Hi guys,
When it comes to drum tails and grooving it I don't know what to do.
Even when I combine some white noise(eq' ed sometimes) with the drum it does not sound natural.
How do you guys make your drums sound more natural and groove better regarding pitch?

 

Groove? It's about timing and minutes stress and drag. I usually play it since I'm a drummer.

Not sure what you mean with "white noise" and "regarding pitch". But velocity/dynamics, modulating and randomizing harmonics/overtones, multi-sampled drums, etc comes to mind.

 

How do you randomize harmonics and overtones in way not to ruin the character of drums?

 

Multi-sampled drums, or add random variation in sample start or FM modulation when layering. I like to subtly add singing that changes randomly for every hit (I'm a drummer since I was 4yo). It's a bit nerdy but the subtleness makes any "robotic pattern" a bit more organic. Same with adding humanization in the MIDI (velocity, MIDI negative and positive offset, etc).

 

The problem is for instance when I sample a couple of one shots from a song I don't have so many sample variations. I only have couple of samples and it is hard to make another music out of those samples.
I am trying to vary few samples and make groove out of them. I hope you understand what I mean.
I don't want to use sample libraries available but sample elements from a song.
The problem is even when I have only one shots from sample libraries making groove out of them seems hard and most of the time drums are out of tune and when you pitch shift it ruins the high end of drums and makes it sound robotic.

 

Any other suggestions?!

 

Don't sample songs neccessarily. Go create, record and edit your own samples. Add different samples for every velocity layer or groups of velocity. Add random pitch variation for every sample (we're talking 50 cents +/- max). etc. There are many ways to make samples "alive". You can easily trick the ear in different ways, with just the use of one or two snare samples (for example).

If you want "real drums", why don't you use real drums (and take advantage of the variety and expressiveness they have)? Makes little sense if you still want to use samples, especially if you only have a few of them. If you want diversity you get real drums or multi-sampled drum libraries. It's really that simple.

 

Last edited: May 24, 2020

I would randomize timings a little bit, move drums there and there couple of pixels until you are satisfied :d

Lately I've been starting to experimenting on making my own samples, out of everyday objects, that can actually be surprisingly fun way that can really make you a lot better producer what I've noticed, I used maybe 2 hours or so, hihat, snare, bass kick and already sounds better with lower noise floor than 99% of commercial samples what I've heard lol..

 

IMHO velodcity is even more important than timing. I'd rather hear quntized drums with good human velocity/volume programming than the other way around (if you can't have both). Listen to drum fills and hi-hats and hear what's happening in terms of how hard things hit. One hand will tend to be a little bit weaker in a 16th note tom fill, lets say, and often to make a fill musical the hits in between the dominant beats will be lighter. If you want phrasing, volume is where it's at.

 

Ah.... never mind, didn't see this. Uh, good luck with that, is my suggestion.

 

True, but when most people try and humanize their drum timing when programming they actually just wind up creating a shitty drummer. Most drummers who are any good are pretty damn tight and the flamming of hits occurs within a window of milliseconds. Usually when people think about human timing in drums they're thinking more about the push/pull of being on top of the beat/in the pocket. I like to do that with gentle tempo mapping and then rely on my live instruments to provide the actual pocket. It's good if one can finger drum live and get the feel that way but in most systems latency makes that almost impossible... anyway, I have my tricks, others have thiers I'm sure.

 

i think some plugin/software can extract drum track (though not perfect and still bleed with other instruments).. and from there maybe you can layer them with one shots.. in case that's the kind you looking for, just sharing.. latest i know is hit n mix infinity for the task..