Nolly from periphery discusses drum programming velocity

PolarityMan

http://getgooddrums.com/nollys-tips-on-programming-realistic-drums/

I found this a little weird because he is completely concerned with the sonic character of the hits and totally bypasses the function of varying velocity which is to emphasise groove.

Interesting little titbit on one footed doubles but iimho he didnt cover hihat / ride accent patterns or velocity in fills. In general I didnt think his drums sounded that natural either (although it did obviously sound like periphery's drums).

What do you guys reckon?

octatonic

I can't watch it right now- what did he say about one footed doubles?

IMHO Periphery's drums are pretty synthetic sounding.
It sounds gridded and quite metronomic.
That isn't necessarily a put down- it suits their music, but I don't want to transcribe that sort of thing myself.

Most records these days use triggered/sample replaced drums, because musicians are recording in non-ideal acoustic environments. Because of this audiences are becoming accustomed to hearing programmed 'acoustic sounding' drums and accepting them as normal.

Comparing Periphery's drums to a really good drummer playing with a band that tends not to use a click (QOTSA, Clutch) you can hear a pretty huge difference.
Go back even further and listen to a band like the Police and you hear the tempo drift by a considerable amount, which was completely intentional.

guitarfishbay

Periphery's drums on the last 2 releases are mostly real - likely timing edited but the hits are almost all real except some floor Tom hits IIRC. Their drummer is a monster.

post 95 onwards

https://www.gearslutz.com/board/so-much-gear-so-little-time/1002819-best-hw-compressors-drums-4.html

aesthetically djent is about super tight timing these days.

I've not watched the video in the OP yet but I also go for tone with samples, then bounce, then manually change any hits that didn't bounce to my liking, then automate for volume.

Nolly did an interview on the URM Academy podcast recently, worth a listen if you're a fan

guitarfishbay

Ok I watched it, and yeah he makes some good points but you have to remember the velocity numbers he's talking about relate to those specific samples. I you change the samples then  you often have to re-edit velocities to some extent so don't take the numbers to be transferable.

Re: the cymbal playing - Matt Halpern has done a more broad overview of how to write drum parts and he talks about dynamics including cymbals, this might be more interesting for you @PolarityMan ;

http://getgooddrums.com/matt-halperns-tips-on-how-to-write-drum-parts-even-if-youre-not-a-drummer/

Sampled cymbals never sound totally real because in real life they are often physically moving and still ringing when hit, this can't yet be done in any sample libraries I'm aware of as they're starting from a dead stop. 

 @octatonic check this out - Matt Halpern live drum cam, no samples, triggers or editing (as per video description). The guy is really amazing IMO. Not my favourite Periphery track but one of the toughest on drums for sure. 

octatonic

guitarfishbay said:
Ok I watched it, and yeah he makes some good points but you have to remember the velocity numbers he's talking about relate to those specific samples. I you change the samples then  you often have to re-edit velocities to some extent so don't take the numbers to be transferable.
Re: the cymbal playing - Matt Halpern has done a more broad overview of how to write drum parts and he talks about dynamics including cymbals, this might be more interesting for you @PolarityMan ;
http://getgooddrums.com/matt-halperns-tips-on-how-to-write-drum-parts-even-if-youre-not-a-drummer/
Sampled cymbals never sound totally real because in real life they are often physically moving and still ringing when hit, this can't yet be done in any sample libraries I'm aware of as they're starting from a dead stop.

The problem you describe is called machine-gunning.
Triggering a new sample each time with the same attack/decay curve simply sounds artificial to our ears.
Sample libraries get around that by triggering a new set of samples but then you have to come up with a complex algorithm to have the first sample tail off and the new one trigger.

You can easily spend more on sample libraries trying to fix this problem than it would take to buy some drum mics and a nice kit, but then of course you need a drummer that can play and an acoustic environment to record them.


 "@octatonic check this out - Matt Halpern live drum cam, no samples, triggers or editing (as per video description). The guy is really amazing IMO. Not my favourite Periphery track but one of the toughest on drums for sure. 

"

Yeah, that is more like it.
They should let him do that on the record and stop grinding the shit out of it.

PolarityMan

@octatonic he pointed out that his drummer plays doublesusing heel/toe technique resulting in the first hit being weaker than the second.

I almost always program the other way round without thinking about it like you would with a typical second stroke from a hand.

Ideally where you want the accent would be hardest obviously but just being mindful of the mechanics of the double I think could come in handy.

@guitarfishbay periphery 's drums might be real but they are also pretty heavily edited and processed. 

octatonic

PolarityMan said:

@octatonic he pointed out that his drummer plays doublesusing heel/toe technique resulting in the first hit being weaker than the second.

I almost always program the other way round without thinking about it like you would with a typical second stroke from a hand.

Ideally where you want the accent would be hardest obviously but just being mindful of the mechanics of the double I think could come in handy.

@guitarfishbay periphery 's drums might be real but they are also pretty heavily edited and processed. 

Ah, ok.
There are a couple of different ways to play doubles- heel/toe is one- I use that a bit but mostly I do something called a slide, where the first hit is with the ball of the foot and the second with the toe.

There is a slight difference in the impact of the hit but drummers spend a lot of time trying to get doubles to be even.

A couple of other ways of doing it but they aren't as common- the swivel technique is similar to the slide, but you rotate your ankle to get the second stroke. I don't like it myself.
There is also an up/down motion with the foot which is different to heel/toe.

It really depends on what you are trying to do as to which technique you use... and when.
For instance, a 16th double where the second hit lands on the one- (so 4ea& of the previous bar and then the 1) it might be absolutely fine for that second double to be louder, because it is the downbeat.

A 16th double that starts on the 1 (so 1 and 1e), yes you want, as a drummer, to try to get the first strike to be heavy- but you practice that a lot and it should get to be pretty close.

PolarityMan

Yeah its interesting because my dummer would use the double pedal even for pretty slow doubles that a lot of other people would do with a single foot so for him its almost always second hit weaker.

It pretty rare for him to use a double onto the 1 though, he would almost always play 3 or 5 hits instead across the double pedal. It's jsut the way he constructs his parts.

PolarityMan

guitarfishbay said:

post 95 onwards

https://www.gearslutz.com/board/so-much-gear-so-little-time/1002819-best-hw-compressors-drums-4.html

Its interesting that he basically says I tried to amke this sound like a sample replaced mix. He did pretty well I'd say

octatonic

PolarityMan said:

Yeah its interesting because my dummer would use the double pedal even for pretty slow doubles that a lot of other people would do with a single foot so for him its almost always second hit weaker.

It pretty rare for him to use a double onto the 1 though, he would almost always play 3 or 5 hits instead across the double pedal. It's jsut the way he constructs his parts.

That isn't very typical, as you say.
Most drummers would rather use one foot if they can because you can continue doing interesting stuff with the hats.

There is a particular drum segment here:



This is very common, probably the most common fragment which features a double.
I'd never try to play that using a double bass- just for one stroke (the second kick).

PolarityMan

Me neither but our drummer does some weird things sometimes.