I must be tripping!! Does it swing??

Good looking out on that post rodrigo, that put it in perspective and I think i understand how to better apply this in my tracks. Just tryin to get people talking about how they use this in their music, of course I scrolled up and read the manual lol I have learned a lot from other people on this site but I have never seen so many people that whine about people asking "stupid" questions, get off my dick!! LOL

lightsleeper wrote:Good looking out on that post rodrigo, that put it in perspective and I think i understand how to better apply this in my tracks. Just tryin to get people talking about how they use this in their music, of course I scrolled up and read the manual lol I have learned a lot from other people on this site but I have never seen so many people that whine about people asking "stupid" questions, get off my dick!! LOL

Think of it as tough love. I've had it happen to me before, but It got people talking on the thread which eventually led to me learning. And for some reason, when I felt disrespected, It got me to grind harder and learn the material better.

To be honest, when I first started posting on the forum, I thought of the forum as a short cut to not reading the manual. Who wants to read a manual???!!!! We just want to make beats!!!hahaha. It sounds like a foreign language the first time anyone reads it. It's like reading something without knowing the reasoning behind it. I didn't understand the approach of using the MPC. It kinda implies that you should follow certain steps, but only when I was stuck in my own steps did I try to learn the machine better. I would realize what I needed to learn to make my beats better, which would then change my steps to making music and catering more to the approach on the manual. But I'm glad I tried to make my own steps cause that's usually how you stumble upon a trick or two.

To the defense of people giving out tough love. It takes patience and a lot of focus sometimes when you don't understand something on the manual (no matter how easy someone else understands it, especially if you don't understand the benefit of learning it). So when you have an epiphany, and you're like "I finally get it", you respect the grind and see the good in it. So when someone else takes the short cut, you do them the favor of dishing out tough love so that it motivates them to get on their grind.

If someone is just hating. Let them hate. They're busy hating and not making beats. Who cares? Just keep learning!

My bad for getting deep.

To answer my own questions from before (finally got on the MPC):

1) You can use the Swing and Time Shift at the same time. It made sense to me when I used the swing accompanied with a "later" setting on the Time Shift. I don't think I understood it that clearly when I added Swing and an "earlier" setting on the Time Shift. I'll have to try it again with more patience. Might have taken a wrong step somewhere.

2) You cannot add Swing or Time Shift on an unquantized track. I recorded without quantization and then pressed Open on the quantization field. I tried moving the amount field and it wouldn't budge.

Rodrigo wrote:I wish I learned how use this function with my older beats. I literally just began learning and experimenting with it. It's mad important to make those drums sound realistic. Brings the beat life. I guess I only cared about learning how to chop samples...hahaha so typical.

Funny, I thought the same thing.

"Good looking out on that post rodrigo, that put it in perspective and I think i understand how to better apply this in my tracks. Just tryin to get people talking about how they use this in their music, of course I scrolled up and read the manual lol I have learned a lot from other people on this site but I have never seen so many people that whine about people asking "stupid" questions, get off my dick!! LOL"

Uh, how am I on YOUR dick (no homo), you are of no benefit to me.
I know how to make beats on my mpc; obviously you don't.
Next time instead of riding everyone else's dick asking questions, look to the right of this page, pony up the 39.99 (like I did), and learn your machine. Wipe your nose off (but not on your sleeve), sit down and read. It's noone's job to provide the answers for you.

"If someone is just hating. Let them hate. They're busy hating and not making beats. Who cares? Just keep learning!"

You're real funny dude.
I'm ALWAYS making beats, as a matter of fact, I'm rockin' one now while I'm typing this.

Awwwe, it's all good. You're right though, it's nobody's job to tell you how to do it. The MPC2000xl tutorial on this site is very helpful. I bought it too, I vouch for that.

I just feel like it comes down to the sounds you use, and how well you arrange your song. That's what separates the best from the good. That's why it doesn’t bother me to teach someone else how to do something on the MPC.

All jokes aside, I'm sure you make good beats (no sarcasm). I don't consider myself a great producer yet, but I feel like the bests producers are always hungry and never feel like they reach their limit. I still have a good amount to learn. So I always appreciate any help I can get.

