I am aware that trip hop and jungle tends
>to have "movements' and segues esp Mowax but not always even then a
>mowax movement can go on in one groove for 3 mins at a time before the
>drums drop out and the weird pads come in ...
>
>What do you think
There's nothing wrong with beats being repetitive, but if you want them to
be more interesting, make sure you add events here and there, either
cyclical (i.e. a drum fill or bass fill at the end of ever 4-or 8-bar
figure) or random (adding a cool delay effect that happens just that one
moment).
You can even do DJ-style beat mutes, like muting the "1" or the "1-2-3". If
you're using loops, you can easily do this by copying the loop to another
part of the keyboard, transposing it so that the tempos/pitch is identical,
then going in and truncating the sample with the start point of 25%
(cutting the "1") or 75% (cutting the "1-2-3") - assuming your loop is a
bar long and your sample also shows percentage points. Also, if your
sampler lets you copy sample parameters, you can save on memory storage
since the sampler willl just make a "virtual" duplicate of your sample.
When you sequence this, then you can simply go in and cut out a certain bar
of the song and replace it with the shortened beat.
Another neat thing is that since you made chopped duplicates that start on
the snare drum beats (2 and 4), you can also toy around with them to play
snare fills in the sequence. You can even assign an octave range to them so
you can introduce snare drums at different pitches, or even filter them.
You can also do crazy 32-nd or 64th note rolls by step-recording a snare
drum - junglists do it all the time.
You can even do things like delay effects - trigger a loop so that the kick
drum repeats every beat - (i.e. 1 - 1 - 1- 1) and then go in and program a
descending MIDI volume change curve - it'll sound like the kick drum has a
slow delay.
Basically, never be satisfied with just a loop. Make copies of it and chop
them up, filter them, route them through different outputs and effects, pan
them, whatever. That way you can make your beats more interesting. This
time you want your cousin-and-law to say, "Daaamn, how'd you do THAT?!?!"
:) The possbilities are endless.
Elson
Giving away his secrets :)
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