From producer to producer: Drums

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proz9c

New member
Hey FP fam what's poppin ?

I am not satisfied with my drums, and probally never will be. I'm having trouble understanding the following:

SWING/GROOVE/QUANTIZE:

I've tried it all:

Playing it by hand without quantize on
Playing with 100% quantize on
Playing with 75% quantize on
Applying various MPC-60 Grooves via Reason & Ableton on a quantized drum track (one at a time that is..)
Tried using the "Shuffle on" feature in Redrum (Reason)
Tried using double tempo (ex. 140 bpm and snare on the 9) - I've seen many do this in beatmaking videos, including "Malek The Hitmaker" ?

But I can't seem to find the "secret" to getting my drums to bounce the right way. What do YOU do to get your drums groove ? (i equalize my drums, and have GOOD drum sounds, so the sound itself is not the problem, it's the groove)

Do I really have to spend $$$ on a MPC to get that magic groove ? (which i haven't even tried, or listened to in real life)


HIHATS/PERCUSSION:

This is probally my weakest point of producing, and probally also one of the main reasons my grooves aren't satisfying enough.

I usually just play a closed hat on every 1-3-5-7-9-11-13-15 or i've tried to play around with a open and a closed hat.. even tried to play around with that popular double tempo trap hat, but it all just comes out stiff and boring.. And if I use ANY type of groove on the hats, they just sound all random.

I heard something about triplets and something about going to edit mode with a 1/32 notes setting and change something from there - but im not sure it's related to my issue and how to approach it, really.

How do you lay down your hihats ?

Share you're knowledge and you're experiences. Quit being and illuminati-wannabe-producer- despressing-all-secret-knowledge-for-own-gain type a cat That IS why we all come to the forum ?

Peace & Blessings
 
You don't need an MPC.

Part of the issue with Rap/Hip-Hop/RnB and several other genres and styles is that the sixteenth notes are played as triplet 8ths-16ths - Each quarter note beat is broken into 6 equal parts (two 16th triplets) and then the middle triplet in each set is not played:
1..&..2..&..3..&..4..&..
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
x.xx.xx.xx.xx.xx.xx.xx.x​
Also using the regroove unit in reason without having sixteenth notes in the pattern will have absolutely no effect on your patterns.

As for quantisation, if you are going to use regroove, then make it 100% as the most common approach used in regroove patches is to quantise everything before applying the regroove patch to it.
 
I haven't seen it, looks promising ! Im gonna go make a joi.. popcorn !

So far through trial and error, the best grooves i've been able to get, is when i set the tempo at normal, and then set the resolution @ redrum to 1/32 - then manually move each kick from ~ 0.1-0.4 forward, the snares 0.1-0.4 backwards and the hats 0.4-0-6
 
Learn to 'play' your drums, don't program them. That's what I think was my biggest hurdle to better sounding drums.

There are plenty of tutorials out there to learn finger drumming with keys or pads. It's hard at first, but a killer skill to have. It was easier for me to figure out on a midi-keyboard, and then transfer to a pad controller.

T

edit: By learning to bang out the drums yourself you learn about playing before and behind the beat ... your musicality can come out much more easily than moving pieces about in a sequencer.
 
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always thought this was an amazing video of a person playing drums on the keyboard





Definitely a hell of a skill to have..I'm still working on it myself.. At the moment, I can only do a basic 4/4 rhythm.. with the hi hat on every beat, the kick on the 1st and 3rd, with snare on the 2nd and 4th....i cant do double time with the hi hat while keeping that same basic pattern going.. but practice makes perfect i guess...never played drums before, so i figure if you play drums for real, it'd be easier to get the coordination down.
 
There is no "secret knowledge" just hard work. Making "popcorn" will slow your progress. I wasted years making "popcorn" and thinking that I needed to understand production/technology and wishing I had certain bits of kit (which come and go like public transport), when what I really needed to learn was music theory (drum patterns = rhythm = music theory) in a structured, methodical manner... yes, playing is better than programming of course, but life is short. Hats are the key to much urban/dance drums, Bandcoach hits the nail on the head (as usual)...
 
What i figured out so far, thanks to everyone's help and some more research + trial and error, is that velocity plays a bigger part than i thought. My hy hats and drums in general sound more alive but i still dont understand how to play triplets. Lets say i have a drum machine with 16 steps/pads. I run a 90 bpm tempo and place the snare on the 5 and 13, where would i then place the hi hats to get triplets ?
 
You would need to do one of two things

  1. Extend your steps to 24 (the number of 16th triplets in one bar and program so that
    • kick is on 1, 13 and any other spot you want
    • snare is on 7 and 19 and any other spot you want
    • and the hats are on 1,3,4,6,7,9,10,12,13,15,16,18,19,21,22,24 OR
  2. Use a groove template to swing the sixteenths for you
 
Velocity plays a major part getting a nice drum groove.