Thanks for your input.

way to turn it around guys.


have fun, make music

Lord Toranaga wrote:way to turn it around guys.


have fun, make music

Always

first of all to each his own when it comes to technique but i figured the easiest way to a beat with good swing and a natural feel is to just play it in yourself.. it seems backwards to say i recorded my pattern and then quantized it so its stiff as a board now im applying swing to make it "more natural" why not play your drums the way a drummer does thats why live drums sound natural theres no quantize and added swing just natural movement and slight imperfection... not saying that the swing function is pointless i sure you can acheive great effects thru experimenting but natural is just that not processed realism...

but with all that said heres something ill contribute: record a snare on 1/8 timing, take a kick into step edit turn off the timing and push it 2 ticks late to like 1.01.02 and the same with the next kick i.e 1.3.02 or 1.3.50 and copy that throughout your bars, take a hi hat on 16 levels and play it in with the timing off and practice "swinging" the hat later and later or varying from early to late its the easiest way to get that midwest/east coast swing.. the lateness and exadgeration of the kick and hats with the rock solid timing and predictability of the snare will get youre neck rocking i promise.. try it...

InsiteTheG-A wrote:first of all to each his own when it comes to technique but i figured the easiest way to a beat with good swing and a natural feel is to just play it in yourself.. it seems backwards to say i recorded my pattern and then quantized it so its stiff as a board now im applying swing to make it "more natural" why not play your drums the way a drummer does thats why live drums sound natural theres no quantize and added swing just natural movement and slight imperfection... not saying that the swing function is pointless i sure you can acheive great effects thru experimenting but natural is just that not processed realism...

but with all that said heres something ill contribute: record a snare on 1/8 timing, take a kick into step edit turn off the timing and push it 2 ticks late to like 1.01.02 and the same with the next kick i.e 1.3.02 or 1.3.50 and copy that throughout your bars, take a hi hat on 16 levels and play it in with the timing off and practice "swinging" the hat later and later or varying from early to late its the easiest way to get that midwest/east coast swing.. the lateness and exadgeration of the kick and hats with the rock solid timing and predictability of the snare will get youre neck rocking i promise.. try it...

but you mean with the snare on time though so it loops properly?

If I'm understanding correctly he means:

Kick: 1/8, Time shift, later by 2 (no need to go into Step Edit)
Hat: No quantization (timing off) with volume changes
Snare: Quantized at 1/8

Good looking. I guess it takes a lot more practice to do all the drums without quantization (timing off), and get them to sound the way you want them to.

Also, something I learned from the MPC tutorial on this sight (I'm using quantized measurements to make it easy to understand):

When you have hits that are close to each other like 1.01.00 and 1.01.48. Make the first hit dull, not just by having a volume change but also drop the frequency a little and also give it a slower attack and faster decay. So it's like boomBOOM Bap.

I do the same with my hats. But I also like to make my last hat before the beginning of the beat dull as well. So the last hat is like 2.04.48 4.04.48 6.04.48 8.04.48.

One last thing I like to do is turn my drums overlap to Mono. This is optional, it doesn't necessarily make your drums sound realistic but I don't like the decay of my last hit to overlap a new hit. Makes it sound tight.

InsiteTheG-A wrote:first of all to each his own when it comes to technique but i figured the easiest way to a beat with good swing and a natural feel is to just play it in yourself.. it seems backwards to say i recorded my pattern and then quantized it so its stiff as a board now im applying swing to make it "more natural" why not play your drums the way a drummer does thats why live drums sound natural theres no quantize and added swing just natural movement and slight imperfection... not saying that the swing function is pointless i sure you can acheive great effects thru experimenting but natural is just that not processed realism...

With this approach, do you start with the Snare? Then add the Kick, and finally finish with the Hi hat? I've also seen people start with the Kick and Snare at the same time, and do the hi hat last. Finally, I've also seen people do all three at the same time (the hardest). I'll pull up a video as a reference later.

I've also noticed that a lot of people who do their drums this way, start their beat with the drums and later add the samples. As opposed to starting with the samples and build the drums around the samples.

Thoughts?

Here is a video of someone doing the whole drum set at once. This is ultimately the most natural way of doing it. I just picked the first one I saw (that is most relevant). I’m sure there are better ones out there. Just look up Justin Aswell or something.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQcu6_bCTFo

I don't think he recorded it into the MPC. That would probably be a harder challenge... to make sure it loops correctly. I guess you would record it with a slower BPM setting (metronome off), and then mess with the BPM (pushing it faster) until it loops correctly. Also, obviously having the quantize feature off.

But if you had to do it each piece separately, you would start with the Snare right? It would help you stay on beat.

Rodrigo wrote:Here is a video of someone doing the whole drum set at once. This is ultimately the most natural way of doing it. I just picked the first one I saw (that is most relevant). I’m sure there are better ones out there. Just look up Justin Aswell or something.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQcu6_bCTFo

I don't think he recorded it into the MPC. That would probably be a harder challenge... to make sure it loops correctly. I guess you would record it with a slower BPM setting (metronome off), and then mess with the BPM (pushing it faster) until it loops correctly. Also, obviously having the quantize feature off.

