Sequencing Drums With "feel" Options

[slowintrepid]

Ok folks I've been producing alot of music on my computer that isn't electronica at all.

thus my drums now feel very very ridgid
I need to get more feel and consistency when sequencing drums..

I either use battery into cubase, or I just use reason

and no matterr what my drums don't sound good (rhymically)

I've tried playing that parts on my keyboard and nothing.

I've tried using the pen tool nothing....

and I've tried different quantitisation methods (like swing and what not)


but still nothing can someone shed some light on this for me

[Daniel LaPlaca]

being a drummer since I was 5 (25 years ago)..and doing music with electronics and computers for at 10 years...this is a problem for me too...the thing I have found, is have a bunch of tracks..the more the better. for instance...I will take of of my drum machines..find a programmed groove that is kinda close to the feel I want..record the midi pattern...then take that midi track and assign to differnt synths..or samplers..then I will import audio samples of kicks and snares...cut n paste (dick james..authere ..style) and by the end I have about 16 tracks in PT....then I bounce them..( after adding fx..eq..all that..) and by the end I am happy witha drum track...usually by then its aboit 2 weeks after I had the inspireation to do the song in the first place. But..I find the drums tracks come out the best...and its a ton of work sometimes..but I need the drums to sound great..and I have to have that natural drum sound..the concept being..never play the same fill twice..and hit as hard as you can and make the drums just as melodic as a guitar...this post probably wont help you...but I would like to hear what other people do to make sweet drums tracks..

peace

blindman

[arvidtp]

Hey, I'm not making conventional drum tracks, nor do they sound really "sweet" as one would typically put it for rock or electronica, but I've been getting some interesting stuff in realtime.

I have a Yamaha MIDI drum brain (PMC-1) that I FOUND AT THE DUMP !!! AND REPAIRED and made piezo drum triggers for. Then I also have been using MaxMSP synced via MIDI clock to Pro Tools to create strange electronic drum sounds (synth and sampled) triggered through the drum brain and also by MIDI clock ticks from Pro TOols, in which case the intensity of the drum hit is randomized in a way to make an interesting pattern that is random and sounds like a pattern but is actually not, and the timing is controlled by counting ticks from PT and firing every, say 6 or 24 ticks (there are 24 per measure and I have realtime control of the number of ticks when it goes off as well). It is a particular sound, and not one fit for every piece of music, but interesting especially for someone like me who is normally no drummer.

I also have realtime control as I am performing this of start/stop (foot pedal), a sweepable filter for each drum sound (MIDI wheels/sliders and mouse to change types - this is the coolest sounding thing about this drumming setup), overdrive, various delay and FM effects and mix. And I am planning to implement more MIDI control in the future.

I record this into pro tools (unfortunately for now it has to go out the analog out of the built-in card (ick!) then back to digital through my Mbox, but I may soon be getting logic and no longer need to do that (will use Jack).)

Then I chop up the audio how I like and record any other things I want, like more fills, etc using the MIDI drum brain. Its sorta fun.

Hope this gives you some crazy Ideas.

[kolo]

Funny how you would never read this kind of posting if the instrument were piano or guitar rather than drums. People take it for granted that it takes practice and time to learn an instrument like those, but drums, oh that's just hitting stuff, anyone can do that. NOT! I've played the drums for over 20 years and making a drum track with a natural feel and groove is not simple. If it doesn't work, the track won't. Drum n bass or other more mechanical styles may be easier to program, but I feel your pain when it comes to a natural, human feeling drum track.
I find that messing with midi editing or cutting and pasting little bits or audio or midi is always harder than just playing a beat via human hands.
Matching drums to the feel of lots of other tracks is hard, so start with a basic guide track done to a click (keyboard chords or guitar and possibly a scratch vocal track) so you know where the changes are. then do drums and later add the rest to match the feel of the drums. It's really hard to go the other way and have it sound like it all belongs together
Here is what I do: I just find a simple beat that has the right feel. Hi hat and snare and bass or just bass and snare. A part of what will be the finished beat. Play it through to the end on my midi keyboard, triggering samples or a module. Trying to just play 4 bars and layer doesn't give you enough time to settle into a groove. So play your partial beat for a longer while. Then find a few measures that really lock in. I usually do it this way and cut and paste those. You have a track with consistant groove now.
OR If you really lock in play right through and then set up auto punch in to fix a misplaced hit, but roll a few bars back to give you a chance to catch the groove before the punch in. You can always move individual drums to different tracks and tweak the timing, making a track lag or rush later on if you want to. But I find that if you want it to sound natural, you need to record it more that way.

