Compressing a kick... punch or weight

[Iron Keys]

What I don't get is... surely if you crush the peak down to the same level as the main 'body' of the sound, you could then effectively raise the drum back up to match its original peak level and you'd have an incredibly louder drum? Which is more desirable?

If you add 'punch' you increase the difference between the peak and the tail, which leaves you less room to boost the overall level of the drum, and so it'll sound quiter, surely?

This is one thing I've never understood fully, as all tutorials always seem to claim that increasing the peak will increase the loudness of the drum, or such. I want my drum to proper thud through the speaker. I want it to sound and feel like a hook the the jaw.

Increasing the punch just makes it cut through and sound 'poppy' but not very BOOM more like POP. I want a defined BOOM/THUD

 

[2GooD Productions]

What I don't get is... surely if you crush the peak down to the same level as the main 'body' of the sound, you could then effectively raise the drum back up to match its original peak level and you'd have an incredibly louder drum? Which is more desirable?

If you add 'punch' you increase the difference between the peak and the tail, which leaves you less room to boost the overall level of the drum, and so it'll sound quiter, surely?

This is one thing I've never understood fully, as all tutorials always seem to claim that increasing the peak will increase the loudness of the drum, or such. I want my drum to proper thud through the speaker. I want it to sound and feel like a hook the the jaw.

Increasing the punch just makes it cut through and sound 'poppy' but not very BOOM more like POP. I want a defined BOOM/THUD

You dont use a compressor for that you use an eq and eq the kick louder than anything else, well I do anyway. And most importantly you have to start with a good kick sample in the first place.
For example lets say you find a drum sample with a high punch and much lower tail....
Using a compressor with a fast attack and fast release will squash the initial punch and raise the tail.
For a sample with a lower punch and louder tail, you would use the compressor with a slower attack and longer release to squash the tail end. With kicks that are fairly short in length its pretty easy to achieve through compression. But instead of trying to fix a bad sample Id rather find a sample that does what I want it to do with minimum tweaking to get the desired result.
Personally I dont compress to get an overall louder sound, I compress to fix something that isnt right, then use the eq to boost and cut frequencies of the sound till I get it to sound right.
There are other ways of increasing the volume of a kick like using a delay with a very fast attack say 24-32hz, with the right amount of feedback, effectivly doubling the sound of the kick, or using a chorus plugin on the kick sound, both have their own unique sound and may be undesirable but they may do what you want them to do.

And when it comes down to what is most desirable, that comes down to you the producer.
Generally the eqing of hip hop is high low end, medium midrange and high high end. This gives an emcee room in the more midrange frequencies to do his thang.
Like you say, you like your kicks to be like a punch in the face, well me too. But that has to be balanced with my desire for a heavy bassline, many times to two can be incompatible.And you have to make sacrifices in one to get the most out of the other.

What formant said is 100% right, he knows what hes talking about. Never ever have anything peaking in the mix. If you have to lower the volume of every track in the mixer to do it and keep the track balanced, then thats what has to be done.

Finally heres my method for a punch in the face kick.....
All by equing...
1)Send the kick to an eq
2) Brick wall filter below 40-50 hz( This allows some room for the bassline) If no bassline this is not necessary as it takes away some of the kicks boom, I would then have the brick wall set at around 30-40hz.
3)Boost 85-95hz( this is the sweet spot for a kick in hip hop- boost to get he most out of this sweet spot) But be careful not to over boost or peak.
4) Reduce at 300hz to take away muddyness. This prevent frequency overlap with some sounds like low strings or the low end on a piano etc.
Tweak those different aspects till I get it to sound how I want it.
Only then would I even consider compression.

 

[Iron Keys]

Thanks for the response, 2Good.

Strangely enough, sounds like we do a similar thing.

Generally what I do goes something like this...

1. Kick layered with an 808 to add weight (though wish to stop layering like this)

2. i. Eq highpassfilter/lowcut at about 35hz/40hz
ii. compress to add punch or to squash peak a little.