But if you had to do it each piece separately, you would start with the Snare right? It would help you stay on beat.

yeah I think the doing it at once approach is neat but you cant get all samples on separate tracks that way.

I think maybe samples or drums can be done in what ever order. Depends on how many cuts the sample pattern will have and if each chop is even or what. for example, for people who use autochop on 16 pads and are just trying to look cool playing a loop, then they could do that when ever cause the way they play the chops will be the same regardless. But, if you are playing randomly chopped pieces of say an orchestra for example... you may want to lay down some basic drums so you get that bounce from the boom bap beat that way you can get a feel for the appropriate swing you samples need to be timed in.. if you kind of get what I'm saying... often even I would maybe lay down the drums again afterwards... to tighten it up or what ever.

I usually find my sample first, and while I'm tweaking it, I get a chance to get the feel of the sample. Then I usually create a drum pattern (kick and snare only) on one track.
Then I add the sample on next track(s).
Then I dress the beat up on separate tracks hi hat, cymbals, ride, percussion,
Once I got the beat pretty much the way I want it, I mute the drum track, record on new tracks kick and snare separately (I usually have a hotter drum pattern in my head by now).
What I like to do also is if the original drum pattern is similar to the new drum pattern and sounds well in the mix, I'll change the lfo filters to make it sound different, and use that as backing for the beat.
You can also turn the sample into the bassline for the track (dope)

mr_debauch wrote:

Rodrigo wrote:Here is a video of someone doing the whole drum set at once. This is ultimately the most natural way of doing it. I just picked the first one I saw (that is most relevant). I’m sure there are better ones out there. Just look up Justin Aswell or something.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQcu6_bCTFo

I don't think he recorded it into the MPC. That would probably be a harder challenge... to make sure it loops correctly. I guess you would record it with a slower BPM setting (metronome off), and then mess with the BPM (pushing it faster) until it loops correctly. Also, obviously having the quantize feature off.

But if you had to do it each piece separately, you would start with the Snare right? It would help you stay on beat.

yeah I think the doing it at once approach is neat but you cant get all samples on separate tracks that way.

I think maybe samples or drums can be done in what ever order. Depends on how many cuts the sample pattern will have and if each chop is even or what. for example, for people who use autochop on 16 pads and are just trying to look cool playing a loop, then they could do that when ever cause the way they play the chops will be the same regardless. But, if you are playing randomly chopped pieces of say an orchestra for example... you may want to lay down some basic drums so you get that bounce from the boom bap beat that way you can get a feel for the appropriate swing you samples need to be timed in.. if you kind of get what I'm saying... often even I would maybe lay down the drums again afterwards... to tighten it up or what ever.

aahhh not so fast you can lay everything down at once and use "edit" to copy individual sounds to other tracks and use erase to eliminate them enabling you to maintain the same pattern and spread it across sepreate tracks.. when you go into "edit" using the "F" keys jump down to where it usually says note/ALL bang in the pad you want and you can move that particular note to another track just make sure your measure are right...

Rodrigo wrote:

InsiteTheG-A wrote:first of all to each his own when it comes to technique but i figured the easiest way to a beat with good swing and a natural feel is to just play it in yourself.. it seems backwards to say i recorded my pattern and then quantized it so its stiff as a board now im applying swing to make it "more natural" why not play your drums the way a drummer does thats why live drums sound natural theres no quantize and added swing just natural movement and slight imperfection... not saying that the swing function is pointless i sure you can acheive great effects thru experimenting but natural is just that not processed realism...

With this approach, do you start with the Snare? Then add the Kick, and finally finish with the Hi hat? I've also seen people start with the Kick and Snare at the same time, and do the hi hat last. Finally, I've also seen people do all three at the same time (the hardest). I'll pull up a video as a reference later.

I've also noticed that a lot of people who do their drums this way, start their beat with the drums and later add the samples. As opposed to starting with the samples and build the drums around the samples.

Thoughts?

whichever process works for you the method isnt the key its the result but youre absolutely right the way i do it is i lock the snare in to keep time and push my kicks late then i try to make the hi hat loose to accentuate the swing... also Mr. Debauch had a point in that its completely up to you in the first stages of the beat to decide whether you want to set the groove with drums or the samples.. i've laid down a template of drums and freaked the chops and when i go back to lay down the drums again they sound much better but when i mute the samples it sounds way off but still amazing as a whole with the samples so sometimes the off timing notes are what gives the track character even if on their own its unpleasant to the ear.. but everybody here is on the right track by seeking their own perfect swing at least youre not commenting on youtube beat vids going "hey dude your kicks sound off" like as if pefect timing is what everyones going for... peace