Layering Kicks - help!

[MGB]

Hi all, apologies if there's a thread about this specifically - I had a look but couldn't find one.

I'm interested in how you go about layering kicks. I've been making some hip hop beats so I've been using old funk breaks and then fattening them up with extra kicks and snares.

Particularly with the kicks, I find it difficult to hear or know whether they are hitting together properly and in phase. Most of the time I'm using the break in Dr Rex and then the extra kick in NN19 to make it easier to pitch up and down. Because I can't see the waveforms, I can't tell if they are in phase or not and while most of the time they sound OK, I feel like they could be hitting harder or fitting better. I will try to post an example of a break I've made later tonight for reference.

So yeah - any tips you have about correctly layering your kicks and dealing with phase issues are most welcome. Thanks team.

[LABONERECORDINGS]

What we would do is have the transient (the 'hit') of one kick and let it tail out, then have our layered kick (808, 909) underneath it. We'd also fade in the 808 / 909 so it won't suppress the transient of our acoustic kick (ADSR use here with attack something like 5 to 10ms or to taste if sample triggering, or really fast audio clip fades)- this may help stop / prevent phasing altogether (as the two hits aren't colliding / cancelling out), and could give you a beefy/thumpy tail on your kick - the initial hit would be pretty fast, the tail would decay 'naturally' or synthetically to your needs (ADSR.... have D = 0, S= Max, R to taste for fadeout after the trigger finishes). Ensure there's no signal between your sequenced kicks (plenty of 'dead' space) so you don't have one tail running over the next kick (polyphony to 1). Nothing worse than a clicking on your kicks (unless you like them that way)

We'd then midi trigger both kicks together, but we'd shift the layered kick a click at a time, so draw in 8 kicks on the grid for the acoustic kick, plus 8 layered kicks also on the grid. Now with the layered kick move them a tick in turn so kick 1 = on grid, kick 2 = 1 tick right, kick 3 = 2 ticks, leaving the acoustic kick alone on each bar grid hit...

As you play through them you might find one pops out stronger than the rest, which would indicate it's pretty good in phase. Bounce the kicks to audio, keep the one you like, export to disk for safe keeping (start creating your library of the ones you like, saves doing this all again later)

To go even more precise, you can take the same 8 bar pattern and time stretch the MIDI to 16 bars long... then double the tempo. Reason for doing this is that you've jut made the ticks double precision. The 2nd kick in the 'time stretched' MIDI clip would no longer be at tick 1 but it would be at tick 2 position, so you can move it back and you'd technically be at '0.5' ticks at your original tempo. You can mess around with time stretching so you're at 12 bars to then have ticks at different timings, again to create different hits that you may find hits just right.

Once you get the hang of it you can create some pretty tasty sounding drums. Also remember levels of the sounds help too, as well as the ADSR envelopes of the samples, plus pitch can make a difference too (if you pitch shift one kick by a few cents you'll get a different sound due to that wonderful phase cancellation again).

This is just a couple of ways for layering. We've seen professionals do the same thing when layering snares; get 3 or 4 snares you like, have 1 as the 'lead' transient and fade the others in - swap around which one leads to create different drum hits. Before you know it you'll have a nice collection of drums you like, then just piecing them together is the next step.

You can look at EQing too, but be careful not to warp the signal too much, just add a bit or cut rogue frequencies you don't like to get the character. Compression is another tool to help control things more (bring up the tail a bit more perhaps, but may also bring up noise from the acoustic kick if from tape / vinyl etc). Stereo imaging... that's a bit more key, but we'd suggest have the high frequencies perhaps natural / wide (5-7k upwards) and lower frequencies in mono. Plus mono check the total signal too (if you've got too much stereo or width on your beater, might sound more wimpy and not so abrupt). You could add a plate or room reverb to the acoustic kick a touch to give it space, but leave the subby part more dry, to stop potential phasing later (especially on vinyl cutting, or mono sound systems in clubs etc)

We're looking into tuning drums too, to a certain extent and in a very particular way, to help when we're getting into composing stage later.

