Drum Layering

I have been experimenting with different ways of laying some kick drums. I was wondering how others are going about this in comparison.

I am layering two kicks, rarly more than that. One with more of a beater head, and another with more low frequencies, a bassier kick.

First way I was doing this was simply layering on the same pad in slot one and two. I found that adjusting the amp envelop wasn't as precise as it seemed that I could only adjust the first layer.

Then I was putting each kick on a different pad. Adjusting as needed and then playing each pad seperately.

Laslty, I've been doing the same as the last but linking the two pads with simult so striking one plays both.

Thoughts?

Sounds like a cop out answer, but seriously either/or.

You already mentioned getting the constituent parts of a fat kick from layers/linked sounds, and know that envelope settings and proper EQ'ing is the key to comping the sound together.

So to me whether or not the individual sounds are together or linked I end up doing the same things, feeding to the same compression bus etc.

I use a lot of software too though, so I'm very used to doing essentially the same thing whatever way is quickest or my mood is.

But it's pretty common to see people using pad link in place of layering on one pad for convenience and more control as you used it for. Outside of MPC's on Maschine I always use pad link because Maschine has no true layer feature, if anything it's quicker.

Perfect 5th wrote:First way I was doing this was simply layering on the same pad in slot one and two. I found that adjusting the amp envelop wasn't as precise as it seemed that I could only adjust the first layer.

Stuff like Amp Envelope, Filters, LFO, effects etc are applied to the entire pad, not any one single layer. So if you have a kick on layer 1 and another kick on layer 2, adjusting the attack affects both layers equally. That's certainly my recollection on the 1000/2500 etc, it's certainly the way the Ren handles it.

The only layer independent parameters are level, pan and tuning.

As you suggest, the only way to get truly creative is really via simultaneous play, as that way you can use up to 4 pads, each as an independent 'layer' for your 'master pad. So if you want to shave some attack off one kick only, stick it on it's own pad and apply your envelope to that pad.

Considering the core target market of MPCs, it would be nice to see more advanced drum layering options, for example, being able to nudge/shift a layer in real time in single sample units, layer inversion, and having the ability to apply ADSR/filter/lfo/effects to individual sample layers on a pad.

If you really want to go deep, look up 'The Art of Drum Layering' by Eddie Bazil, its a great reference book on the subject. MPC-Tutor may have an ebook on the subject with some input from Eddie, IIRC?

Also, resampling your layers into a fresh sample can help to simplify things once the individual layers have been balanced.

If you really want to get super precise use a DAW but using the MPC's frequency and resonance feature along with the attack and decay you can get some really good results. I like to take a shorter sounding kick drum and a kick drum that has a little bit more ambience and lower frequency and layer them together. The idea at the end of the day is not to make it sound like you layered two kick drums.