OK KANA » Music Theory

The secret to swing and why you can’t produce without it!

Adamg — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 12:54:30 +0000

How come my tracks don’t sound like a commercial release?

Part 2 – : Swing!

Swing? Isn’t that a style of music developed in America circa 1930? Well, yes it was. But the swing I’m referring to is the shuffle or groove of your track, that more ‘human’ groove that sounds realistic and ‘more pleasing’ to our ears.

Ever wondered why that rhythm you are trying to write sounds ‘robotic’ and ‘cold’? Its more than likely because every hit in your drum pattern or every note in your sequence has been quantized to a rigid grid. This quantization is unnatural since we are not robots and it is practically impossible to play a drum pattern live in perfect quantized periods.

The fact is, our hearing has evolved to ‘expect’ certain things. Yes thats right, our ear-brain connection has certain elements it looks for inorder to help process the audible information it receives, which means it expects things to be out of time (slightly)!

What swing do you mean:

So what does this all have to do with swing? Well, swing (shuffle, groove, humanization) or whatever name you wish to give it, is essentially a process by which you can ‘push’ a desired range of ‘hits’ out of this perfect, quantized alignment. In part, creating a more ‘human’ feel to the groove you were trying to create. Suddenly, things will sound less ’sterile’, have more ‘warmth’ and just ‘glue together in the mix’ much more effectively. Don’t take my word for it, read on and give it a try for yourself!

As usual, this article will focus on Kana’s DAW of choice, Ableton Live. At the end of the post you can find links to using swing in other DAW’s like Cubase or Logic etc.

Creating your own swing:

One of the best ways to achieve a more natural sounding, self-programmed, drum loop or musical sequence is to play the part manually (on a midi keyboard or drumpads) with the Global Quantize set to None. This means all the notes will essentially land exactly where/when you hit them.

The big advantage to this being you have essentially applied your own personal level of swing to the notes by playing them yourself – instead of drawing the notes in with the mouse! Getting it right the first time can be quite tough, so its a good idea t oset yourself up for a continuous recording session where you can make multiple takes and choose the best one at the end.

Setting up multiple takes in Live is quite simple, just set your loop region to the size and zone you wish to work in (this is the resizable bar at the top of the arrangement view). Make sure overdub (OVR- at the top near the play button) is turned on – this will allow any patterns to be layed down continuously until you hit stop. Now, just continue to play again and again until you think you nailed the feel you want. This way you can then expand (stretch out) the looped part to reveal all your attempts and choose the best version.

Once you have chosen your favourite groove, simply move the loop range to encompass only that section and play it over and over whilst you listen to each individual sound. The chances are that at least a handful of hits will appear too early or too late, when you hear them zoom right down to the individual notes and adjust them to suit.

To move notes without ’snapping’ to the grid, click and hold the note, press and hold the ‘Apple’ key, then move the note to the exact place you want it, then drop the note & release the ‘Apple’ key. You will notice the placement is no longer restricted to the quantize grid and you can make really small adjustments to just gently drag the note closer to the timing you really like. Easy as that, Bam!

Adding swing to pre-recorded loops:

All decent DAW’s will allow you to impart some sort of swing or groove function onto your chosen pre-recorded loops or midi clips. Some programs allow a very complex groove to be copied, including timing and volume of each hit (velocity if dealing with midi notes), and then applied to any source imaginable. This feature was implemented in Live 8 but first we will cover how to get simliar results in Live 7.

Swing in Live 7:

You can use the built in swing/groove setting to add a little more movement to an otherwise set pace.

In Live 7, you are restricted to using the more formulated quantized groove settings. The “0″ between the metronome and the 4/4 notation at the top left of the project window is your global swing amount. From 0-99, you can impart more or less swing to all clips that have their Clip Control groove setting to anything other than None – options include 1/8, 1/16 and 1/32. You can get some pretty nice subtle movement with a clip groove setting of 1/16 and a global groove setting of 40-50.

Have a play with it and go Extreme! By pushing things to the limits we learn how to tame the beast and achieve the sound and control we really want!

Almost perfect but not quite:

The only unfortunate oversight here is that a truly magic groove has not only sounds occuring slightly out of time, but also at varying volumes. To do this you will have to put in the hard work by manually adjusting the volume of each sound in the Envelope Volume window. Granted, this is not a precise science since dropping the volume of a hat after a snare will reduce the volume of the snares tail as well, but hopefully you will not be relying on a sampled audio drum loop as the main focus of your track. That way you can get away with little adjustments like this.

Live 8 and beyond:

Live 8 has really stepped up and taken this one major step further by incorporating a full groove library which also allows you to extract the groove from other songs/sample loops and apply it to your own parts. Here is a tutorial video by Jesper at Airbasemusic.com which will run you through the process.

Some links to ways of imparting your desired groove in the other major players like Cubase, Logic Pro, Sonar, Fruity Loops.

Summary:

An often overlooked element of developing producers is the significance of real world performing. Digital is great, but it removes some of the human element, and its this human element that we have evolved with, hence what we perceive as pleasing.

