please suggest a drum machine for live shows (mogwai, sigur ros, ratatat hmmmm)

I am starting a project... I play guitar and I have a friend who plays drums but also is a dj, bass player, and plays synth. We wanted to start a 2 person band and when we play live shows we'd have a drum machine play each song.

I just mentioned those bands in the Title because so far the little we have written people say has a similar feel to those.

What would you suggest for this?

A real drummer. A laugh at bands using a machine.

then butt out.

Aaric, are you dead set on a piece of hardware? Reason is a great tool. you can then run a lappy on stage, or use an ipod or similar device to play back your accompaniment.

I'd recommend a groovebox that can do sequenced synth parts in addition to drum tracks. The Korg Electribes are pretty easy to use. I had a Yamaha RM1X for a while, it's very powerful but difficult to learn, and better suited to driving external sound sources as the onboard stuff is not stellar.

I haven't tried any of the Roland boxes but they're pretty popular. You may get more useful replies in the keys/synth/sampler forum just north of here.

Groovebox! I forgot about those things! I always played with them when going in music stores but never knew what the real purpose for them was. They could do stuff like this?

Ultimately we want to have cool drum sounds and I am sure different songs will have different sounding drums. I think we will want other noises (not like natural drums) and effects too.

I second the laptop. You can multi track any sounds you want. You can also pan the recorded music out to the PA and have a click in your ear at the same time if needed. You will not be limited to drums but you can record and then play along with anything you want to.

Audacity is free, as well as many options for purchase.