PM us if you want some more ideas, be good to bounce a few back and forth

[MGB]

Amazing advice, thanks so much! I've got a bit to try out, i'll be in touch again soon

[Creativemind]

I've sought advice on this over the years. Still not go to grips with it but would I be right in saying, that a) sample selection is vital and b) that the elements you might listen for in the sample selection would differ from genre to genre (if it's electronic music)? a house kick you see is noticeably different than a trance kick. A trance kick is more zappy / pulsey sounding.

I was told the technique is the same for all electronic music but the one I've seen on you tube (and it's the bees knees) but it has (and most layering kick drum vids do) a click element to the kick as one of it's 3 layers but I wouldn't want a click in my kick for house.

[LABONERECORDINGS]

House kicks, to us, are more 'weighty' and have that softer 808 style sound, without the 'click', more bassline orientated (so a little tuning will help to fit your track) - you might want the click to get over smaller systems though (ie the 'in-the-pocket-smartphone-monospeaker-walking-down-the-street-yagetmefam' sound system), or you might just want to do a faster pitch bend to be heard (smaller systems may only go down to 80Hz, so even though house music we would say is aimed more at a club sound system, if you want radio play, you'll have to pitch bend from a higher note point first, so the 80Hz speaker can hear the transient, else it might be heard as a non existent kick on these systems) - House music also benefits from sidechain compression tied to the kick, to have more of a pronounced effect, especially on smaller systems because we, the listener, will fill in the 'blanks' a bit more (our brain is clever at doing that)

Trance is a little higher up and a little to a lot harder (more 909 kick than 808 we would say), or if you use the 808 have a more higher pitch bend faster, and a shorter tail (to coincide with the tempo, maybe)

The 'click' element is the beater (the 'twack' that gets your attention), then the ultra fast pitch down is the result of the skin of the kick drum reverberating in response to the beater hit, and then the tail is the continued 'skin' coming towards a stop. Harder the hit, the slightly higher the pitch of the body (the click has long pasted so that doesn't change pitch, or tends not to: same beater on same contact just harder/softer, think hard = open filter, soft = low pass filter cutting the highs), because you're forcing the kick skin to stretch further so it must return to initial state quicker (hence the faster pitch). Softer hits = more filtered 'click' (due to softer touches from beater) plus less pitch down to the final pitch of the drum (we'd say the body is more the tune/tone of the drum because that's the sound that's more associated with tuning, in our opinion)

Yes from genre to genre kicks (and other drums) do change styles; house/trance/techno/4-to-the-floor are more 'electronic' / 'synth' based, whilst music genres using breakbeats would have a more acoustic+synthetic sound to it (acoustic from sampled records for example, and synth to add in more 'weight' since drum breaks from 1950s/60s/70s tend not to have low end that much, since the styles back then didn't demand it - home systems were basic, stereo systems only came out around these times, so bass was a bit of a rarity, especially on vinyl - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereopho ... _and_video for more on the 'stereo' info, as a tangent read)

You can use anything really for kick drums though, don't think drums are the only instruments: you can use plastic bucket hits (for the 'beater'), basketball/football kicks/bounces (for the body / tail), or even metal oil drums (for more timpani sounding)

Sample selection can be vital, but, and here's the real but, don't feel constrained to 'follow the crowd' because 'x artist uses this kick so I must to get my track like theirs'. Look at theirs for inspiration, analyse and see where their kicks are hitting, but also see if they are tuned within the key of their track (not just to the root note, this is what we're doing in regards to tuning our kits to a key, not specifically a note, because we can then select a tuned kit in a key and the kit 'should' fit in better because not clashing as much as a 'just slapped in sample because it sounds good on it's own'. The sounds should all work together, to get the whole message across. Each part as a sum of all parts = the concept / idea you want the listener to get/understand.

If you can, try using a VST/AU host that can either rewire Reason, and then use Voxengo Span to get a stereo spectrum analyser on your drums (Reason's one is good for a starting point).

