Discuss the various methods you use in music production, from compressor settings to equipment type.
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By bearhead Sat May 04, 2013 6:45 am
Hey guys, I'm trying to figure out how drum beats like this are made on the MPC. Any of you guys have any idea? I'm not talking about the textures, but just how glitchy loops like that are built.



What I'm talking about starts around the 1:49 mark.
By Adam78 Sat May 04, 2013 2:31 pm
Both One shots & Note on samples with Note repeat with diffrent Note value & Shift timing lol
The glitches is just an illusion and a lot of experiments and mayby some drugs could help you to achieve this.
By m56p87 Sat May 04, 2013 3:36 pm
Yeah it's just some stochastic drum hits with a "repeating" effect. However the bibio track seems to employ something like live's "beat repeater" on a live drum track rather than being done with midi. But Adam is right you could easily recreate the same effect on your mpc. However I don't think you need drugs to get creative :mrgreen:

I would recommend making a 16 bar sequence and then adding little bits at a time, then add different variants in layers. So first you record a few clean kicks and snares, then add some note repeated at 1/8th... Then 1/16th... Then 1/32 etc.. That's how you get that sort of groove by adding bits and pieces.

This is an area you mpc can really shine at if you start tying pad velocity to things like sample start or using the NV slider for pitch/filter. I have yet to use a machine/software that can do polyphonic granular stuff as good as an mpc or as easy.
By Adam78 Sat May 04, 2013 4:54 pm
I do not recommend drugs BTW , well not on the mixing and mastering stage :lol:
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By m:t:c Sat May 04, 2013 5:13 pm
Sounds like the amen break there is just triggered from different starting points (note on) with haphazard note repeat, delay and tune tweaking.

So when you've programmed your drums (break) on mpc (one shots or whatever), bounce (resample) it to be a single loop.

Throw that back into the sampler and vary the "sample start" while triggering it (note on) and spice with note repeats.

Record that to be a short sequence and overdub it with tune automation as you see fit.

Edit: instead of tune automation you could just make the loop span across the entire keyboard to have more control of the pitch values you'll want to have.
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By mr_debauch Sat May 04, 2013 6:45 pm
that sounds like in fl studio when you make two patterns each with their own drum sounds or percussion types... then when you play both together it does that effect.
By reeloy Sat May 04, 2013 7:27 pm
...that is defintly the gold old amen break, sliced for another two million times....

and hell yeah. note repeat while gliding through the quantise measures gets you there even better....
and there's no real glitch here....
to get some chemical taste in it......squeeze the delay on very short delay times with lots of feedback and put the time ration on a slider......
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By sciguy Sat May 04, 2013 8:21 pm
Also, for the type of sound that dude is doing in that video, throw in a bitcrusher. The unfiltered aliasing is something that you hear a lot in "glitchy" sounds.

and yep, chop up the amen break and go crazy. :-D
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By bearhead Sun May 05, 2013 2:01 am
Thanks for the responses. I'm going to mess with some drum hits tonight and see what I come up with.

And it looks like that link was more focused towards break beat, which isn't what I was really getting at. I'm talking about more of the glitchy drum production like you'd hear from Clark or something.
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By sciguy Sun May 05, 2013 4:15 am
bearhead wrote:I'm talking about more of the glitchy drum production like you'd hear from Clark or something.


yeah, his drums are just amazing.

That definitely clears up what you're asking, at least for me (Idunno how many people are familiar with him).


From what I can recall, he often use a wide array of acoustic drum sounds, with fluid, natural rhythms, getting a sound that's almost like a live drum set. But not quite; he'll contrast the organic flow of the beat with machine-like stutters and such, retriggering, pitchshifting, trimming samples, sounds you'd never get on real drums. I think it's this contrast, injecting those unnatural accents into a rhythm with a natural feel, that really gives it the "glitchy" aspect you're talking about.
As opposed to other types of "glitchy" drums, such as chopped breakbeats, or Aphex twin craziness, whatever.
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By bearhead Mon May 06, 2013 6:44 am
Yeah, it's just so hard to put my finger on how to do it, though. Obviously, other producers and musicians have done it, so it's not some secret technique. It just sounds so natural and loose rather than "choppy".
By m56p87 Mon May 06, 2013 3:31 pm
peterpiper wrote:Squarepusher has killed it with his drum programming IMO. But I don't know how he did it.


Yamaha QY700
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By peterpiper Tue May 07, 2013 12:26 am
m56p87 wrote:
peterpiper wrote:Squarepusher has killed it with his drum programming IMO. But I don't know how he did it.


Yamaha QY700


:shock: I have the QY70 (read it's basically the 700 in a smaller case). I got it from a neighbour but never really got behind its sequencer concept. Very user unfriendly machine IMO

peace