Kick Drum Advice

[Creativemind]

Hi All!

How did they get this kick drum so powerful in this track:-

Thanks!

[tobypearce]

It sounds like quite a loud kick, as in it's mixed high compared to the other tracks. I suppose having a steep High Pass Filter would enable you to do that with having the bottom end too muddy.

I'm pretty sure it's a matter of EQing on this kick, too. It's powerful because of the frequencies it's dominating.

[MassiveSoundStudios]

It sounds like a dirty TR-909 kick drum. They most likely achieved this sound by running the kick drum through some outboard and overdriven preamps. It very well could have been sampled and you're hearing some lofi grit from an EMU or AKAI. That's just my guess.

[Exowildebeest]

It sounds like quite a loud kick, as in it's mixed high compared to the other tracks. I suppose having a steep High Pass Filter would enable you to do that with having the bottom end too muddy.

I'm pretty sure it's a matter of EQing on this kick, too. It's powerful because of the frequencies it's dominating.

This, try a little EQ bump around 60hz for beefyness, + the above post mentioning a bit of overdrive.

[selig]

It sounds like quite a loud kick, as in it's mixed high compared to the other tracks. I suppose having a steep High Pass Filter would enable you to do that with having the bottom end too muddy.

I'm pretty sure it's a matter of EQing on this kick, too. It's powerful because of the frequencies it's dominating.

^^ I second this ^^
Was going to say pretty much the same thing. You make the kick powerful by turning it up louder than anything else (and by starting with a decent kick sample to begin with)!
Saturation/EQ, etc, is also your friend, but shear MASS wins out in most cases.

[Exowildebeest]

It sounds like quite a loud kick, as in it's mixed high compared to the other tracks. I suppose having a steep High Pass Filter would enable you to do that with having the bottom end too muddy.

I'm pretty sure it's a matter of EQing on this kick, too. It's powerful because of the frequencies it's dominating.

^^ I second this ^^
Was going to say pretty much the same thing. You make the kick powerful by turning it up louder than anything else (and by starting with a decent kick sample to begin with)!
Saturation/EQ, etc, is also your friend, but shear MASS wins out in most cases.

Ironically, the "powerful kicks" of rave-era tracks might just be down to bad mixing The mixes on those tracks are often all over the place. Part of their charm, though.

[Creativemind]

I'm using a 909 kick (have a few, and selected the one that sounded closest to the one in the vid) and not sure where to boost with EQ. I've boosted it quite a lot and have been sweeping through the frequencies but nothing seems to be achieving the same effect. I tried Overdrive and increasing the preamp on that has helped a lot, got a lot closer now. Given it more of a punch quality to it. What does overdrive actually do then?

Another thing to ask is, Is this the right kick drum? I suppose. That's the first thing I isn't it. Choosing the right sample. Knowing which drum machine this kick was from is key.

Also, what would I be looking for in the spectrum analysis to tell me what to do with EQ?

[ravisoni]

A major part of it has to do with the type of sample they began with. The rest is explained above.

[mataya]

It doesn't really sound that big to me. It's a classic overdriven kick from that era of house. I have an old sample cd "Total house", I think it's called and a bunch of house records from that era and I always hear that driven kick used over and over.
I agree that it's just loud compared to other sounds, but also the dynamic range seems greater than in today's electronic music.
In this example

The kick sounds more powerful to me, but the dynamic range is much smaller and the kick is so squeezed with the rest of the drums...
Lot's of sidechaining and compression, where in your example I hear no sidechain and a quite overdriven kick.

I recently discovered Kush audio transformer simulations and it's excatly what I needed to express my kickin' needs.

so, in short...use an overdrive or a tape/tube simulation on a kick and don't sidechain and compress like so often they do these days and you'll get that sound.

M

[Creativemind]

Would someone be able to answer this question for me? it's one of my main EQ quandary's actually in general, not just for kicks.

So what would I be looking for in the spectrum analysis (of a kick) to tell me what to do with EQ?

I think we could do with an Re like Sonic Academy Kick or Sample Magic's Stacker to layer kick drums up. That would be awesome.

[selig]

Would someone be able to answer this question for me? it's one of my main EQ quandary's actually in general, not just for kicks.

So what would I be looking for in the spectrum analysis (of a kick) to tell me what to do with EQ?

I think we could do with an Re like Sonic Academy Kick or Sample Magic's Stacker to layer kick drums up. That would be awesome.

I personally cannot tell relative balances from a spectrum analyzer. Yea, It's obvious when there's no low end or obviously excessive top end, but then it's obvious to your ear way before that.