3. i. Cut at around 150-250hz to help define the kick/leave room for the bass harmonics of whatever bass I choose (or don't)
ii. Boost at around 1500hz (if necessary) to help the kick cut through mix, and help it be clarible with playback on crap systems.
iii. Boost at anywhere from 60hz to 90hz ... though I usually find that most kicks sound better boosted at 60hz having more 'oomf' there... I don't much notice any decent effects boosting higher up than this. (??)

4. Sometimes I'll run the kick through a tape sim to give it some 'warmth' then eq just to keep it clean.


I find it near impossible to find decent kickdrum samples to use. They either have the right sound but not enough 'oomph', or just ain't the right sound.

 

[Iron Keys]

Work clean, dont peak/clip anywhere, compression input level = compression output level. If any of your levels in the mix are going towards peak, your doing it wrong. If your baseline levels are going peak, youre doing it wrong. If the reading on the master is barely moving at peak, youre doing it wrong. If the levels on the master are moving rapidly you have something healthy going on since its not squashing.
Regardless of what levels you're trying to push, everything needs headroom to live and thats REGARDLESS of how loud your stereo bus is.

Another thing to look at is if a source is mono or stereo or if a process deals with a source as mono or stereo. You dont want to staple the same sound in the mix to make it stand out in the mix. So kicks, snares, baselines are in most cases just mono but if youre applying parallel compression, make sure you're not set to stereo since you would staple the source and lose detail(transcient)along the process.

Of course I don't let things whack up into the red, and I'm cautious to make sure the signal isn't clipping in the plugins (important to watch out for) as they can be clipping in the plugins but you won't see it on your channel if the fader is turned down.

The point is though, your track is going to get mastered, or at some point, you're going to have to release it... and if your peaks are flying way up the meter, but your average sound is extremely low, shit ain't gonna be heard... and it's gonna have to be squashed/clipped when mastered.

Personally, in my limited experience, I've found louder mixes (mixed well still) make final compression/limiting effects work smoother without dramatic dipping or unnaturyal sounding results.

I'd like to hear your thoughts regarding this as you seem very knowledgable.



Also, regarding the 'stapling'... could you elaborate on this, as I'm not too sure what you're talking about.

Much love

 

[2GooD Productions]

Thanks for the response, 2Good.

Strangely enough, sounds like we do a similar thing.

iii. Boost at anywhere from 60hz to 90hz ... though I usually find that most kicks sound better boosted at 60hz having more 'oomf' there... I don't much notice any decent effects boosting higher up than this. (??)

85-95 adds punch while lower freq's add oomf.
I boost my basslines at around 60hz, so never boost my kick in that range because it clashes with my bassline. If I have no bassline which is very very rare, lol, I would boost in that range. Boosting at 60hz on the kick can make the overall mix peak in that range when combined with a bassline and that can take some of the oomph out of the kick in the final mixdown and compression stage. Certainly it adds body to the kick but the overall result is destroyed by adding a bassline. This could be where some of the problems are arising.

Also what DAW are you using, because in reason 5 the kong sample bank has some really dope sounding kicks and snares.

 

[Iron Keys]

Ah see, I've been favouring my kicks over the bass lately. I focus on giving the bass a little more harmonic value. Either way I take care to make sure the kick and bass ain't clashing.

I'm using Sonar 8 at the moment... never really felt comfortale using Reason. Think I found cubase most comfortable, but still.

Some real good samples and decent drum vst would be decent I guess.

 

[2GooD Productions]

I think you can rewire reason into sonar, even if you just use it for the drum sounds you can do the mixing and fx processing in sonar.

 

[Iron Keys]

Yeah I think you can... I think I remember seeing a default 'rewire' set up, or something.

I used to be cheeky and re-wire the demo version of reason to cubase and quickly export the drums! Was pretty funny.

Would be useful to have reason... it's kinda just a handful of tasty synths/instruments.

What stuff you using, 2Good?

 

[Formant024]

boosting is fine, just dont forget to use a roll off around 50hz. Rumble eats headroom too, still making baselines and kicks fight eachother.

 

[2GooD Productions]

Yeah I think you can... I think I remember seeing a default 'rewire' set up, or something.

I used to be cheeky and re-wire the demo version of reason to cubase and quickly export the drums! Was pretty funny.

