Advice Needed On Drums

[Dr. Varney]

Do you have any tips on how to learn and what's the best way to practice my drumming?

I'm not a drummer, I don't even have a drumkit... I merely have a standard MIDI keyboard which I use with my pattern sequencing software/ DAW, but I don't have a clue about drums.

I decided to have a go but I was having a lot of trouble keeping time and the onboard metronome wasn't helping... so I made a 'click track' using a high hat and sidestick. Anyway, I've got that down with robotic precision throughout the song.

So then I come to lay some drums down - starting with a bass drum and snare but I can't quite understand what's going on here...

The click track pattern isn't as long as the drum pattern but the effect is such that it wouldn't matter because it's continuous. In other words, close your eyes and you wouldn't know where the click pattern begins and ends.

I designed my drum pattern to be repeated so that all I have to do is place on after another - and that should be continuous, too.

The problem is, it goes out of sync with the click track after a few repeats. If the click is seamless and the drum pattern is seamless, I don't get how they can start off perfectly, then decay into a mess later on.

It's not a latency problem - the problem is with the drumming itself.

So what I'm fishing for, is some advice on how to assemble a drum track properly...

Like, where do you start? What's your technique? What do you lay down first? Do you attempt to play it all the way through or do you do it chunks and assemble it later? I realise everyone's going to have a different approach but it has to be better than mine - which just results in a terrible mess. Any basic advice you can give me on how to keep time etc and vary the patterns will be a good start.

Thanks

Dr. V

 

[jlewis]

I decided to have a go but I was having a lot of trouble keeping time and the onboard metronome wasn't helping... so I made a 'click track' using a high hat and sidestick. Anyway, I've got that down with robotic precision throughout the song.

I sometimes find it hard to play to a metronome as well,

The click track pattern isn't as long as the drum pattern but the effect is such that it wouldn't matter because it's continuous. In other words, close your eyes and you wouldn't know where the click pattern begins and ends.

You need to include a kick drum in the pattern. That will start it off for you. Try playing this pattern or mousing it into the pianoroll.
KICK HAT SNARE HAT.

Or, its probably because your click track isn't as long as the drum pattern. If it is not as long, then you are off-beat, or in a different time signature or something

I designed my drum pattern to be repeated so that all I have to do is place on after another - and that should be continuous, too.

The problem is, it goes out of sync with the click track after a few repeats. If the click is seamless and the drum pattern is seamless, I don't get how they can start off perfectly, then decay into a mess later on.

It's not a latency problem - the problem is with the drumming itself.

If you have a quantize function, try to apply it to your pattern, or make sure that you have 'snap-to' enabled in your DAW. Try drawing a simple pattern into the midi editor. Zoom in real close if you have to, to make sure the notes are perfectly on the bars. And again, if the length of the track that you made isn't some even division of the size of a measure in the time signature that your DAW is set to, then it must be in a different tempo or time signature or off beat some other way which would cause the DAW's click track to go off beat after a while. hope that makes sense, it felt weird to type.

Like, where do you start? What's your technique? What do you lay down first? Do you attempt to play it all the way through or do you do it chunks and assemble it later? I realise everyone's going to have a different approach but it has to be better than mine - which just results in a terrible mess. Any basic advice you can give me on how to keep time etc and vary the patterns will be a good start.

I usually get a beat in my head, start playing it, guess what the tempo is, set my click track, play the beat with the click, adjust the click, record the beat (in chunks) Varying patterns is sometimes tough. Especially if you are trying to make midi sound like real drums. You pretty much have to know what you want it to sound like and go from there. Take it one drum piece at a time if you need to. Listen to the whole song and try to imagine when the drums should change, when do they feel like they need a little extra pizzaz etc... Other than that, just try and make sure you are doing everything according to the tempo and time signature that your daw is set to and you should be groovin in no time. Good luck!

 

[Dr. Varney]

Thanks. I didn't know I should put a bass drum in a click track. I thought it just had to go 'tick, tick, tick'. In fact, I've no idea what one should sound like. I've never heard one before. I just saw some people talking about it on here and thought it might be a good idea to use one.

As you advised, I've put a bass drum on and a snare and now it sounds more like drums. Thing is, it synchronises absolutely brilliant in most parts and makes my reference track (I'm doing a cover btw) sound more like an up tempo dance thingy... Trouble is, the song keeps changing in places and I can't put my finger on how or why... what is it doing? It goes out of sync so I have to keep moving the click track along or back a bit to make it sync again...

Surely, if you tap rythmically to the tempo of a song, it should stay exactly the same all the way along, so how can it be changing?

I just realised there was something called 'insert tempo' in a menu somewhere. Is it possible for a song to change tempo while it's playing? Wouldn't we notice that and wouldn't that make it suddenly sound wrong or do they cover it up somehow so we don't notice?

