What instruments can i use to produce a old school hiphop beat?

imDCStar

New member
Hi,
I am trying to make an OLD SCHOOL kind of beat in FL. I wanna know what instruments can i use. And can an old school hiphop beat have a positive and fresh vibe to it? other than thug or gangster kind of electronic sounds?

I also heard that we only use minors in hip hop. I am currently making it on Amin and using Guitaar and horns. Is that okay?

Looking for detailed guide. Also let me know if you can share some examples.

Regards
 
A minor will be great. You can get a nice low end that's deep but still audible in that key. Instrumentation is going to change based on what you're feeling for the beat... if it's G-Funk you're going to want some synthesizers for sure...
 
you can use electric keyboards like the Rhodes piano. Lounge Lizard EP-4 is really good for this.
a lot of those old skool hiphop beats have sampled electric pianos in them. those jazzy sounds
You could use some trumpet/saxophone horns. i personally like to use Sytrus in FL Studio for this. Look at the Presets section of Winds.
You could get some soundfonts to for realistic horn sounds.

But i think sampling would be easier cause that's how most of the old beats really used to be made.
 
Last edited:
Hip hop and the style is in the drums.

Also define old school, because a West Coast Old School beat is inherently different in sound design to an East Coast hip hop beat. Ones a derivative of Funk, ones a derivative of Jazz.

West Coast as said before probably requires a few synthesizers from a DAW. East Coast you could probably just do with more traditional instrument samples.
 
I would look into sampling old records, particularly soul and blues stuff. It all depends on what style you’re going for, I would just focus on using lowfi sounding synths and loops. And old school hip hop can totally be upbeat and positive! Plenty of old beats have feelgood vibes to them.

You can probably find old school hip hop sample packs that’ll serve you well. Also, Isotope makes a vinyl emulator that’ll make your track sound like it was ripped off if a vinyl record, which adds to that old school feel; I use it all the time. It’s less about the instruments you use, and more about sounding like it’s sampled, even if it’s not. That’s how i come at old school style beats, at least
 
I make hip hop in a similar way to what you're attempting; old school sounding but with VIs (I have synths, guitars & electric bass too, but they don't get used much since I bulked up the VI libraries). Nothing is off limits, and it depends what you're going for. Traditional instruments (bass, guitar, electric & acoustic pianos, electric & stand up bass, brass, winds, strings, etc.) and synths will get you there. No genre was off limits, but maybe start with instruments typically in a jazz or r&b band.

East & West coasts did it a little differently. Depending how far back, check other regions as well. Listen to what you're trying to emulate and go from there.

As for keys, again, nothing off limits. It will depend on the feeling you're gong for. Minor will sound dark, sad, sentimental, tragic, depending how you use it. Major will be bright, uplifting, majestic, and can be sentimental when slow. Try some of the other modes too (Dorian, Mixolydian, etc.). Each will give you a unique sound depending how you use them.

Like localspace said, samples were the primary source, but don't let that discourage you. Many of today's VIs sound extremely realistic, you'll just need to mix & effect with that sound in mind. They have plugins to help with that too. Mixing & effects may be a challenge as it's another set of skills you'll need to develop. The basics are not hard to learn, but take time to master.
 
Been making West Coast and G-Funk beats for almost 4 years, what I can suggest is, start with a smooth electric piano chord progression or get the melody first, synth leads are recommended, saw, square, sine or triangle, even better if you combine them and make something more interesting, after that add Moog bass, with little bit of attack to create bounce, don't be afraid to be late when playing, in West Coast it's all about bounce, program your drums or if you can use pad to create them, add swift to hi-hats to make your beat more bouncy.
 
its your music man. do what gets you most stoked on you song. Find some sample packs online and find a song that you want to mimic and try and recreate it or just use it as a reference.

there are no rules. i say make a song in major because fuck whoever said you shouldnt. and if everyone else is doing it in minor, thats a perfect opportunity to bring something new to the table

Love - Calectic
 
I’ll tell you what equipment you need to make old school hip hop. I lived threw that era. So! First. You wanna get a sampler. The style is up to you. What I mean by style. Keyboard style or drum machines style. Personally, I would choose the MPC 60 or 3000. This will give you just about every element of making boom bap tracks that you need. You get the converters which sound crispy and fat. You get the good sequencing of tracks. You automatically get 8 outs plus your regular stereo outputs. You get a tank basically. Going the keyboard way. Like the EPS 16 or ASR 10. You gonna get the phrase and drum style sampling. This will enable you to take sounds and lay them across the keys you have. This is very good for creating new sounds out of sampled sounds. Effects come with this board too. The sequencer is not as good as the MPC’s but. It can work for you. Most producers I knew in the past had both. The MPC doing the sequencing, sample chops, drum chops and phrase sampling. And the ASR doing the creation of new sounds. I mean making some weird shit. This two were the main piece I’ve seen used and used myself. Well the MPC was more my style. I could create a full completed arrangement on that thing, without midi connection to anything else. And if you wanna go different. SP1200 and Akai S950 sampler. Don’t get know better. Oh yeah! Can’t forget the DJ mixer and turntable. Ya gonna need that. A good ear for sounds and tons of records. I hope this helps.
 
Back
Top