Would be useful to have reason... it's kinda just a handful of tasty synths/instruments.

What stuff you using, 2Good?

I pretty much use reason exclusively these days. I dont use many sounds outside of the factory sound bank. I do a lot of composition so it works okay for me, but then I can sample with it very easily too.

 

[Formant024]

Of course I don't let things whack up into the red, and I'm cautious to make sure the signal isn't clipping in the plugins (important to watch out for) as they can be clipping in the plugins but you won't see it on your channel if the fader is turned down.

The point is though, your track is going to get mastered, or at some point, you're going to have to release it... and if your peaks are flying way up the meter, but your average sound is extremely low, shit ain't gonna be heard... and it's gonna have to be squashed/clipped when mastered.

Personally, in my limited experience, I've found louder mixes (mixed well still) make final compression/limiting effects work smoother without dramatic dipping or unnaturyal sounding results.

I'd like to hear your thoughts regarding this as you seem very knowledgable.



Also, regarding the 'stapling'... could you elaborate on this, as I'm not too sure what you're talking about.

Much love

Staple, to stack sound upon eachother, in this case the same sound causing it to get amped and distorted.

You dont have have to make the mix loud to a get proper mastering. If you summ and hit -3db you have enough room for a mastering engineer to beef your mix up, add brilliance. Imo, id rather deal with mix which had no signal processing over the master track so i have all the freedom to work with. If you squash before mastering it will give the mastering engineer less room to work with (fix-up vs touch-up).

Imo, most people make their mix loud to adapt to their own listening experience and the whole loudness war is actualy derrived from the development of home hi-fi and chip-amps(car stereo etc) used in them opposed to older, often, more powerful amps found in home hifi. The dynamic range of those hifi sets are low, so people turn the volume to 10 and its not good enough. The last thing you can do is to make the material aired over the system appear much louder to stand out...opposed to just being able to make your hifi amp go to eleven (so to speak).

 

[Iron Keys]

I understand also though, one of the reasons for keeping shit bubbling at a high level, other than the loudness wars... is because of bit rates...?


But back on the subject of peaks... if you have a kick/snare or whatever peaking at 3db, but sounds ultimately quiet as hell... are you suggesting instead of squashing the peak of this snare, you instead mix your whole track in like -40 db?

 

[Formant024]

I understand also though, one of the reasons for keeping shit bubbling at a high level, other than the loudness wars... is because of bit rates...?


But back on the subject of peaks... if you have a kick/snare or whatever peaking at 3db, but sounds ultimately quiet as hell... are you suggesting instead of squashing the peak of this snare, you instead mix your whole track in like -40 db?

i reference to a drumbus as a loud one at -6db, mostly kick/snare are little below -6db. That's a knock on the kick but the thump of a kick is often overrated so people tend to add more low end then needed. A good kick sample by itself has enough thump and would need little eq. So if youre levels are peaking but the loudness is low than you're probably overdoing it with eq, compression just blows that up. The remaining headroom would squash the volume to appear softer in the mix.



Ill drop a snapshot of the mix on this later, its pretty timid if you check the levels but even this dry gives delivery. There's hard any low end boost on this.

 

[2GooD Productions]

i reference to a drumbus as a loud one at -6db, mostly kick/snare are little below -6db. That's a knock on the kick but the thump of a kick is often overrated so people tend to add more low end then needed. A good kick sample by itself has enough thump and would need little eq. So if youre levels are peaking but the loudness is low than you're probably overdoing it with eq, compression just blows that up. The remaining headroom would squash the volume to appear softer in the mix.

YouTube - ‪The Perceptionist - Beast mode (Formantix rmx)‬‏

Ill drop a snapshot of the mix on this later, its pretty timid if you check the levels but even this dry gives delivery. There's hard any low end boost on this.

You're a beast formantix, I could learn a lot from you.