Working with the swing of your individual parts will impart a finer glue to all your sounds, it will give room for other sound to be heard in the mix and suddenly get your booty shaking when you couldn’t explain why it wasn’t before.

If you got to the end of this article I truly hope you’ve found some value and managed to improve the sound/feel of your tracks. After all that is what it was written for.

Have anything to add? Your comments are always welcome, just click the article heading if you are on the main page and scroll to the bottom to “Reply” to this post.

Good vibes & happy producing,

Adam & the Kana crew.

EDIT:

One fairly cruical element to swing which I some how forgot to mention is the use of Track Delays. This little bad-boy makes some jobs a dream by just slightly moving a whole tracks’ audio forward or backwards by anything from 1 millisecond upwards.

You can find it on the right hand side of the arrangement screen if you select the small circled D on the far bottom right.

Secret tips to improve your mix by avoiding Ear Fatigue

Adamg — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:21:03 +0000

How come my tracks don’t sound like a commercial release?

Part 1: Ear Fatigue

News flash…Your ears fatigue Very quickly at high listening levels (yes, that means your ears do indeed get ‘tired’). When your ears are fatigued, your brains ability to register & seperate frequencies is dramstically reduced. Tha means your hearing becomes ‘muddy’!!

What is it about dance music that really drives us on? Why do we fell so empowered by it to move and shake?

Because the air being pushed by the massive (& extremely loud) speakers in your favourite club are quite literally pushing you around! The gravity effect of a kick and bass over a loud PA (public address) system is quite literally physics moving your body.

Don’t believe me? Next time you are in a club where the music is pounding your body (as well as your poor ears), try and move your self up and down (some call it dancing) in the opposite direction to the kick drum. i.e. move upwards when the kick strikes, and move downwards inbetween the kicks. I guarantee you it will feel awkward, uncomfortable and down right unnatural. Not to mention everyone around looking at you like your an alien! Get my point? Music is sound, and sound is physical.

So…. Why did I bother running you through that little episode and whats it got to do with Ear Fatigue? Well, quite simply, your ears are able to fatigue at levels much lower than that experienced in a club. And it is up to you to protect them from this fatigue to ensure you are making the most informed decisions possible about your music. If what I’ve said so far means nothing to you, perhaps skip the rest of this article and keep turning up your mixer to full. Good luck getting a decent sound, let alone being able to hear in 10 years.

Okay, thats all good and well, but what am I supposed to do about it and how do I know if my ears are ‘fatigued’?

The phenomenon known as TTS (Temporary Threshold Shift) basically means after prolonged exposure to loud listening levels, your ears’ ability to actually hear is reduced. You’re going temporarily Deaf! Don’t freak out, as the name suggests, this is temporary. But if you keep it up, can lead to permanent loss of hearing.

This handy site has provided a nice little chart with some real life decibel comparisons and even how long you can listen to certain levels before causing yourself damage. You’ll notice that increasing the volume from 90db to 95db (train whistle at 500 feet to a subway train at 200 feet) reduces the safe listening times from 8 hours to 4 hours! Don’t know what 90db is? Get yourself one of these valuable assets. A decent meter will only set you back about $100aud, and it will save you a lifetime of hearing if you use it… a wise investment if you ask me.

So, if you’re still wondering how loud you should be monitoring your productions, well that is a relative question. How long do you want to sit at the computer for? A good & safe place to start is: 8 hrs = 90db; 4 hrs = 95db; 2 hrs = 100db. Overall, if you stick to around 90db, you’ll protect your ears (you only have one pair!) and produce better music (since you won’t fatigue as quickly).

Now, if you thought I’d be finished, you’re wrong. Sound level is only one part of the ‘fatigue’ equation. Another very important area which often gets no attention, especially when you are feeling ‘in the zone’, is how long you spend listening to any one piece of audio. The longer you spend listening exclusively to one loop, one vocal part or one whole track, the quicker your ability to make objective mixing decisions fades.

Comparison is your best friend in this situation. The longer you listen to one piece of music, or one EQ setting, the quicker your ears adjust and get ‘comfortable’ with what they are hearing. This is a nasty trick your ears play on you and the only way to combat the adjustment is by making regular comparisons to other sounds.

If you are mixing your track, working on levels, panning, eq, compression etc, then by now you should have already chosen a commercial song from which to draw inspiration. Deciding which track is best suited to your needs is a personal choice but things to keep in mind are:

- Does it have the groove, energy, direction I want to achieve?

- Do I like the ’sound’ of the song?

i.e. Is the Kick/Bass prominent and punchy enough? Can I see myself going mental to this on the dance-floor (or not… if that’s your direction). Are the different elements of the song (snare, hats, melody, pads etc) clear and cohesive or are they muddy and jumbled?

Once you’ve chosen the right track from which to compare, you should do so regularly.

For simplicity and speed, load the track into your project on an empty audio track, mute it and drop the channel volume until it matches the master bus when your own song is playing. Now that its at the same level, you can easily hit the ‘Solo’ button for a quick reference to what should be considered a professionally mixed & mastered track. You can make things even faster and intuitive by assigning the reference tracks solo button to a Hot-Key on your keyboard.

