drums

[col]

Bin writin some full time 140bpm shit. Havin a few problems with gettin my beats to sound fat and full of life. Any 1 got any tips on how to acheive this and does any1 know about layering beats?

[joseph-j]

Compression.

Used properly it can really beef up the drums and gel the pattern together. It can distort the bass tho, so be careful.

Trial and error though, innit. Different peeps use it in different ways.

And what do you mean "layering beats"?

[shonky]

Double (or triple, quadruple, etc) your snare hits. Look for different tones and then layer them together, you may want one with body, maybe a knock or woody sound, and some high end presence and then use these in combination to get the sound you want. You'll probably want to do the same with your bass drum, one for low-end oomph (808 or somesuch), and then high pass one with a bit more punch (high passing should stop the frequency clash with the other kick) and then layer those.

High pass the kick anywhere between 80Hz and 120Hz to avoid muddying the subbass end of the spectrum, and high pass the snares between 300-500Hz or higher to cut out any unwanted undertones that could mess up the other frequencies (best to use your ears to get the sound you want, these are just rough guidelines).

With breaks I'd advise listening to them with your main drums and see if they cancel out any of the frequencies if they go out of phase. If it's congas or other midrange percussion, high pass them so that they don't clash with the bass drums, and try and ensure that you use a snare sound that complements the break and doesn't sit in the same frequency range.

Use your ears is probably the best advice, but try and remove any frequencies you can't hear, as there may be residual audio that may clash with your frequencies elsewhere.

[col]

nice 1 ill give it a go