Help with Tarnce drum FX

[crimsontider]

I grew up playing metal and post punk(manchester style)but have recently been intrigued by Trance stuff(classic). I can actually compose(imho) a good bass and synth trance sound with my V-Station, Korg Legacy and Vanguard and DR-008 but getting a decent FX on the drums ruins it every time! What strikes me curious is that I am a drummer, have been for 20 years.

I use FL Studio, could anyone point me to a good tutorial in mixing 808 type samples? Or maybe even email a good Fl Studio Mixer Track State for trance drums?

In my opinion, you can download a thousand vintage 808 809 drum samples but if you can't mix them, it will sound poor.

Any comments appreciated. Where to get samples, something better than DRR-008 or whatever.

My present mixer track states for FL Studio

http://crimsontider.com/vsti/trancesnare.fst
http://crimsontider.com/vsti/trancebass.fst

[SeanyK]

Minimal FX on drums, perhaps small amounts of reverb on the hats, but very little, if any at all, on a Kick drum.

[crimsontider]

I'll give that a shot. Thanks for the sugggestion

[kritikon]

I'll second that...electro drums tend to be recorded pretty dry nowadays. If you must use reverb, what I do is use convolution and load up impulses of short ambiences or even close mic'ing - gives you that sense of "realness" without muddying the mix.

Another good trick with drum reverb is to use it with a big predelay - only on one sound, usually a snare. Make the predelay long enough so that your reverb sounds more like an echo and tweak the tail so that it fades out before the next drum hit. By the way - that's pretty well a rule of ine nowadays...whenever I use reverb on drums (unless it's on a big dubby breakdown) I always have the RT60 smaller than the time between one drum hit and the next.

I usually use delays more than reverbs on drums though...an often used trick on older trance tracks was lots of slightly filtered delay on the hats - makes them bounce about but the delays also then sit in a slightly different part of the spectrum to the original ones. And tweak the delays so that they are not tightly synced to exactly the tempo (just a mSec or several either side will do...) means you have a bit of automatic shuffle going on in the delays. In fact, if you have 2 delays, try one slightly short of the tempo, and one slightly long. i.e if your tempo is, say 120bpm(for ease) then have the L delay at 372 or 370mS(rather than exactly 375) and the R delay at 253 or 255mS (rather than exactly 250). Can work a treat if you experiment.

And often I won't use either - I'll often send all the drums to their own group (minus the kick) then use all manner of dynamics tools on them - compressors with character, overdrive, very mild distortion, preamp impulses, valve sims, tapesat sims etc. 2 of my favourites are Nastyshaper by BigTick, and PSP Mixsat. Those kind of dry FX can still give some kind of stereo imaging and presence without the muddying of reverb and delays.

And don't worry too much about getting drums too in-yer-face...listen to some trance and the drums are pretty low in the mix. If you want more in-yer-face e.g. if you're doing older Acid type stuff, then short reverbs of lesser quality can be good - gives the feel of some of those 80s reverb units. So pretty well any native reverb will do that well

[wwwill]

Yeah less is more. You may try more effects on snares/claps, shakers and cowbells/percussion, medium amounts on crash/ride cymbals and less on hi hats. Reverb on kick drums only really works for short drum sounds, if you're going for that gated reverb sound. That sound typically doesn't work with synth kicks like 808/909.

Again use the effects sparingly on the hi hats. Use enough to make the drums like they are coming from the same room.

Now delay is nice but a lot of tmes I like to use a wash on snare/claps. A bright, short beginning with a longer, darker, muted decay. What I REALLY like is to put some flange or chorus on drums and then feed that into reverb/delay. A crash with a long decay or 8th note ride pattern going through zero is awfully SWEET.

That's my $.02, I'll need a receipt.

If you haven't found a good plug try my favs:
Glaceverb
WAReverb
Ambience
Kjaerhaus Classic Reverb

Of course these are just my personal tastes.

[crimsontider]

Thanks to all for the suggestions. They are definately appreciated and will be used

[Amberience]

I always put a little bit of reverb on a kick drum, with short decay (very short) and maybe 1ms of predelay, with a 20/80% wet/dry mix. This will give your kick drum a bit of length and sort of blend it in with your other drum sounds.

The drum in Born Slippy by trainspotting for example. Has a lot of reverb on it for a kick drum, but it still sounds snappy and beefy.

[crimsontider]

Thanks for the good advice on the kick drum. Consensus is to use FX precisely but sparingly. This is helping me a lot as I was doing the opposite.

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[Trojan Badger]

Tarnce is so last week. Trange is where it's at now.