Tips please- How do I get drums to sound more a part of a loop?

3ternal

3ternal

New member
I know sidechaining helps, is the rest just down to reverb?

There has to be more to it then that.
 
No matter what if I'm sampling a small part, or looping, I always chop the sample, ALWAYS. When you chop by beat you can lay it down beat by beat by beat etc, so that the kicks and snares all fit on top of the loop properly. If you're just tossing the sample in and trying to lay drums over it, it wont work. Back before they had samplers and quantization, they did everything by ear, so the samples usually a little off. Just chop by the beat and that should help tons. hope this helps
 
Could you please explain more?

I'm still relatively new to the whole process of sampling.

If you chop the sample regardless, does that not give the beat a staccato sound?

Also what do you mean chopping a loop?

You don't chop a loop, other than obviously chopping it from it's source.
 
First of all, a beat is the sound of the tempo basically, for instance kick, snare. kick, snare. etc. (not all songs are sequenced that way, but hey.)
It shouldn't give it that staccato sound if the tempo is set high enough for the chops all to just blend nicely.
A loop I'm guessing, would be a certain part of a song that's not chopped up sounding but just looped, it keeps the same certain melody/groove as you heard on the record repeating. And if you don't chop up the loop to play smoothly for a quantized (look up the definition if you don't know) playback, your drums wont sit properly on the loop. Some samples drums/beat (not all samples have drums but do have a beat/tempo) have alot of swing, others are just really off for whatever reason. So when you chop the loop by the beat, then play your chops back as a loop, it sounds nice and on tempo and your able to put your drums on a lot easier. You can even add swing and shit properly that way. I don't know how to get more in depth about it unless I was able to show you in person, if you don't get this your best bet would be to watch vids on youtube explaining it visually
 
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I tend to chop sounds from loops rather than on the down beat its fairly easy to get the samples on the beat that way too.
 
I understand quantize and swing, LOL I'm not exactly a noob.

I'm just starting to mess with sampling though.

I should have clarified in my original post, I was referring to a loop with drums on it.

But I wanted to put my own drums over the loop.

My problem isn't matching the groove of the loop.

My problem is the drums I'm trying to add over the loop just don't sound right.

It sounds like two different things, the loop and then my drums (which it is), but I don't want it to.

I'll see though I'm thinking about maybe messing with the EQ a little bit.
 
high pass filtering helps a lot. As does eq on the drums you want to use. mix the beat like anything else just make sure your drums stand out on top and that your timing is razor sharp.
 
a.paulished said:
LOL...........
use your frikken ear, and pick different drums.
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SMH, I don't think you're getting what I'm saying.

I'm not talking about the style of the drums.

I'm saying the sample, and the drums, sound like from two different sources.

One sounds like a sample of a drum, the other from a record that was recorded in studio XYZ.
 
3ternal said:
SMH, I don't think you're getting what I'm saying.

I'm not talking about the style of the drums.

I'm saying the sample, and the drums, sound like from two different sources.

One sounds like a sample of a drum, the other from a record that was recorded in studio XYZ.
Click to expand...


Then do what he said and get sounds that blend with the sample better!
 
I think what you meant is that.. once you add your own drum sounds over a section of the sample source you looped, your foreign drum sounds don't blend in well with the drums of the sample? I had an issue with this starting with sampling.. Basically what I do to fix this issue is to look at two things.. The groove/swing (I know u already said u know what it is) and the EQ and dynamics of the drums ion the sample..

If you have an mpc.. Record ur drums live (hats kicks snares) all in one without quantize.. Jus swing with the original record.. I then eq and compress the drums.. Let it dive into a lo-fi state so it dynamically blends with the sample as if it was part of the original record.. That's what I do regarding this issue.. That's if if that is even ur problem.. But if it ain't.. Well just thought I would put in something! Peace!
 
Rather than recording without quantize as many cannot groove the way some of these records do would be to chop the sample on the downbeat like A Polished already mentioned and play back the chops to the metronome and then play drums on top of that all quantized. It makes more sense
 
Lol, I think he just needs to find new drum sounds. Most I ever have to do is eq a tiny bit, then always compress them (usually through the multiband compressor, gives them that nice big feel)
 
Look into re-amping

I've actually used my studio monitors to play a source and then record them back. It makes the drums sound more lively. In actuality, the drums on a record are not necessarily recorded in the same room or mixed in the same way or even recorded at the same time as the rest of the instruments. They may have even been edited themselves (tape edits.)

In terms of chopping and looping I'm not really sure theres a difference.

I spent most of a day chopping up a very complex drum break and putting it back together at the same tempo. Of course it didn't work, but parts of it did, the parts I got right. What was good about having those tiny chops is that some of them could be used and work quite well to make my own pattern. Obviously, I was taking things like 4 chops of one cymbal so some of the samples didn't make sense on their own.

Get a good source signal, good converters, nice effects if you're going to chop - chop well and try re-amping or convolution reverb.
 
a.paulished said:
Lol, I think he just needs to find new drum sounds. Most I ever have to do is eq a tiny bit, then always compress them (usually through the multiband compressor, gives them that nice big feel)
Click to expand...
Probably does need to find new drums but I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt
 
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