But I have a 'three point EQ' system I typically follow, which is to identify three points on any sound: The "body", or the fundamental area, the "mud" area above that, and higher up the 'attack/clarity/presence' area. Sometimes one of these ranges needs boosting, sometimes cutting, but it's in balancing these three basic parts of almost every sound that I end up with the sound that works for my track.

With a kick, the body is in the first two octaves, the mud in the 3-4 octave, and the attack in the 7-8th or so. In referencing octaves, I'm counting from 20-40 Hz as the first octave and 10 kHz to 20 kHz as the 10th.


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[Kov]

It's a distorted/overdriven 909-kick.

To recreate in reason: 909-sample (like the bd-xtc-samples from redrum single drum sounds in the fsb) or 7R-909 kick or rp punch -> scream tape setting. Maybe some kong overdrive before scream.

[Creativemind]

I don't know what it is but I'm still not getting the right sound on this kick. I'm trying a 909 kick drum (tried FSB, and 2 or 3 other samples which I have) and used overdrive on the Kong (that didn't sound well) and using Scream 4 on the Tape setting but still not getting there. I haven't in 4 and a half years been able to create a kick drum anywhere near like I hear in some of the old skool records I aspire to. They can't have been layering in them days, can they? so I can only presume analog equipment must be the key here. There must be something in the power of the analog gear that does something, or the circuitry of the anaolog gear adding something to it. People have said distortion, maybe the harmonic distortion in the analog gear. Might try saturation knob on there too.

[Creativemind]

The kick has a right pound to it and I'm slowly coming to the conclusion it isn't achievable digitally. It must be because these tracks were made on analog gear.

[QVprod]

The sound of that kick drum has nothing to do with analog gear vs digital. There's really not much special going on with it. It's loud and there's some distortion (overdrive). Sounds like there may be some compression to increase the attack as well. Perhaps maybe some EQ to fine tune the sound.

[Bonkhead]

Nope. this is a pretty simple kickdrum. I'm not at home right now otherwise I can replicate it for you. Maybe in 2 days.
Can you drop a list of re's you have that I can use ?

[scifunk]

Yep, 909 with with some overdrive (probably done on the mixing desk gain to overdrive the channel) and then the bottom filtered off and some boost in the mids.

Awful track ha ha

[Peter]

Kick drum advice: don't spend a month thinking about a kick drum.

[Djstarski]

Dont forget the space that was created for the kick to sit in . The sounds around the kick have to be treated too . There isnt much going on in the centre of the track . If there is , it sounds thin-ish which makes the kick sound more powerful .

[Creativemind]

Nope. this is a pretty simple kickdrum. I'm not at home right now otherwise I can replicate it for you. Maybe in 2 days.
Can you drop a list of re's you have that I can use ?

Sorry I don't have any Re's. If you could replicate it though that would be amazing. Maybe a video or an audio clip?


I suppose half of it is having a great kick drum to begin with.

What Re's were you thinking of using?

EDIT:- I've just found a 909 Kick drum sample that has a very similar feel to the tracks kick. It had electrical interference after the kick sound though. I turned down the decay on the Kong itself. Is that how people here would have eliminated that sound? I tried importing the sample into the sequencer and shortening the clip but by eliminating the electronic interference it made the kick cut out too soon and sound bad so the Kong method seemed best.


I imported the same sample into FL Studio and trimmed the interference off easy by just turning up the OUT on the sample up to 50% which I'm guessing is maybe the fade-out of the sample.

[O1B]

The kick takes time...

Hi All!
How did they get this kick drum so powerful in this track:-
Thanks!

The frequency content of that kick is pretty poor - for a kick. Someone mentioned Dynamic Range, but when the only sound contributing to that range is a blunt kick, the music ends up being flat. If you have a freq analyzer, you can see that the sub part of the kick has been phased. The Crest Factor nails at exactly 6.0 when the kick comes in, which tells me some killer limiting is going on. Without that LOUD kick - what am i saying, the song is the KICK. As it is, the DR of the Sides is 3 HIGHER than the MIDDLE.

A while back Hydlide at ReasonExperts made a video, using ReDrum, to break a kick into it's 6 parts.
Great video, if you can find it, or coax him to redo it. Thank God for keepvid.

Here, smell this 909 for size. The low end is relatively undisturbed. :

Sp-12 raw, i believe. Now that sounds like a whole lotta raw DR. KING.

[Creativemind]

That second video is ace. when it plays though afterwards, you can hear the processing that's been added. Sounds like compression but that's just a guess lol!

[Bonkhead]

that's the camera mic