Now when you are making important decisions about how much bass to have, how loud the snare should be, how far back the pads should sit etc, you have an accurate place to compare your own project to. Sure it will be very challenging if not impossible to achieve exactly the same sonic signature, but with a lot of practice and perseverance you will find your sound quality improving dramatically.

Make sure when you are working with these tools that you check sooner rather than later. Don’t leave it until you’ve been at it for an hour, or even 10 minutes. The ear will adapt within seconds to fine EQ adjustments, and within minutes to a whole song.

This same technique can be applied when making EQ adjustments. The trick here is to ‘bypass’ the EQ instead:

- You have decided a certain sound requires an EQ tweak

- Reach for the EQ and start affecting the areas you feel necessary

- Turn the EQ off (or bypass the zones you have changed) and listen to the sound as it was previously

- Turn the EQ back on and compare to what you were trying to achieve

- Repeat until you have the sound just as you need it without making it sound worse

If you leave too much time between swapping the EQ in & out, you run the risk of allowing your ears to get used to your newly EQ’d sound. This will greatly hinder your ability to make objective decisions regarding your music.

In summary, your ears are your best friend and should be treated with respect. These friends like variety, hate loud noise for long periods of time and only have one lifetime. Once they are damaged, they are gone for good.

Monitor your music at safe levels for the appropriate lengths of time and you will find your ears lasting a very long time. Make quick comparisons to music that you would consider very well made, to a professional standard, and you will find the decisions you make in regards to your own sound become much easier and yield better results.

If you have any questions about this article or want to get into further detail, leave a comment and I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m able.

Good luck on your musical journey,

Adam

How come my tracks don’t sound like a commercial release?

Adamg — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 09:47:05 +0000

Introducing a short series of tutorials

At the end of a long day working on your latest production in your bedroom/loungeroom (or as some like to call it “the Studio”), when you’ve finished that bumpin’ groove, tamed that thumping bassline and trimmed that sizzling snare, you might like to sit back and admire your handy work, no?

On first inspection it sounds killer! Off the hook! Capital Ph – Phat! Well of course it does, because you’ve just been nodding your head to it for the last 6+ hours haven’t you? You go for a walk to the shop, rest your ears a little you think, grab a beer maybe, have a smoke even (if you like the dirty habit!), come home watch some TV and just chill out. “Job well done”, you say.

Next day, after listening to some of your favourite commercial tracks on the ride home from work you’re thinking, “Hell yea, I totally nailed that beat last night, it sounds just like whats on my iPod!” But all is not the case is it! You come home, all fired up ready to push play and bask in the glory that should rightly be the next big hit, only to find that in comparison to everything you’ve been listening to on the ride home, you’re new baby seems (prepare for some buzz words), lack-luster, plain, lumpy, lifeless, busy, cluttered, muddy or just plain Whack!

Well…?? What the hell happened?

There’s about 10 topics I will cover which could have occured to rob you of your glory. Be certain that this is by no means an exhaustive list, but these are some of the more common areas I find affecting people on the road to their own musical nirvana.

You could have been suffering from ‘ear fatigue’ last night, a bad listening environment or even mixing the track at a level that’s too high (or too low).

You listened to your own project for too long and didn’t reference other material or you didn’t program your sounds appropriately (with regard to each and every other sound in the mix). The sounds that you programmed so delicately weren’t placed in the mix properly or your little pet that’s always jumping up at you with beaming eyes wanting to be played with (your effects!) got the better of you!

You had a little too much alcohol or drugs (contrary to how you feel at the time, you don’t do things better when drunk or high), or maybe you were acting like a kid in a candy store, adding sound after sound, trying to ever evolve that otherwise rockin’ beat.

I’ll probably repeat myself a few times throughout this mini-series, but there’s no harm in hearing things over & over till you got it, right? Take what you need from these articles and, I promise there is no way in the world that you won’t improve your songs and how they sound next to a commercial release.

Happy reading and good luck on your musical journey!

Adam

What to expect from Kana’s music theory articles

Adamg — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 14:28:55 +0000

To those that are interested in music production or even those who have been developing their skills over the years, Kana will be presenting a series of articles on music production theory. ¬†Some articles will be aimed at the advanced producer and others at the beginner. ¬†

Overall, some knowledge about computers and music software will be required to comprehend these topics. ¬†Since it would take a very long time to go through all of the basics, these topics are best left to other resources where the time has already been invested. ¬†

You will most likely find information here that you can find elsewhere. ¬†These articles are being shared with the sole purpose of giving value back to our readers and possibly shedding new light on a concept you perhaps are already very familiar with. ¬†You will be able to bring up the articles any time by using the Tag Cloud to the right of this page or by using the Categories beneath it.

To quote¬†Shunryu Suzuki-roshi, a Zen priest who has been noted as one of the principle founder’s of Buddihsim in America. ¬†More information can be found on Suzuki here¬†http://sfzc.org/

In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few.

Step one in the battle to beat the “Loudness War!”

Adamg — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 10:33:48 +0000

Turn Me Up!‚Ñ¢:¬†www.turnmeup.org¬†Ever wonder why recorded music used to sound so much better? If you think mastering is all about making your music LOUD then you need to read this…

:: follow link for more info.