I've been producing now with Ableton for over a year and half, but just recently over the past few months have I actually started programming/writing my own drums in Ableton (Impulse). My problem is not the patterns, but it just seems sometimes that no matter what I do my drums seem lifeless at times...
Looking for some tips on what people do to add that original feel to their drums (panning/compression/attack and release/anything)
I have also recently been taking off the grid and making minor variations which I am finally realizing changes the entire feel of the beat, but ANY tips would be amazing as I feel like I'm stuck in a rut...
Injecting life into your drums?
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Bright Morningstar
- Posts: 80
- Joined: Sat Jul 11, 2009 10:21 pm
- Location: Ohio
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Re: Injecting life into your drums?
Hi,
We have some free videos here Quantize Free Videos
There is a video on Glitch sounds and one on groove templates that might help you out a little.
Hope this helps.
Thanks
Keith
We have some free videos here Quantize Free Videos
There is a video on Glitch sounds and one on groove templates that might help you out a little.
Hope this helps.
Thanks
Keith
Re: Injecting life into your drums?
In my life
Why do I smile
At people who I'd much rather kick in the eye?
-Moz
Why do I smile
At people who I'd much rather kick in the eye?
-Moz
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theophilus
- Posts: 532
- Joined: Fri Mar 06, 2009 3:54 pm
Re: Injecting life into your drums?
Depends on what you mean by 'lifeless'. I never quite got the drums until recently... got a nanopad and some decent real drum samples, and discovered that a lot of it is in the samples/sound you use. Meaning.... if you play a real drum, if you hit a snare soft for instance, it doesn't just sound softer, it sounds _different_ than if you hit it harder... hit soft, you get kind of a 'sssh' sound, hit hard, you get a 'crack'. Hitting different places on the head sound different, etc.
All this to say... play with the velocities of your hits, and make sure those velocities are doing something useful. Hopefully it's something more than volume control. One simple thing to do is to route velocity to pitch, not a lot, but a little, you'd be surprised at what that does. Actually, if you have sampler, I'd recommend trying this even with the drum machines patches that come with Live 8... take 909 classic for instance, route velocity to pitch at about +7, and actually I found interesting results routing velocity on the hi-hat closed to pitch at negative values... try -24. Very interesting. Positive works too. Part of the reason this works is because the brain interprets both louder and higher-pitched sounds as having more energy (which they actually do)... so you're giving the 'accented' notes a little bit extra energy.
Also... if you don't have some drumpads, get one. Note that you don't have to be playing real drums for this to be true... i was playing with drumaxx, and even some of the more electronic sounding drums respond this way, because of the modeling they use to make them. But by playing with them, you can really get a feel for how they should be programmed too. At least, it has helped me a lot.
All this to say... play with the velocities of your hits, and make sure those velocities are doing something useful. Hopefully it's something more than volume control. One simple thing to do is to route velocity to pitch, not a lot, but a little, you'd be surprised at what that does. Actually, if you have sampler, I'd recommend trying this even with the drum machines patches that come with Live 8... take 909 classic for instance, route velocity to pitch at about +7, and actually I found interesting results routing velocity on the hi-hat closed to pitch at negative values... try -24. Very interesting. Positive works too. Part of the reason this works is because the brain interprets both louder and higher-pitched sounds as having more energy (which they actually do)... so you're giving the 'accented' notes a little bit extra energy.
Also... if you don't have some drumpads, get one. Note that you don't have to be playing real drums for this to be true... i was playing with drumaxx, and even some of the more electronic sounding drums respond this way, because of the modeling they use to make them. But by playing with them, you can really get a feel for how they should be programmed too. At least, it has helped me a lot.