IDM music - drum programming?

shakenbake

Hi Folks,

I've been 'tune smithing' for a while now and was curious does anyone know what the 'formula' is for doing IDM beats?

When I listen to some of these artists the beats are so complicated and seemingly random but structured .... I can't believe that they sit down infront of a blank midi bars and start filling in the dots randomly. There as be structured way they have to do this and help them?

Can anyone shed any light on it? I'm takling about artists like Aphex Twin and Ochre.

Neurojazz

I'm just begging a friend who does this stuff to come post - he's a genius with it and been doing that sort of extreme drum programming for about 15 years

jiltloop

Yeah I've always been curious about this too. It's not just the complex drum programming that baffles me, it's also how they program the amount of weird hits and drum samples that are usually involved in the drum sequences. Sometimes the hits seem to be different with every bar, constantly varying.
Would love some pointers on this myself!

They use a tracker, such as renoise instead of a sequencer..or some such..

Neurojazz

Deleted User wrote: »

They use a tracker, such as renoise instead of a sequencer..or some such..

The guy i know does it all manually - the skills come from having nothing but some samples and a black sequencer - it's all deliberate, meticulous and executed with precise manipulation of the flow of the rhythm.

Anima

Post an example and we can have a go at recreating it.

jtsuited

haha this topic reminded me of the first electronic track i ever made!

is this the type of drumwork you're talking about?
The first electronic track i ever made!



warning - was listening to a lot of aphex and venetian squares at the time, but was still in singer songwriter mode so had to put in loads of melodies. Jaysus, listening to it makes me properly laugh at loud!

shakenbake

This would be a really good example of what I'm talking about

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgimNqIwpd4&feature=related

splitrmx

http://www.cycling74.com/
http://www.recordlabelrecords.org/ae.html

empirix

npt bad track jt suited - drum wise!

as for Ochre - that sound like a machinedrum - if your getting one get the uw version €1600 but very good. Having said that you can do this kind of programming with any software sequencers and good hardware drum machines. A lot of the breakcore use a trakker like renoise - quite complex daws though. v=Venetian snares uses remoise and the machinedrum

Lukasz.

there are no rules as such,in IDM (IDM is a term i really dont like to use to be honest but anyways...)

some IDM tends to be up in very hi tempo brackets,i find a lot of idm i listen to is 160 bpm plus!

listen to some jungle and drum n bass,and think about how the drums are constructed,them try to emulate that on your drum machine.
what equipment do you use?

use synthetic drums,electronic sounds,synth sounds to actually make drum sounds,ive done this with sine waves,to make a synthetic drum sounds,and you will get an "IDM" sound.

dont try to be like aphex or any of them,just do your own thing,be creative and dont be afraid to try new sounds.
and also,change timing signature periodically once n a while to make it nice and complex.

and make it as weird as possible!!!

Lukasz.

mpc style drum machines/sequencers are great for this.....

ICN

Heard a lot of those Guys use Trackers of course..

And also..

Reaktor (Automated / randomised Drum Synth patterns).. dbGlitch.. Supatrigga.. Pluggo/Cycling 74 or Whatever (heard Autechre are big fans).

Audio Damage Replicant is another random glitcher. Although I have it, I've never warmed to it at all. Never used it on anything. Supatrigga on the other hand.. Free & does a useful bit of randomness.

If you have Ableton.. Beat Repeat is undoubtably the modern classic thats brought a little bit of pasturised glitch to the masses.

Lukasz.

ICN wrote: »

Heard a lot of those Guys use Trackers of course..

And also..

Reaktor (Automated / randomised Drum Synth patterns).. dbGlitch.. Supatrigga.. Pluggo/Cycling 74 or Whatever (heard Autechre are big fans).

Audio Damage Replicant is another random glitcher. Although I have it, I've never warmed to it at all. Never used it on anything. Supatrigga on the other hand.. Free & does a useful bit of randomness.

