The Fake Drums Tone Thread

JDOD

therecordingrebels.com
OK, here it is, in the style of the New Tone Thread from "guitars and basses" I've decided to post the "Fake Drums Tone Thread"

Most of us would love to have real drums on our recordings but don't have the space, neighbours, money, talent or time to develop our drumming so we have to use fake drums from a variety of sources and we try to make them sound as real as possible.

A lot of the time we only hear peoples fake drums in a full mix, but I think it would be handy to post them up without other instruments to let people hear them properly and assist making them sound as real as we can.

As its easy for us to cut shit up and stick it together, try and just link up the key beats you're using from different sections of your song - no one wants to listen to 6 repetative minutes of fake drums from a whole song!

I'll start - here's my effort for a song I've just finished the guitar work for - I'm in the process of adding vocals now:

View attachment Drum Sample Tone Test.mp3

Any tips to make them sound heavier and more real would be welcome!
 
JDOD, it's your thread and your rules--until and unless others show up and do as they please. ;)

I'm interested in a thread on programmed drums, but the New Tone Thread might not be the best model. The problem with that thread is that guitar tone doesn't matter outside a musical context, and that goes double for drum tone.

Anyway, if you're using quality samples, tone is not the issue. A sampled snare hit is going to sound like a recording of a real drummer striking a real snare--because that is what it is. But is it the right snare sound? Depends on the song.

For me the bigger issue is the programming. I program my drums by hand. Even if I start with a MIDI groove, I'm going to modify it extensively. Things like accents, nuances of note placement in relation to the beat, varying degrees of shuffle and swing--that stuff is very hard to program in a way that sounds authentic. It takes a pretty good live drummer to have a handle on it too, and few of those can articulate what they are doing and why. Even if you're skilled at programming, whether it works or not ultimately depends on the song.

Having said that, I hope the thread goes. I'll read it as I do the New Tone Thread. If I have anything to contribute, I will post.
 
Rules! LOL. There are no rules.

Post up some highlights of your beat building and explain how you got there.
 
Maybe I'll post a snippet this evening from the song I hope to finish in the next few days. What I will do, and what would be most helpful to hear from others, would be this format: A few bars of the drum part alone, followed by a few bars of the same in its song context.
 
A few bars of the drum part alone, followed by a few bars of the same in its song context.

That was what I was going to suggest. Hearing drums solo'd and in the context of the mix would be useful.

Here's an example of some drums I've done recently. I'm playing an Roland E-Kit (although I'm not a very good drummer yet!) triggering the EZDrummer2 main kit that I've tweaked a bit here and there. Still haven't completed the mix of the song yet. The drums are the stock sounds, no EQ/FX.

View attachment Drums.mp3

View attachment All.mp3

Here's a screenshot of the velocity for that part, if it helps to visualize it.

View attachment New Bitmap Image.bmp

:thumbs up:
 
The sound really good, Clean. They don't sound hugely fake at all to me but I suppose you're actually playing, not just lining samples up on a grid so they have a bit more of a organic feel to them. That's just from a timing point of view though I suppose. I've never recorded a real kit so I don't know how real they sound from that point of view... But you definitely sound like a bloke playing the drums
 
Okay, here's one. A few bars of the drum groove followed by the same in its musical context, an instrumental section from a song I hope to finish in the next few days. The samples are from the stock EZ Drummer kit, but I might switch those out for something else. No mix to speak of yet.

It's an uptempo backbeat shuffle. The shuffle is on the 8th note hats and kicks, so the strength of the shuffle feel depends on the volume of those relative to the quarter note hats and kicks. At the moment I've got them set fairly low, hats especially. Nothing is quantized. Snares are slightly ahead of the beat, which is unusual for the songs I've been doing lately, but I thought it propelled the groove just a little. On the other hand, the bass is playing behind the beat. The contrast between early snare and late bass sounded off-kilter and interesting to me. I'll take this down once I've posted the finished song on the Clinic.

 
Most of the drum VSTi's today are real drums. So that isn't fake. The playing is what ends up fake. I agree, I would love to have a full kit and have someone playing it. But I settle for VSTi.