Would this mean using more than one click track or would I use just one and change the tempo of the song somehow?

This is getting complicated. Before I started, I thought I could just drum along but it turns out not so easy at it seems.

Dr. V

 

[jlewis]

Thanks. I didn't know I should put a bass drum in a click track. I thought it just had to go 'tick, tick, tick'. In fact, I've no idea what one should sound like. I've never heard one before. I just saw some people talking about it on here and thought it might be a good idea to use one.

You don't have to, but since you said you were having trouble hearing where the loop began, I thought a bass drum would set it off. A click track can be anything that you can keep a rhythm to.

As you advised, I've put a bass drum on and a snare and now it sounds more like drums. Thing is, it synchronises absolutely brilliant in most parts and makes my reference track (I'm doing a cover btw) sound more like an up tempo dance thingy... Trouble is, the song keeps changing in places and I can't put my finger on how or why... what is it doing? It goes out of sync so I have to keep moving the click track along or back a bit to make it sync again...

sounds like you don't have the 'snap-to' function enabled in your DAW, that function basically locks your pattern to the grid so it always lines up in the same spot on any given measure.

You also might want to make sure your pattern is exactly the length of one measure in your DAW. that way, if you copy and paste it, measure for measure, it should fit perfectly.

The reason it sounds like a dance song is because the particular pattern I suggested is a popular one in dance genres. It is extremely basic, so you can play just about anything overtop of it. To get a more rock and roll style drum, you would have to vary the pattern more.

Surely, if you tap rythmically to the tempo of a song, it should stay exactly the same all the way along, so how can it be changing?

The copied pattern will sound off even if it is just 1/64th note off. It's annoying, but like I said, zoom in super close to see that everything is properly aligned.

I just realised there was something called 'insert tempo' in a menu somewhere. Is it possible for a song to change tempo while it's playing? Wouldn't we notice that and wouldn't that make it suddenly sound wrong or do they cover it up somehow so we don't notice?

It is possible for you to change the tempo during a song, but that would only be for certain applications or effects, which I wouldn't worry about right now. You are going to want your song to stay in the same tempo throughout probably, otherwise you might get more confused.

Would this mean using more than one click track or would I use just one and change the tempo of the song somehow?

You would do everything to the same click track, but the click track would change depending on the automation of the tempo. If you are doing only midi, then you could play the whole thing set to one tempo and adjust tempo changes at any time.

This is getting complicated. Before I started, I thought I could just drum along but it turns out not so easy at it seems.

Yes, midi drums are tough, keep it up though, you'll be able to get usable tracks eventually, but don't expect it to sound like John Bonham

 

[Dr. Varney]

Thank you for taking the time, JLewis. That's quality advice. It's possible you've saved me another headache as I was about to go off on another tangent of experimentation which might have led to more frustration...

It is possible for you to change the tempo during a song, but that would only be for certain applications or effects, which I wouldn't worry about right now. You are going to want your song to stay in the same tempo throughout probably, otherwise you might get more confused.

That's just it. I was beginning to think maybe tempos change almost unnoticably all the time. I'm glad that turned out to be a red herring.

You're right - turns out I wasn't zooming in 'super-close' enough. I was using the gaps between the patterns as my visual clue, rather than the line itself.

Kind Regards

Dr. V

 

[FURY101]

can you write tabs or notation?
try a program called guitar pro...it does everything

 

[guitarplayr82]

The problem is, it goes out of sync with the click track after a few repeats. If the click is seamless and the drum pattern is seamless, I don't get how they can start off perfectly, then decay into a mess later on.

Yeah, like jlewis said, you definitely need to quantize that. It might sound perfectly in time for the first few measures, but it gets worse as it goes along.
If you are looping your drum track it could also be that the loop doesn't make a whole number of measures. For example, if you started the loop at measure 4 and looped to measure 6.25, your second loop will start 1/4 of a measure later than where your first loop started in relation to fractions of measures. This can be hard to detect if you are only a small portion of a measure off, so you might have to zoom in to the looped segment to find out if this is the problem.

Like, where do you start? What's your technique? What do you lay down first? Do you attempt to play it all the way through or do you do it chunks and assemble it later?

I tend to try a different technique each time I do MIDI drums, but I think I finally have a method locked down that I will continue to use. Because I can play drums on a real drum kit (and not just on a keyboard), I have a Yamaha DD-65 which helps me a lot in tracking drums since I can physically play the beats on drum pads rather than tapping them into a keyboard or MPD. Basically I record all my guitars for my project first and then practice the song on the DD-65 a few times all the way through. This gives me a pretty good feel for what I want to do when tracking so it goes a lot quicker. When I feel ready, I hook the DD-65 up via MIDI and record the entire song all the way through. If I mess up at some point in the song I'll most likely stop and restart tracking from where I messed up, however on my most recent project I was able to get through the whole song in one take. Once I am done tracking I go through the piano roll and quantize parts that were slightly off time. After quantizing, I go through the entire piano roll again and manually move MIDI notes that were either not quantized properly or were hit on the wrong drum pad into place. From there I go through the piano roll once more and adjust all the individual note velocities to where I want them. Next I seperate out all the different drums from each other (since I tracked into one single MIDI file) so I have a MIDI track for each drum. Now I can finally EQ, compress, and automate volumes.

