Looking for tips on unquantizing hip-hop drums

Appreciate the advice band coach. Last question, a little different from what we've been talking about but still related to the main question of this thread, about non quantizing drums. Should my drums that essentially start on the 1 or right when the sample plays and everything else starts in a pattern or loop hit directly on the one time? Basically like on maschine there's a metronome countdown before u begin putting in my drums. I was wondering if my kick that starts as as soon as the countdown is over and I can record should hit directly on that first note or for more realistic drumming should I be playing it slightly off from the 1? I'm doing sample based hip hop so I want my drums loose and groovy feeling u know
 
whether it is on the downbeat of each bar is down to you - some folks insist on nailing one and leaving the rest loose others insist on everything being loose
 
You gotta be careful too sometimes you'll stair at a screen and see certain drum hits on the grid lined up perfectly and your eyes not your ears say it doesn't sound good
 
There are plenty of ways to humanize quanitized drum patterns.

The first issue that usually makes drum patterns sound robotic is simply not trying to be creative. If you have a drum pattern that goes kick-snare-kick-snare on every count and a 1/8 HH pattern then your pattern will obviously sound robotic. Try reading up on boom bap. Even if it necessarily your style at least you will have somewhere to work on.

Secondly, playing with fixed velocity is tricky. You wont want to play your drums at 127 velocity because it's just ridiculously loud. I tend to play each different drum hit (ex: the snares first, hihats, then kick) at different velocities and then edit them a little bit.

And Lastly, it depends on your drum samples. If you're using poor sounding samples then it will reflect ultimately on how it sounds.


These are just some guidelines. Everything comes with time and practice.
 
Your drums will sound more live if you don't quantize. I make some quantized and some unquantized beats and most people prefer the un-quantized beats.
I simply just play over a metronome and tidy up manually afterwards.
Snares should be slightly earlier than the actual metronome tick, with slightly delays hats to give that swing feeling.
The base line should have even more of a delay.
 
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