 

[Step Soprano]

You dont use a compressor for that you use an eq and eq the kick louder than anything else, well I do anyway. And most importantly you have to start with a good kick sample in the first place.
For example lets say you find a drum sample with a high punch and much lower tail....
Using a compressor with a fast attack and fast release will squash the initial punch and raise the tail.
For a sample with a lower punch and louder tail, you would use the compressor with a slower attack and longer release to squash the tail end. With kicks that are fairly short in length its pretty easy to achieve through compression. But instead of trying to fix a bad sample Id rather find a sample that does what I want it to do with minimum tweaking to get the desired result.
Personally I dont compress to get an overall louder sound, I compress to fix something that isnt right, then use the eq to boost and cut frequencies of the sound till I get it to sound right.
There are other ways of increasing the volume of a kick like using a delay with a very fast attack say 24-32hz, with the right amount of feedback, effectivly doubling the sound of the kick, or using a chorus plugin on the kick sound, both have their own unique sound and may be undesirable but they may do what you want them to do.

And when it comes down to what is most desirable, that comes down to you the producer.
Generally the eqing of hip hop is high low end, medium midrange and high high end. This gives an emcee room in the more midrange frequencies to do his thang.
Like you say, you like your kicks to be like a punch in the face, well me too. But that has to be balanced with my desire for a heavy bassline, many times to two can be incompatible.And you have to make sacrifices in one to get the most out of the other.

What formant said is 100% right, he knows what hes talking about. Never ever have anything peaking in the mix. If you have to lower the volume of every track in the mixer to do it and keep the track balanced, then thats what has to be done.

Finally heres my method for a punch in the face kick.....
All by equing...
1)Send the kick to an eq
2) Brick wall filter below 40-50 hz( This allows some room for the bassline) If no bassline this is not necessary as it takes away some of the kicks boom, I would then have the brick wall set at around 30-40hz.
3)Boost 85-95hz( this is the sweet spot for a kick in hip hop- boost to get he most out of this sweet spot) But be careful not to over boost or peak.
4) Reduce at 300hz to take away muddyness. This prevent frequency overlap with some sounds like low strings or the low end on a piano etc.
Tweak those different aspects till I get it to sound how I want it.
Only then would I even consider compression.

have to disagree partly(excuse me if i'm somewhat incoherent, been in the studio for close to 60 hours now with no sleep). When compressing drums, the drum bus not the individul sounds should be compressed around 5:1 for 3-4 dB's of GR with a medium to quick attack to allow both the punch and a hint of sustain to come through. As far as individual drums, the clarity and sparkle come from the overheads. For a big sound, you also need a heavy dose of room mic's. Next, create an aux channel with a tone generator on it, and find the root frequency of the song(in the 50/60hz range) and then add a noise gate after the tone generator. From there, You sidechain the kick drum to the gate below the tone generator on the same channel path to give u a low end boom/weight, similar to an 808. NEXT, send the kick drum and the 808 channel you created with the gate/tone generator along with the rest of the drum kit and smash the living hell out of it, while dividing the time between the downbeats on the kick by two... half of the down time goes to the release(yes, you want a slow release when compressing drums, because that is what creates the sustain that allows it to cut through the mix) and the other half of the down time between beats should be programmed to the release. For punch, absolutely fast attacks and releases can be very handy, but to combine a punchy sound with a sustained tail, it is vital that you parallel compress the fast attack/fast release punchy drum bus to a bus with a mathematically precise difference between the attack and release... meaning half of the time between hits will be your attack, and the other half of the time will provide your release. This tricks combined with the side chained kick to tone generator and gate can provide you with some of hte hardest hitting drums you will ever here. Not only do you get your punch, but you get the boom of the 808 and the weight of the sustain.

Trust me, It is practically fullproof for mixing great drums. Learned it from Grammy award winning and 15X platinum engineer Scott Kieklak, formally of Criteria an the Hit Factor in Miami.

 

[Iron Keys]

Nice one, Step Sop... sounds pretty complicated.

 

[Step Soprano]

Nice one, Step Sop... sounds pretty complicated.

It's really not, just takes a basic understanding of signal flow and routing. If you need help, pm me and ill give you my phone number to help better explain it. Like I said, I'm running on fumes right now, so explaining it over the phone/in person would probably get the point across better.

 

[Shonsteez]

This turned into a great thread! Informative comments Formant & Step!