Since we have such a hot topic in DnB basses, why not a complimenting thread to discuss different approaches to the all-important accomanying beats?
I’ll get it rolling by talking about something I actually know a little bit about, structure of beats, and working them into meaningful beat phrases…
Alot of DnB I hear only has looping breakbeats overlayed on one another, with certain breakdowns and effects, or simple variations such as changing the structure of one pattern then switching back to original or the original with effects, etc etc… but in effect just creating more of the same loop… and then theres some really fantastic stuff seems to have beats that constantly flow and change. I spent years playing around with things trying to find a way to do this easily, and at one point conceded that it had to be a case of intense beat programming and lots of complex resampling… and amazing short term memory skills in the execution… since programming dnb is not quite as simple as programming hip-hop or something. Not so however, at least with 4/4 timing (well maybe not even… but its too complex for me to think about in anything but 4/4 hehe) Allow me to elaborate;
Start off by listening to the two breakbeat loops that will be used in this demonstration, that I’ve already taken the liberty of resampling into slot 00 and slot 02 after cutting them up a bit…Left that out as the initial 09xx creativity/randomness/etc is not what I’m talking about…Nor is EQ so dont bug me about it
Now - looking at patterns 0 and 1. it doesnt sound much there, but basically I’ve sliced up instrument 00 in a way that expands it out to twice its length; by using sample start-points [09xx] in quarterly increments [0900(assumed), 0940, 0980, 09C0] of the total length. No reason not to do all this in halves or eighths or sixteenths or whatever, on either parameter, depending how complex you want to make the whole thing sound, and unless you want to keep the next step from being ugly, keep things like retrigger and 0Dxx type commands, which will not be propperly expanded by the advanced editor, out of it for now.
Anyway, instrument 01 is made as a result of rendering these two patterns.
Patterns 2 and 3:
What is done here is clone pattern 1 and 2, expand each new pattern and switch the instruments from 00 to 01 with advanced edit (that little tab at the top right corner of the pattern sequencer…) So it does the same slicing to a different break, at exactly half the rate… will make sense in a sec
Patterns 4 and 5:
Allow me to propperly introduce instrument 02. Here it is layed out in (almost) the exact same format as instrument 00 was in patterns 1 and 2 with regards to 09xx maneuvers. Again, clone 1 and 2, replace instrument slots wih advanced editor (dont expand though!). The only deviations from the original cloning were added after the final step, and rendered its way back up there, which I’ll explain in a sec…
Patterns 6 and 7:
Exactly the same process as patterns 2 and 3, but from pattern 4 and 5’s resample.
Patterns 8 and 9:
essentially 6 and 7 overlayed on 2 and 3.
You could do the same thing ad infinitum and the beats would keep being split up in slightly different ways, but not sound like random repetition as its more of a fractal effect.
Now, the thing I was saying about variation… due to the nature of spreading the sounds of the beats over time inherently with this process, it makes it possible to add complex variations across a long sample at the end result by changing small values higher up in the chain. This particular variation in pattern 4 was added because I thought it sounded too mechanical when overlaid in pattern 9, so I added a degree of human randomness to the equation, and that was enough to fix the problem
So yeah, have a play around with expanding your beats like this if you’re ever stuck with trying to work in variation… I discovered this method after being caught umpteen times making a short loop that I quite liked but screwing up the ideas I had with expanding them in teh execution. the trick with doing it with more than one layer is to do everything exactly the same to each layer, and work backwards with which stages need to be modified on which layer, as it can have chaotic (haha, literally^_^) effects, so its pointless to preempt where the changes should be made ahead of time, and you can waste time barking up the wrong trees…
So, for instance, you don’t have to literally use the expand button either, each step can have an entirely different set of parameters and still acheive good results, so long as you work on the principle of applying the effects to each layer equally and working backwards after seeing which parts don’t work… I dunno maybe your luck is better than mine though
Footnotes:
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I in now way think this clip to sound “fantastic”, thats not what i’m implying, there are lots of other ideas that can still be worked in for even better results, such as ghost notes, and theres a million effects you could use as well. Its just a demonstration of a single idea; if anything its derived from two beats I didnt think would marry very well, as a test to my theory. Please dont take it for anything more, I’m tired of my threads being derailed like that!
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The reason for this thread is that I’d love to hear different methods and habits people have for doing this sort of stuff, and also drum mixing in D&B, drum selection/sound marraige in making breaks, LIVE variation of drums without resorting to another band-member, and any tricky time-savers you can think of… much like the basses thread but with drums