Kick but not thud
 

Hi,

I'm working on a dance track and I'm having problems with the kick. I have hundreds of kick samples but I need that real "thud". I'm currently using 4 different samples with some eq on each which is almost there but just lacks that "something". I'm aiming for the same sort of kick that is on Cher's "Believe".

Has anyone got any compression tricks they could suggest in order to get the effect I want? I'm tempted to steal a sample from a commercial CD I have but I know that's not the route I should be going. The remix people "Almighty" have the sort of thing I need.

Thanks and Happy Easter from Munich, Germany.

Vogue

Re: Kick but not thud
 

Try a little bit of distortion if your sounds are too clean, like using LoFi plugin

The rest is a question of having the right sample, eq, compression, limiting...

good luck

Re: Kick but not thud
 

Try bussing to an Aux track with a low frequency Signal Generator (sine wave) that is gated off a side chain from the kick drum. Playing with the frequency and levels can sometimes give a nice 'thud' to the kick.

I hope this helps.

Re: Kick but not thud
 

Try reducing the pitch with a pitch plugin, but keep the time the same.

Re: Kick but not thud
 

The above ideas are good, especially the gate/sidechain into signal generator idea. You might be using too many samples & getting too crazy, maybe pick one or 2 and work with just that. If that fails steal the damn kick off a CD and dont tell anybody, it'll just be OUR little secret.

Re: Kick but not thud
 

good advice!
or off vinyl...

what are the laws regarding that? i thought the sample has to be more then a certain length. what is it? 5 seconds? though, if a one second or less sample like a kik is used for the whole track (maybe 200 times, does that matter?

Re: Kick but not thud
 

Tr-909

buy one, a original one.

what sampler are you using. i have a exs 24 kit that i sampled from my own 909. with the levels on the preamp pegged. and the 909 has a great mod. its noisy but in a mix. driving!!

he only kick i ever use for a deep chunky house track.
the gate trick is cool but its a sine wave and more boomy than anything. kinda like a 808 kick. plus it kinda itroduces some deconstructive interance in the bottom. nothing too extreme in the studio but in a club on a club system. na
keep it clean one kick, roll it off and turn it up