EDIT: just realized someone else said that already.. errr sorry.
 
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proz9c said:
I tried your advice Band, didnt sound really well :/

Kool Aid and Frozen Pizza (Instrumental) *Download Link* - YouTube - this beat for instance, original by Lord Finesse, i can't replicate those drums... the "bo-bo bo-BAP-boom boom-BAP" feel.. i tried with swing, velocity and what not, what am i doing wrong ???!
Click to expand...

Just realised that I got all ready to do an answer for this then didn't do it. - problem with moving house, you forget other stuff.

Anyway the tune you mention doesn't work because the beatmaker uses 32nds as his basic breakdown of the beat rather than triplet 16ths.

So the two bar phrase is something like this



1-e-+-u-2-e-+-u-3-e-+-u-4-e-+-u-|1-e-+-u-2-e-+-u-3-e-+-u-4-e-+-u-:|| beat level
x...x...x...x...x...x...x...x...|x...x...x...x...x...x...x...x...:|| Hats steady 8ths
........x...............x.......|........x...............x.......:|| Snare on 3 and 4
x..........xx.......x..x........|x...........x.......x..x........:|| Kick
00000000011111111112222222222333|00000000011111111112222222222333:||32nds
12345678901234567890123456789012|12345678901234567890123456789012:||level
​

This is what it looks like in notation (90bpm, more or less)

koolaid-drums.png


For those that are scared by that one, here it is as a half time notation - play it double time to get the same effect (180bpm more or less)

koolaid-drums-2.png


This is what either one sounds like - no fancy stuff, no velocity shift no humanisation, nothing.

[mp3]http://www.bandcoach.org/fp/audio/koolaidDrums.mp3[/mp3]

And here it is with all of the above (velocity range, humanisation)

[mp3]http://www.bandcoach.org/fp/audio/koolaidDrums2.mp3[/mp3]
 
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It depends on the music you make as to how live/mechanical you want to do the drums. Dance music can be completely mechanical (A few natural drum loops are sometimes thrown in to help it groove though). Whereas, rock needs more of a live feel. Drum fills are especially difficult to get right with quantize ideas.

Learning to play the drums on a keyboard is a good skill to have if you need to do the later - or for many genres. A combination of mechanics and live playing is what I usually do for most things.

Breaking the drum part down is usually a good idea to make the part easier. You might have a quantized kick and snare but then play the hats live.

Another idea is to merge the two ideas together by playing the part live but then using iterative quantize to nudge it only and light midi compression to do the same for velocity.

Needs a book this one...
 
I think a lot of newer producers have this notion certain things are easy, but they're not.

If you want your drums to sound a certain way find reference tracks by maybe Dr. Dre or The Neptunes or whoever, and make that from scratch.

It's as simple as that.

Whether it takes 10 minutes or 2 hours to program your hats like whoever, you're gonna learn little tricks along the way.
 
Hey !
you can have the best samples, the best groove quantization, if your notes are not at the right place in the loop, they will never catch you.
Rhythm pattern has to be "tuned" exactly like Harmony.
Think Balancing, Question-Answer, Dialogue.
Good luck.
 
what i do is quantize my drums and snares, everything but the hats, move them slightly to the right and then you get that special groove to them (just make your grid snap to 1/6 and move them over half a bar or so).. make sure to change the velocity levels on the hats. just experiment, listen to lots of madlib and dilla. You could take the lazy way and just download mpc groove templates, ableton live comes with them pre-installed. basically all they do is shift all your drum sounds slightly to the right. Another tip is to not quantize your instruments in the track, just let them be off a little bit. it sounds more natural and helps your drums stand out even more
 
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everyone seems to be very helpful, while i too am never quite satisfied with my drums, i would like to try and help you out as much as i can. I used to quantize the shit out of all of my drums, but the more and more i've been making drums, the more and more i realize how soul-less a grid made beat sounds. If you feel the need to quantize some of your drums because you cant keep rhythem very well, maybe just quantize the kick, but swing it. Then, add your snare (or play them at the same time and dont quantize... or quantize, it all depends on the tune). I like to layer another snare ontop of that snare sometimes, unquantized, so its alittle off from the original snare, kinda gives that flam touch. Then throw down some hi hats. I almost never like to quantize my hats, in order to try and get that live feel... like i'm actually playing a set (it gives it far more soul than having some processed sounding hat pattern... unless thats what your aiming for). that being said, get funky with it! maybe bus your hats or your snare, or even your whole kit through some reverb to make it sit better in the mix. Panning helps alot as well, and eq'ing. Just changing the way your different samples sit in the mix will make a ton of difference on how you hear the entire beat. I'm learning everyday, so this is in no way a definite way to do it, but i hope it helps alittle. message me if you have any questions
 
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