Don't discount using loops. There are lots of natural sounding loops with great natural feel and they usually come with fills that match the groove. Also you can buy or find midi tracks you can get and piece together with fills and variations... or god forbid, find a partner in crime who has more experience doing drum tracks and collaborate!

[Podolski52]

Yup..

I also experienced it to be very tricky to getting the right feel to a drumtrack. From my experience I can tell that it is not only the timing of the sounds (the quantisation) but also the dynamic range that is crucial to a natural or 'warm' feeling. If you are working with sampled drumsounds this means that you need quite a few velocity layers to produce a rhythm that does not sound to rigid. This is true for drumpatterns of around 4 bars (as I often use them being mainly a hip-hop producer) as well as for the drum programming that kolo described (a way some of the jazz artists in our studio employ).
There a quite a few drum sample libraries with enough velocity layers out there that you you can use in conjunction with a softwaresampler to get decent results. Since we did not find the kind of dirty sound we would like to use (doing Hip-Hop, Soul and Jazz) we developed one on our own. Here are the links if you want to listen to some demos:

http://www.funkequipment.com/audio/FunkDemo.mp3
http://www.funkequipment.com/audio/Ultrafunk.mp3
http://www.funkequipment.com/audio/TheJam.mp3

Since we are dedicated but a very small team (in fact 1 person did most of the work but it wasn't me) any advices or comments to the sounds would be welcome.

[Riverdog]

I've been playing drums since I was 5 as well... And at 37, I've heard a lot of drum tracks good and bad...

One of my tricks is to be VERY picky about the sounds I use if I'm looking for a realistic drum track... Sometimes it doesn't matter how musically you've played your track - However you decide to record it - If You're crash cymbal doesn't have a reasonably smooth decay and your hi-hat only has one volume (LOUD) with no dynamics, You're already in trouble...

Now, I'll "Renig" and say that recording it however you do it - It DOES matter... I use a number of techniques as described in the other posts here to achieve realistic results... But, I also have a minimum of 20 different sets from which I draw sounds to provide just the right mix for my rhythmic needs...

Last note: Keep it simple... If you drum, think of how you move about your own set and don't add things in that give you a "fifth" arm... For realism, I try not to add too much more percussion than what one drummer and one percussionist can handle...

Hope this helps...

[B3 Basher]

Riverdog makes a great point. Do not add a 5th arm (limb would have been a better metaphor). Watch a drummer and see what he/she is capable of and what he isn't. You can't hit a crash cymbal at the same time as you are doing a snare paradiddle. You simultaneously can't play a closed hi-hat beat whilst playing a snare/tom fill.

Secondly, if you're using a drum machine such as RedRum in Reason 2.5, use 4 variations of the same snare drum, slightly detuned to each other to simulate the random 'whacks' that a real drummer may give. Sometimes they are hitting the centre of the snare, sometimes towards the edge (rimshot). Such changes in the timbre of the snare can give a realistic sound to a basic 4/4 rock beat. Hi hats can be given the same treatment particularly with the use of accents that 'tie in' with actions of a real drummer.

Try triggering two similar snare hits together and shift them a few milliseconds apart to give the impression of a two handed snare hit by a real drummer (Think of the drum track to "Funky Cold Medina" by Tone Loc - sheesh who would have thought he would be a reference to drums with feel!).

Above all - LISTEN to a real drummer. I'd recommend a DVD for drum tuition, it's amazing what you might learn in the quest for realism!

Expensive tip - Hire a session drummer and a electronic drum kit with a midi input to your sequencer. I'll be recommending hiring a whole orchestra next!

This post has been edited by B3 Basher: Tue 5 Oct 2004, 17:01

[don says mac]

i've played drums for many years, but not quite as seriously as many of you have i'm sure... however, i get frustrated with trying to make a naturally rhythmic beats using two fingers and a couple keys on my midi controller... i'm still getting the hang of all the software out there, but once thing that i have used and love is Roland's Handsonic . i can't really tell if y'all have seen this and simply don't like it, but it is, at least for me, an amazing alternative to programing drums patterns. it's by no means perfect, but at the very least it gives you the ability to lay down your drum pattern exactly as you would on a regular drum kit, or bongo, or whatever other sound comes with it. especially if you add the kick trigger. my advice is to rent one and try it out for yourself.