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Tranquility Base - Surrender (Original Mix) - Help required
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| satchboy69 |
Hey All,
I'm just getting into this production lark and I'm finding that the best way for me to learn at this stage (ie before creating my own tracks), is to try to emulate some of the songs I like in order to learn how songs are structured and pieced together.
I stumbled upon this forum by chance, and I've been very impressed at the help on offer by people. I appreciate how much newbies such as myself can get on peoples nerves though, so I've carefully searched for help on here before posting this. Plus, I think it's a little bit different to a lot of the newbie threads that get posted on here, this one could actually turn out to be quite practical lol!
Anyway, I've been into this track for a while now with its simplicity being the main charm and draw for me.
I've managed to get the basic drum structure down fairly accurately in Cubase through MIDI, and now I'm assigning some sounds to the drums, which is where I require a bit of help.
The first sound I'm struggling to recreate is around 2:46 into this song. At first guess it sounds like a clap, but pitched up a bit and with some reverb applied. Am I right with this or is it something way off like a hi-hat with reverb applied? It's the subtely of it thats throwing me off as I think a clap has too much definition. This is what I mean with trying to learn by emulating, as I like the way the elements such as this in this track fit together so nicely. Can anyone offer any suggestions with this sound?
Also, my second problem with emulating this track is with the hi-hats. I really have a bit of a problem in being able to pick out different elements and loops when hi-hats get busy. An example of this is where the track picks up from a drop at 3:42. Can anyone help me out in identifying how the hi-hat rythyms are put together here?
Thanks in advance,
Satchboy |
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| dbl |
| if you want help with this you gotta post samples of what you want help with.. |
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| satchboy69 |
Good idea lol!
Right here we are then, first sample is just the basic hat structure before the claps come in:
Hi-hats & percussion
Second sample is the sound i'm confused over, be it a clap or a hi-hat or whatever - or is it a combination of a clap and a snare? I have no idea, please help lol!
Main section
Third sample is when the hats and percussion all come back in together - can anyone help me out with whats going on here?
Main hats & percussion
Cheers,
Satchboy |
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| Sean Walsh |
The clap is a very standard reverbed clap that should be pretty easy to replicate in any audio editor, such as SoundForge or cool edit. Just start with some clap or highpassed snare sound, make a copy of, apply reverb to your taste, then mix paste the copy back on top of it to keep the attack portion of it (or just tweak the wet/dry setting of the reverb, but I prefer the method I outlined, hehe).
As for the final part that you're confused with, the only new element added (percussively anyways) is the addition of a drawn out Open Hat in between each beat. In fact, the huge amount of reverb from the pluck synth drowns out every percussive element other than the OH and clap. To make one of these, start with your standard 909 OH, fade it in a bit to eliminate the sharp attack, and then stretch it out a bit. Run a highpass filter/EQ over it once you have the desired length. |
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| satchboy69 |
Sean,
Sounds like great advice, I'll give it a go tonight when I get home thanks!
With regards to the hi-hats though, I'm sure I can hear more than just an open hi-hat throughout the course of the song. Any idea what the closed hi-hat patterns might look like or how many different patterns are going on?
Cheers,
John |
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| Sean Walsh |
Yeah I'm not saying they're not there, in fact in the first clip you can hear a very complex high-hat pattern, just when that sharp saw-pad is brought in it drowns out all the elements other than the OH and clap.
As for the actual pattern, it's not something I can easily dissect by just listening to it. They've made liberal use of bandpass filters on their various hats; you can distinctly hear a lot of non-generic hat sounds in the first clip. |
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| satchboy69 |
I see what you mean - do you think the sounds are just hats with filters applied then?
Anyone got any ideas about that hi-hat pattern that may help?
Cheers,
John |
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| Sean Walsh |
| Well for starters you can hear a few layers. There's a standard open hat pattern and several rapid fire panned high hats with reverb. The sound that gives it distinction and a non-generic sound is some sort of bandpass filtered hat, sounds like they pitch it down a bit as it goes. I'd have to play around with it myself to get the actual pattern, but it shouldn't be too hard to dissect. |
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| kewlness |
know this is totally off topic.. but you are one of the best newbs i've seen on this forum out there...
1) you admit that you don't know much
2) you have a willingness to learn
3) you are polite
4) you used the search!
thumbs up for you! :) |
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| Sean Walsh |
| quote: | Originally posted by kewlness
know this is totally off topic.. but you are one of the best newbs i've seen on this forum out there...
1) you admit that you don't know much
2) you have a willingness to learn
3) you are polite
4) you used the search!
thumbs up for you! :) |
In addition, he posted very clear sample clips to back up his questions. If every help request was as clear, concise and polite as this I'd be posting on this forum a hell of a lot more often =P |
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| satchboy69 |
Lol cheers, didnt mean to appear to kiss any arses or anything, it's just there seems to be so much potential on here, I thought I'd show a bit of respect where it's clearly due :toocool: Hopefully some day I may be able to get to your level as well and then I'll be able to take some of the work load off you guys and answer some of the newbs lol!
I see what your saying about the hats Sean, I think it may be the shift in tonality that is making it hard for me to identify whats going on in there. I hate to be a pain, but if you did manage to re-construct that pattern, would it be possible for me to have a look at it?
I'm going to try the clap part in a little while, in a song such as this, is the layered clap usually offset with a low velocity snare, or is this not present in this case? I can't really tell on this song, I think it might just be the attack on the clap thats set quite high - guess I'll find out when I have a play about really lol!
Just out of curiosity, is it nice and easy to apply high pass filters in Cubase? Or is it best to use something like Soundforge? I've never really messed with filters before and have practically no idea what sort of setting to go for. I'll have a read round though, I'm sure there must be some threads on that somewhere lol!
Cheers,
Satchboy |
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| satchboy69 |
Oh, another thing, on a similar topic but a different song.
I've really been a fan of Zero 7's for a long while, and I want to try producing some trance synths and layering them over the top of an ambient sort of style track.
The track I'm trying to replicate is called 'Distractions' by Zero 7 and a sample is below.
Zero7
Would anyone have any idea how I can create a kick and snare sound like in the sample? The Kick sounds really low and set back in the mix, where the snare sounds quite deep and reverby but sort of explodes into reverb at the end, any ideas?
Cheers,
Satchboy |
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