-and-drop install, expressive macro mapping; no documentation is the only friction |
| Features | 3.5/5 | Good preset distribution but no project files, MIDI, or sound design materials |
| CPU Efficiency | 4.0/5 | Presets are not unusually heavy; 8 simultaneous instances ran without issue |
| Overall | 4.2/5 | A focused, well-made liquid DnB pack let down only by its lack of educational extras |
Alternatives to Consider
Black Octopus Imaginate is the choice if you want broader bass music coverage. It crosses more subgenres and typically ships with a higher preset count, but you lose the tight liquid DnB focus. Best Serum 2 Preset Packs for Bass Music
Kulture Samples Vol. 1 for Serum 2 is the call if you want the educational layer this pack skips. Project files, MIDI clips, and contextual sound design notes make it the better learning tool. The sounds are good, but the aesthetic is less specific. Serum 2 Preset Packs Reviewed and Ranked
The Tone Foundry Late Night DnB for Serum 2 is actually the best pairing here. It covers the darker, more subdued atmospheric end of DnB, and together with Emotive DnB you've got a full emotional range across your sessions. Both for $19 in the bundle. Late Night DnB for Serum 2 Review
If you're newer to Serum's modulation system and want to understand how to build sounds like these from scratch, check our Serum 2 Beginner Sound Design Guide before buying any preset library. You'll get more from the macros once you know what they're controlling.
Also worth noting: The Tone Foundry has an All Serum Expansions Bundle at $59 that covers their full catalogue, and an All Expansions Bundle at $59 (was $754) if you want to go deep on their entire output. Those are separate buys and worth investigating if you like what you hear here.
At $10, Emotive Drum & Bass for Serum 2 is the easiest yes in the liquid DnB preset market right now. Buy it. If you want to go deeper, grab the three-pack at $19 and thank yourself later. Just don't buy it expecting a sound design course. It's a palette, not a classroom. If that's what you need, Kulture Samples is your lane.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Emotive Drum & Bass for Serum 2 work with the original Serum (not Serum 2)?
No. The pack uses the .serumpack format, which is native to Serum 2 only. If you're still on the original Serum, you'll need to upgrade first. The Tone Foundry is clear on this requirement: the latest version of Serum 2 is needed for the presets to load correctly.
Does the pack include drum loops, vocals, or MIDI files?
No. The audio demo on Plugin Boutique uses vocals and drum loops for context, but those are not included in the download. You're getting 80 Serum 2 synth presets only: 20 basses, 20 leads, 20 pads, 5 chords, 5 FX, 4 plucks, 3 arps, and 3 keys. No MIDI, no samples, no project files.
How does the bundle deal work, and what's included?
The Drum & Bass for Serum 2 Bundle (Exclusive) includes three separate packs: Emotive Drum & Bass, DnB Roll Out, and Late Night DnB, giving you 210 presets total. At $19 (down from $137), that's the stronger buy if you know you're committed to DnB production. Check Plugin Boutique for the current bundle pricing, as the discount period may have updated since this review.
Are the macros documented anywhere, or do you have to figure them out yourself?
There's no official macro documentation included with the pack. You'll need to open each preset in Serum 2 and explore the macro assignments manually. It's a frustrating gap for newer producers, but the assignments are generally logical: macro 1 tends to control filter movement, macro 2 typically handles modulation depth. Experienced Serum users will dial things in quickly.