 

[Dr. Varney]

Thanks, guitarplayr82. That process is similar to how I was thinking of doing it, though i can only handle one drum at a time.

My click track is just right now but I'm still making a complete mess of the main drums, take after take. My problem is I can't decide what to do with the drums and keep changing my mind on each take.

I was wondering if it's possible to plan it all out first? I tend to jam; like throwing mud at a wall and seeing what sticks.

It's easier when I'm making up stuff, 'cos anything goes in your own song, right? I often just throw in a drum machine preset pattern... keep going through them 'till I find one I like, then play some guitar or keyboards over the top, but there isn't much to be learned by doing that. This is a cover, so it's showing up all my weaknesses... which is good!

I'll read up on quantizing tomorrow. I don't fully understand how it works yet.

Dr. V

 

[Dr. Varney]

Right, I spent a very long time yesterday, manually placing each pattern instance of my click track against the source. It varies to a ridiculous degree and snapping has done no good. The only way to get this right was turn snapping off and free-position each one meticulously.

So today, I've stripped down to just the clicktrack (snapped to beat) and the source - and now I've attempted to move the source in line with the click instead. Starts off okay but decays quite rapidly into a mess later on.

This is what I can't understand: How am I supposed to make music at all, if this is happening? Starting, as I have, with an original source, which was originally recorded by proper musicans and you'd expect those musicans to keep pretty damn good time - and a DAW, which is snapping patterns to the absolute beat goes wanging off into the distant land of total bananas... ???

Supposing I was doing something original? Without a source reference of someone else's music, how would I know mine was going to stay properly in time? More to the point - without something to set it by, how would I know where and by how much it was going out?

Should I be looking at latency compensation? If so, how does one begin to calculate how much is needed?

I'm really stuck here. Please can you advise? Where, what am I doing wrong? Could there be something wrong with my computer or something? Or something wrong with my brain? It just doesn't make any sense.

Dr. V

 

[jlewis]

I doubt latency is your problem. Since you are trying to line up a drum pattern with a song that has already been recording, you need to figure out what the BPM of the song is and set your DAW accordingly. It could be that the band did not play to a click track and because of that, there will be natural tempo changes throughout the song, making it impossible to add a beat which is set perfectly to a certain tempo. In a case like this, you would have to play along through the whole song to get everything to line up properly.

OR, you could just try and build the cover without ever actually playing overtop of the original. That way the tempo doesn't have to be exactly as it was, as long as it is similar and the notation is the same then it should sound like the original.

 

[guitarplayr82]

Right, I spent a very long time yesterday, manually placing each pattern instance of my click track against the source. It varies to a ridiculous degree and snapping has done no good. The only way to get this right was turn snapping off and free-position each one meticulously.

So today, I've stripped down to just the clicktrack (snapped to beat) and the source - and now I've attempted to move the source in line with the click instead. Starts off okay but decays quite rapidly into a mess later on.

This is what I can't understand: How am I supposed to make music at all, if this is happening? Starting, as I have, with an original source, which was originally recorded by proper musicans and you'd expect those musicans to keep pretty damn good time - and a DAW, which is snapping patterns to the absolute beat goes wanging off into the distant land of total bananas... ???

Supposing I was doing something original? Without a source reference of someone else's music, how would I know mine was going to stay properly in time? More to the point - without something to set it by, how would I know where and by how much it was going out?

Should I be looking at latency compensation? If so, how does one begin to calculate how much is needed?

I'm really stuck here. Please can you advise? Where, what am I doing wrong? Could there be something wrong with my computer or something? Or something wrong with my brain? It just doesn't make any sense.

Dr. V

What DAW are you using?

 

[Dr. Varney]

Jlewis, I think you're probably right there... build up from scratch using the source as a rough guide only, listening in occasionally for prompts.

I've stuck the clicktrack firmly to the grid and started chopping up the source .wav instead, to fit the fixed click track. I think I can live with the chops. It only needed about three or four slices and it works, at least. In fact, it sounds quite good. The only other thing I could do is keep the source .wav whole and just nudge it this way and that, as the need arises.

If chopping it up proves troublesome, I can easily import it again and do the latter.

I've popped in a few time markers, so I know roughly where to cue stuff in.

What DAW are you using?

I'm using FL Studio 8 (Producer Edition). I tried Reaper but I can't get any of the native FL instruments to work with it. FL is ideal for beginners, like myself. There was almost no learning curve initially.