Mixing and Sample Breaks

Skeksii

hello there
Joined
Feb 21, 2013
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Bitteh Citteh
Hey Guise,

I don't normally post here but I had a question I thought you might be of help with:

For my most recent track I'm using break samples as opposed to singular drums hits and programming my own break. How does this affect what I'm going to do in Mixing? Like do I chop it up and put each part on a different mixer channel or could I just put the whole break on a single mixer channel and go at it from that angle?

Hopefully this makes sense.
 
I think it depends on how prominent the break is . If its a layer just to add fill eg .. splashy break to fill the the tops then no , However its its your main beat and you need to process hits independently eg to eq kick / snare too beef them up then yes . Just my thoughts (im not expert)
 
I think it depends on how prominent the break is. If its a layer just to add fill eg.. splashy break to fill the the tops then no , However its its your main beat and you need to process hits independently eg to eq kick / snare too beef them up then yes. Just my thoughts (im not expert)
Pretty much how it is yeah. Usually if its just a layer there's no point splitting up every hit, you just need to treat it as a whole and process it accordingly. Bus compression and EQ is probably all you'll need, unless you want a certain fx for the break.
 
I was gonna say, I don't think I have ever split every hit onto its own channel for a break. Usually though I'm using a combination of breaks with other one shots that form the more dominant parts of the percussion, so they act as a fill with the general perc and to gain a more fluid and organic breakyness to the overall perc. A lot of people like to use programs that slice the beats, recycle being one of them. I know in Battery, you can bring in a Rex file and have each slice placed on a cell individually, allowing you to easily put slices into their own groups/busses for processing. I personally do the editing straight up on the audio tracks within Cubase, as it has the ability to be able to slide the audio file left and right within the audio part, while it stays in place, and it's very useful to me for lining up hits. I cut up a break (single bar) say into 16ths and then start shifting the audio, then switching hits about in different orders to create rearrangements of the same pattern.
 
It really depends on the break and what you want to achieve. I often keep it all on the same channel but there's the odd time where, for example, the hihats have a lot of flab in the bottom so I'll move them to another channel and take it out but keep the bottom on the kick and snare.

Things like how rigidly you quantise the break and also the decay of each hit can make a big difference to how a break rolls.
 
Thanks so much. Seems simple enough. I'm finding as I learn more and more about the technical aspects of music the more mix conscious I'm becoming.

Perhaps this is a good thing.
 
Thanks so much. Seems simple enough. I'm finding as I learn more and more about the technical aspects of music the more mix conscious I'm becoming.

Perhaps this is a good thing.
It definitely is. Everything you chuck in an effect rack should take into consideration how it it'll fit
 
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