My method of layering drum tracks (no magic here)

[Robbie Sullivan]

Copying my post from: http://www.robbiesullivan.com/blog/?p=28

 

A big way to increase the dynamic range of a song is to switch up the sounds being used, for instance in drums. A singer will be husky on the quiet parts and soaring in the chorus--why can't we do the same in the drum domain?

 

But there are a ton of factors that come into play as you start shifting your sounds--it becomes more complicated, you take more time getting the sounds right, and you are left with the question of how to trigger the different sounds--do you bounce the layered sounds down to samples, then trigger from there? Should they all be in one track, then broken out using aux channels for mixing?

 

So I'm going to share my method triggering/layering drums, one which I believe is about as simple and flexible as possible without making compromises on sound quality.

 

The Method

 

Basically, I create a new track in Logic for each drum sound I use. I use ultrabeat (though I hate the GUI it is fast and CPU-light, if buggy). If I have an acoustic kick as well as that same acoustic kick w/ a high-pass filter, those are two different tracks. All kicks are on C1, all snares on D1 and E1 (to facilitate rolls), rims C#1, etc.--essentially GM mapping. Hats are special--closed and open on the same instrument, set to monophonic to close the open hate when a CL hat is played.

 

When I want to play in a pattern (I do as much of my programming live as possible and so should you), I select the tracks that I want for the part (as many kicks as I want, as many claps as I want, as many snares as I want), then I record them all together. I may hit the C1 key once, but if I have two kicks going each will receive the message and sound. Obviously fine-tuning (for instance, beat 2 has this snare, beat 4 has this snare) is done after the fact.

 

If I am still composing (and I always am), when I shift to the next section of the song I can just copy the drum pattern I want to any other track. Even though each midi region may contain a number of different notes, because my drum tracks are notes-specific, I can move a region from a snare in a chorus to a kick in the next chorus and the kick from the chorus comes along.

 

While I end up with more tracks on the screen, the mixer (probably you) will see all those tracks anyway. I'm not breaking out tracks, and when I save the drum sounds as channel strip settings I don't have to rebuild the routing/effect chain.

 

How do you guys layer?