Feature | The Essential Drum Machine Masterclass
ROLAND DRUMS REIMAGINED From Frankie Knuckles to Aphex Twin, Roland’s classic ’80s drum machines – especially the TR-808 and TR-909 – are as synonymous with electronic dance music as the acoustic drum kit is to rock. Even though the majority of producers have never had their grubby mitts the original machines, we all recognise the sounds instantly thanks to their ubiquity in dance music. Luckily for us mere mortals, having enough dosh for the now-antiquated originals doesn’t matter: not only can we download countless sample collections packed with processed permutations of these drum hits, but Roland themselves have brought hardware fetishists affordable digital replicas of the originals: the Aira TR-8 (a hybrid 808/909) and the new Boutique TR-08 and TR-09. So basically, it’s never been easier to use
these infamous drum sounds in your productions. But with every producer and his dog sequencing these iconic one-shots, it’s become harder and harder to customise and innovate with them. Take the genre of trap (plus its
pop/urban crossover offshoots) as one example: you can’t get away from that distorted 808 kick, rhythm-shifting closed hats and skippy snare ďŹ lls. Likewise, you hardly hear a house or techno record that doesn’t feature the interplay of the 909 closed and open hi-hats; or that robotic, rattling 16th-note snare ďŹ ll. So how exactly can we take these sounds into the future? Well, the secret is to maintain the original timbre – after all, that recognition factor is the power of their appeal – but add your own dimension of originality somehow. For instance, use a pitch envelope to bend the 909 OH, then use a short delay to mix in a
Creative cowbell adventures Here we’ll transform the classic 808 cowbell sound into an extended, pitch-manipulated riff, drenched in effects for a completely new sound All of the TR-808’s drum sounds are iconic, of course, but aside from the thunderous kick, one stands out: that cowbell! Sounding absolutely nothing like a traditional cowbell, this synthesized hit has a ringing, nasal timbre that you either love or hate. Its tonal nature makes it a great candidate for all manner of processing – tune it to an appropriate pitch and use it as the basis of a sampled riff; drench it in endless ambience to ďŹ ll out space behind a dry rhythm track; or wildly automate pitch changes for techno-style trippiness.
>
In this ďŹ rst example, we’ve programmed a rhythmic 16th-note pattern to emulate sequenced 808 steps. To give this recognisable hit some character, we’ve pitched down certain frequencies by an octave, widened the sound, then assigned ďŹ lter cutoff to velocity for mufing movement.
28
>
To design a tonal FX bed, we take one single cowbell hit and swamp it in an alien space courtesy of Eventide’s weird ’n’ wonderful Blackhole reverb. That plugin is doing the heavy lifting, obviously, but you can still decipher the original cowbell sample’s key and timbre within the effect – a nifty way to put your own spin on a recognisable sound.
>
Finally, we’ve used an 808 cowbell sample as a tonal note to create a simple one-bar riff. We’ve duplicated our MIDI notes to span two octaves for unison density. Creative distortion, plate reverb and dark delay repeats disguise the original sample, and we can play with amp decay and release parameters to evolve the riff.
metallic tone. Heavily distort the 808’s tinny cymbal, then smother it in weird reverb. Or try crazy stereo tricks in parallel on your 808 kick. It’s up to you to take the sounds further and give them a unique sonic stamp. Another way to give the sounds a shot of life and character is via organic humanisation. Yes, timbrally, these robotic drums are a million miles away from realistic acoustic drum kits, but you can still program them in clever ways. Take the electronic hi-hat: we all know the original machines featured decay parameters for shortening or lengthening the hits. So by manually ramping the decay knob up and down in real time (we’re talking in subtle increments), as well as gently pumping the sound’s level in and out of other parts of your track, you’ll instantly bypass the ‘machine gun’ repetitiveness and give those hats an underlying feeling of authenticity and movement. However, we’re straying into subtleties here, and this feature is all about sound design. In the modern day and age of unlimited choice, it’s actually quite refreshing to limit yourself to that restricted palette of electronic drum sounds when you need some source material to mangle, distort, ďŹ lter, loop and GENERALLY FssK UP !LTHOUGH IT S A clichĂŠ by now, look at the use of the 808 kick in jungle and D&B. It’s no longer a ‘drum’; that kick is considered a low-frequency oscillator that can provide more sub bass and harmonics than your average cheesy synth patch. And since a good ol’ drum machine is as good a studio starting point as any, that makes it a fantastic candidate for processing on those days when you can’t nail a chord progression or synth patch. We’ve kept this pretty conceptual, but let’s wrap up with a few practical ways to make your drum machine sounds stand out from the crowd. For starters, as you’ll see in our tutorials, mashing up tuned kicks and toms with delicious distortion can create interesting bass and synth loops. Programming-wise, rapidly repeating notes off the grid – or lashings of delay effects – will induce rhythmic oddities that become groove enhancers. And treating percussion like synths and melodic samples will also broaden your horizons beyond the expected. Time to plug in and start experimenting!