We'll cobble a video together soon to show you what we get up to, using Addictive Drums 2 (we've got the full catalog so we'll be abusing that A LOT)

Take it another way too, just because we're saying what we do don't take it as gospel, you might find another way that works for you. There's no rules, only guides. A guide can always go off the track, while rules, well, are meant to be broken (and twisted or simply ignored) - we don't follow rules

[Creativemind]

House kicks, to us, are more 'weighty' and have that softer 808 style sound, without the 'click', more bassline orientated (so a little tuning will help to fit your track) - you might want the click to get over smaller systems though (ie the 'in-the-pocket-smartphone-monospeaker-walking-down-the-street-yagetmefam' sound system), or you might just want to do a faster pitch bend to be heard (smaller systems may only go down to 80Hz, so even though house music we would say is aimed more at a club sound system, if you want radio play, you'll have to pitch bend from a higher note point first, so the 80Hz speaker can hear the transient, else it might be heard as a non existent kick on these systems) - House music also benefits from sidechain compression tied to the kick, to have more of a pronounced effect, especially on smaller systems because we, the listener, will fill in the 'blanks' a bit more (our brain is clever at doing that)

Trance is a little higher up and a little to a lot harder (more 909 kick than 808 we would say), or if you use the 808 have a more higher pitch bend faster, and a shorter tail (to coincide with the tempo, maybe)

The 'click' element is the beater (the 'twack' that gets your attention), then the ultra fast pitch down is the result of the skin of the kick drum reverberating in response to the beater hit, and then the tail is the continued 'skin' coming towards a stop. Harder the hit, the slightly higher the pitch of the body (the click has long pasted so that doesn't change pitch, or tends not to: same beater on same contact just harder/softer, think hard = open filter, soft = low pass filter cutting the highs), because you're forcing the kick skin to stretch further so it must return to initial state quicker (hence the faster pitch). Softer hits = more filtered 'click' (due to softer touches from beater) plus less pitch down to the final pitch of the drum (we'd say the body is more the tune/tone of the drum because that's the sound that's more associated with tuning, in our opinion)

Yes from genre to genre kicks (and other drums) do change styles; house/trance/techno/4-to-the-floor are more 'electronic' / 'synth' based, whilst music genres using breakbeats would have a more acoustic+synthetic sound to it (acoustic from sampled records for example, and synth to add in more 'weight' since drum breaks from 1950s/60s/70s tend not to have low end that much, since the styles back then didn't demand it - home systems were basic, stereo systems only came out around these times, so bass was a bit of a rarity, especially on vinyl - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereopho ... _and_video for more on the 'stereo' info, as a tangent read)

You can use anything really for kick drums though, don't think drums are the only instruments: you can use plastic bucket hits (for the 'beater'), basketball/football kicks/bounces (for the body / tail), or even metal oil drums (for more timpani sounding)

Sample selection can be vital, but, and here's the real but, don't feel constrained to 'follow the crowd' because 'x artist uses this kick so I must to get my track like theirs'. Look at theirs for inspiration, analyse and see where their kicks are hitting, but also see if they are tuned within the key of their track (not just to the root note, this is what we're doing in regards to tuning our kits to a key, not specifically a note, because we can then select a tuned kit in a key and the kit 'should' fit in better because not clashing as much as a 'just slapped in sample because it sounds good on it's own'. The sounds should all work together, to get the whole message across. Each part as a sum of all parts = the concept / idea you want the listener to get/understand.

If you can, try using a VST/AU host that can either rewire Reason, and then use Voxengo Span to get a stereo spectrum analyser on your drums (Reason's one is good for a starting point).

We'll cobble a video together soon to show you what we get up to, using Addictive Drums 2 (we've got the full catalog so we'll be abusing that A LOT)

Take it another way too, just because we're saying what we do don't take it as gospel, you might find another way that works for you. There's no rules, only guides. A guide can always go off the track, while rules, well, are meant to be broken (and twisted or simply ignored) - we don't follow rules

Very good in depth response there LAB:ONE. Thanks!

The house tracks I mainly listen to are old skool 89-93 rave / house tracks. Luvvem. I will link a couple here if you wouldn't mind taking a listen. If you're 36+ and into dance music, you'll probably be familiar with these tracks. I'll find ones that display the kind of timbre / oomph I'm after.

Also, if I was to analyse a kick in o-zone, Reason or audacity, what would I be looking for / analysing precisely?

I know those kicks aren't anything special be honest but the drums seem to sound phat in clubs and drive the track well. Also, I know they're probably done on analog gear as they were all before computers and daw's.