The key to a good MIDI drum, is the sequencing and the easiest way to get the sequence is with either an full on e-kit or some sort of pads to give it a real groove. The velocity is probably only second to timing. The e-kit gives a more natural (and faster) way to get the drums to hit the groove. One can do it from hand, but it really is tedious and I would think after a few bars, one ends up doing a lot of looping or copy past.
 
Most of the drum VSTi's today are real drums. So that isn't fake. The playing is what ends up fake. I agree, I would love to have a full kit and have someone playing it. But I settle for VSTi.

The key to a good MIDI drum, is the sequencing and the easiest way to get the sequence is with either an full on e-kit or some sort of pads to give it a real groove. The velocity is probably only second to timing. The e-kit gives a more natural (and faster) way to get the drums to hit the groove. One can do it from hand, but it really is tedious and I would think after a few bars, one ends up doing a lot of looping or copy past.

Yes, I recall the last time you said this, and every other time every other fake drum guy has said this.

Seriously, you guys need two macros- one for "I'd love to have real drums but I just don't have the time/money/location to learn" and another for "But the samples are reeaaaal! It's all about how they're prograammmeeeed!"

Then you could just say everything you ever say with two macros.
 
Here's an example of some drums I've done recently. I'm playing an Roland E-Kit (although I'm not a very good drummer yet!) triggering the EZDrummer2 main kit that I've tweaked a bit here and there. Still haven't completed the mix of the song yet. The drums are the stock sounds, no EQ/FX.

Cool sounding song, is that yours?
 
Yes, I recall the last time you said this, and every other time every other fake drum guy has said this.

Seriously, you guys need two macros- one for "I'd love to have real drums but I just don't have the time/money/location to learn" and another for "But the samples are reeaaaal! It's all about how they're prograammmeeeed!"

Then you could just say everything you ever say with two macros.

This.

I mean I know why a lot of people do it, and Im not hating on it, I just said it would be cool to have a thread like this with real drums. I dont want to get into a long and drawn out debate over fake drums and how they always sound fake no matter what or why its ok to use fake drums that are fake. I give zero fucks about all of that. My interest is hearing how other fellow home recording peoples kits are sounding and what I can do to make mine sound better.
 
This.

I mean I know why a lot of people do it, and Im not hating on it, I just said it would be cool to have a thread like this with real drums. I dont want to get into a long and drawn out debate over fake drums and how they always sound fake no matter what or why its ok to use fake drums that are fake. I give zero fucks about all of that. My interest is hearing how other fellow home recording peoples kits are sounding and what I can do to make mine sound better.

Right yeah, me too, but I feel like you can't even mention real drums without certain people getting offended, storming in and defending their right to use samples, even though it wasn't threatened.
 
Right yeah, me too, but I feel like you can't even mention real drums without certain people getting offended, storming in and defending their right to use samples, even though it wasn't threatened.

I dont come around here much but you are not the first to mention this recently.
 
Right yeah, me too, but I feel like you can't even mention real drums without certain people getting offended, storming in and defending their right to use samples, even though it wasn't threatened.

I say it to show appreciation for those who do the real thing and not pretending what I am doing is the same as a real kit and drummer is doing.

I have no idea where you came up with the offended,I was showing respect for the real deal.
 
Right yeah, me too, but I feel like you can't even mention real drums without certain people getting offended, storming in and defending their right to use samples, even though it wasn't threatened.

giphy.gif
 
Cool sounding song, is that yours?

It's a friend of mines song. I'm working with him to build an albums worth of songs for him. He struggles to play guitar now with his old hands so I'm doing all the instruments for him and he's just got the singing duties.
 
Right yeah, me too, but I feel like you can't even mention real drums without certain people getting offended, storming in and defending their right to use samples, even though it wasn't threatened.

Who's doing that Fleet? Must be happening in some corner of the forum that I don't visit. I'm not seeing the people who are writing and recording much wasting time defending what they do or attacking others. They've got a muse to feed, and only so many hours in a day.
 
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