layering drums to sound thicker...care to share???

[pirell]

..ive heard that this is a main technique used by the big cats, and makes the drums sound so thick... i beelive ive tried it a few times and aim to try it each track i produce..especially for HH and RnB, but im not sure if im ever doing it the right way.

ive read thru all the tutorials (and thanks a zill for thos tutorials btw wings), but there isnt anything specific to this topic.

so can someone pls take me thru Drums layering 101, taking into account that i program most of my drums

 

[Equality 7-2521]

im not exactly sure about this whole topic either but id suggest doing a search on the "low end theory" (the technique, not the album)

 

[pirell]

ok...ill try that...here or the net in general?

 

[BeAtArKiTeK]

yeah i usually like to use this technique:

i take a kick and another one of the same kick. i play the first one at normal pitch and volume. the 2nd one i either pitch it up or down depending on what im trying to do ...i mess with the second kick's pitch till i get something i like and i layer these two together and i get pretty good results....this also applys for snares, samples, basslines.

 

[eka]

The low end theory is taking a basskick, filter all the high and mid out of it so you are left with all the low in the kick (I use the multiband compressor in wavelab for this, but all eq is good I think)
than place that bassdrum in your track and than layer the original kick over the processed kick.
you can do this also with two,three,four, etc. etc.... different kicks.

 

[Fade]

Did you check Merc's article?
https://www.illmuzik.com/articles/tutorials/dirtydrums/dirtydrums.php?ID=14

 

[erkl]

thats a great article..

its easy to do if u have an mpc, u just assign the two sounds to one pad, and mess with each sound till they blend, works great if u have the individual outs going to a mixer so u can seperatley eq each sound

 

[nas2000xl]

the key is layering your kicks. you don`t have to use filters for this. just sample different types of kicks and blend them together. same with snares. but it really don`t do no good to go through all of that if you are not going to layer the rest of your sounds as well. it would sound kinda odd to have thick kicks & snares and everything else sounding thin. just my opinion

 

[Honesty]

^^ He's right...it's not that hard of a thing to do. For example, I use one drum that has some sort of "clop" do it, but not a whole lot of actual kick, so I'll place a drum w/ plenty of kick also. I ALWAYS layer my snares. It gives them a fat sound. Also, 808 drums are perfect for layering, I normally use them beyond cymbal crashes or as some sort of bassline minus the hum of course...

 

[TachyonFresh]

theres this group called dynospectrum........fuck their drums are so sick

 

[MarkN]

yea all that has been said above is true one technique i use sumtimes is to take one kick and put it through a chorus unit play that at a lowish volume, then layer the original kick over it !

 

[The Bastard]

i always layer kicks and snares in alllll my beats like erkl said if u got an mpc is mad easy thats how i do it,then just fuck wit the volumes till it sounds like a one shotagain

 

[juzblazwun]

You've prob' heard of this video going around, but this guy uses the same steps to a sampled phrase. Try this.... http://www.hieroglyphics.com/features/beats_101/. Like I said it doesn't deal with drums but you can use the same steps.

 

[pirell]

do you do these in midi or after converting to audio?

 

[massikrbeats]

yeah, i try to use multiple techniques like that too. It sees to work out well when I change the timing on my kicks like suggested and EQ both kicks seperately, i get a punchier feel, especially after saving my settings. I can apply it to most kicks I come across

 

[Equality 7-2521]

a good way to fatten up a kick drum is to use an externally keyed compressor so you get a pulse of low frequency sine tone under each kick.

 

[ItsYaBoyJay]

Use 808 kicks or either take a low kick, a mid kick, and a high kick, use a parametric EQ on them to filter out all the high end of them and blend them together it's give you a nice punch, thump sound to your drums

 

[massikrbeats]

I usually EQ the hell out of a kick to make it more thumpy, then I either take the same one and lower the pitch a few notches or a titally different one and do the same. Remember: lower the pitch to get that low feeling in your kicks, man (especially to the underlying kicks)

hoLLA

 

[MadManBeats]

a technique i use is take 4 different drum kicks or how many u want....and throught my beat sequence match em together in different variations....i usually have one of these kicks with the highs cutout so when the drums sounds keep switchin throught the beat it kinda gets rid of the loop syndrome.....i also usually put one of the drums on a different track then the rest and loop it 7 bars versus 8 or 16....that way it always keeps switchin on em.....

 

[Sucio]

if u use FL...just layer the drums...and/or add plugins to them

i like to layer hard snares with slappy ones....that thickens them up pretty well in my opinion.

kicks i just throw 2-4 together and use one that fits best

EQ THE DRUMS!!!! definitely works wonders
FL Parametric EQ is wonderful....

compression (endorphin, waves) is good

or something like the amplitube plug-in and play with the knobs....