[LABONERECORDINGS]

Just came across this again... will take a look tonight (going in on a new break we've come up with using Addictive Drums and Slate VMR using Eiosis Air and Earth plus a couple other bits, so will see if that sort of thing matches up)

[LABONERECORDINGS]

Ok ... the Sasha remix track.... basically sampled the intro where the kick can be heard and using Black Knight EQ to low cut and high cut to create a sort of band pass filter, to find the character of the kicks. Simply grabbed a 1 bar loop intro first 4 kick hits, set to 130bpm, and away we go.

For some MIDI note to key freq help use http://subsynth.sourceforge.net/midinote2freq.html

75Hz seems to poke out fairly prominently (D - Eb) for the main subby part of the kick (using MOTU CueMix FFT analyser, would use Voxengo Span but not in Cubase, also so we can see both channels info same time). As expected this low end is mono, only slight stereo info probably coming from vinyl rumble. Black Knight settings Low cut at 69Hz, 0.5 Q, High cut 66Hz 0.5 Q, to get our BP filter (purely to hear characteristics, not to be all surgical - remember weire' looking for similar qualities, and not total cloning). Hitting around -17db for the sub end here (so quite solid, using Flower Audio default settings)

There's more of a beater hit up at about 100Hz (G to Ab) - so as far as we can tell, we have D and G, or Eb and Ab, which are harmonic and in the key of D Major / D minor. High cut 180Hz 0.5 Q, Low cut left as is for now

As we open the High cut upwards we don't hear much change until 500hz ish where the front end starts to come thorugh, the actual beater of the kick can be heard. 800Hz beater gets a bit more clarity. 1K and we're starting to hear the tambourine mix in a touch, which could be kick rattling the tambouring (or some clever editing).

2 to 3 K we're hearing even more beater and sounds a bit more airy, so while we're going up we'd expect this could be the higher end of the kick. If we move low cut up to800-900HZ we're getting beater range of the transent, quite clearly, at around -26db level. Moving Low cut down to 200Hz, we're hearing the beater really clearly, and a bit of punch from the kick too (so this tell sis the 'twack', that chesty sound maybe around this area). !30HZ and we're getting closer again to more electronic style kick. 100hz is traditional dance style kick presence, especially for breakbeats (bass has room to play) - but we're talking house here... Go back down to 67HZ and our subby end comes back. 50Hz can clean up the vinyl rumble (if we were to use this), but that now tells me that lower than 50Hz wont be a lot of signal, so this helps define the bass of our kick to be 65-80HZ region, so we can tune to our track

5k adds more tambourine, giving the impression of a bit harder transient, but the tambourine is more pronounced.

6.7k sounds a lot more toppy on tambourine, even close to a high hat sound.

Open the low cut completely and you'll have all the tops in (16th hats, definite tambourine clear as day)

Ok now the other side of things... the kick length....

Messing around with the EQ to 'mask' out certain frequencies, we found that the kick length is around the length of the beat or around that. We tried fades to see if the kick appears 'stuttery' or if we could smoothly dip the signal following the tail. Cut too far back you can tell the kick should be longer, so 1 beat length is about right. This is probably the extra drive for house tracks, because as the tail of one kick finishes the next propels hard and loud for maximum impact. You can have too much impact where the listener doesn't get the vibe so much of that 'illegal warehousey' sound, which is what these tracks strive to achieve, and probably why they sound so powerful on big rigs. Also we'd say if you were to use similar sounds in this way, make sure the kick is monophonic so you could easily have the following kick cut the previous kick without any overlapping. You may have to manual edit the audio bounce after due to possible clicks if the ADSR just isn't doing it - but that's more in the detail.

Also, the bassline that's in the track works well with the kick, giving the kick some extra 'roll' even though it's the bass - that's the thing with these types of tracks too where the kick and the bass do overlap; you could sidechain, or you could level automate or maybe filter automate at key points, or you could simply avoid having both playing at exactly the same time altogether (ala walking bass kick bass kick bass style patterns).

Ok what about the construction? We've addeda file here for you to download, so have a play with it. You could swap out the Physical modelled Kick for a more 'acoustic' or sampled kick, play with tuning, length, pitch bending too can give the front end that little more pronounced beater hit.

http://www.combinatorhq.com/index.php/d ... nstruction

Let us know if this helps at all