If you have Ableton.. Beat Repeat is undoubtably the modern classic thats brought a little bit of pasturised glitch to the masses.

im sorry,i dont mean to be old fashioned,but i am totally out of touch with all this "beat repeat" and "random glitcher"


i am looking at IDM in terms of ......Acid and techno.
thats what aphex and ceephax and squarepusher and luke vibert etc etc all started out with (and still utilise),but they took it to the next level,especially aphex,when they basically got better and more skilled making tracks,and just started doing weird stuff.

i think,honestly,if you want to make IDM music,dont try/attempt to make idm music,just be extremly experimental,and do not use certain programs to emulate someone elses sound,or a particular type of sound.

at the end of the day,the drum programming for an "IDM" track,can be done with the help of a click track,get some weird drum kits(maybe make your own,as i said in a previous post) and just start making drum patterns,and use "note repeat" on your mpc or daw or whatever,and use the note repeat to get that techy,computer sound.do your own thing.

and last byt not least,for synth parts,for idm,you should be looking at getting your hands on a tb 303,(if you can find one) or more realistically a 303 emulator or vst.

if you dont know what a tb 303 is,you should not even be thinking about IDM or anything of the likes.

but,thats my two cents.

IDM has its roots in acid,acid house,and techno.
thats the bottom line.
and im serious,go listen to all that oldschool techno and acid from detroit and chicago in the 80's,thats what all the guys from britain were making.to try and make their own "acid tracks",IDM spawned from this years later.they took acid to a whole new spectrum.

ICN

Lukasz. wrote: »

im sorry,i dont mean to be old fashioned,but i am totally out of touch with all this "beat repeat" and "random glitcher".

Thats a shame.. Apology accepted

franklyshocked

I'm just reading back over this thread and laughing to myself. For a good reason.
The topic is fascinating and good to see such well worded and structured responses. I was reminded by some arguments against the setting up of this forum, that it would be the sound of tumbleweed after a short while.
Its great to see the naysayers were badly wrong.

Neurojazz

Even if they were right and it was just the sound of tumbleweed, we would have sampled it, looped it and stuck a filthy 909 4 to the floor over the top.

Executive Steve

Grab this VST - dbGlitch.


Load in a drum sample and muck about with the parameters

VOILA!


IDM.

Terry Cotta

I use renoise to slice breaks and its fairly handy. Its really good for taking in samples and messing around with them. Try the demo cause theres no trial period and you can save your projects but cant render tunes.

deathronan

[cm]tyranny wrote: »

Grab this VST - dbGlitch.


Load in a drum sample and muck about with the parameters

VOILA!


IDM.

thats an unbelievable VST!!

Quiggers

use and abuse your sample editor, reversing stretch, bit crushing what ever you come accross in your sample folder as well as looking for unusual stuff to sample in everyday life, but please no dog barks!

And variety is the key, no 4 bars section should be the same, swap the samples, stutter edit it, add fills, remove everything or just gate some white noise. the key is to not build a loop and let it roll over for 3 minutes.

audacity is a free sample editor, but most sequencers have one built in.
trackers are very popular with the current big names but they grew up with trackers on old comodores and atari's, i didn't and have never taken to trackers, so i work with audio, its easy to abuse it, and thats a key part of the sound, keep messing with it till your ears fall off.

electrogrimey

I know this is a really old thread, but I'm still going to give my advice...

I know a few of the IDM guys (Aphex Twin) a lot of the time set the BPM on their DAW to about 720 or so, and then treat one beat as a bar, which brings the result down to the normal 180, but gives them the possibility to get snare fills etc 4 times as fast.

krd

The beat repeaters and stuff give you instant glitch.

But where's the fun in that?

Original glitch sounds came from doing things like spinning back the delay length dial on some hardware and the confused robot would do strange things with the sample fragment in its' memory.

Like a lot of the effects people get on the Elektron Machine Drum is just spinning the dials and the machine becomes all glitchy by itself. - but does it in a really musical and rhythmic fashion - not like a DAW that's going to **** itself.

But it's really unpredictable. Electronic music hardware has a conciousness of its' own.

I think Aphex would jam with his equipment - catch something good. Then edit it down. Then do DAW tricks.

Today - I've discovered a weird glitch on my Roland MC 505 - on a single 1 bar pattern loop I've got it to randomly select different basses and stabs as it plays - I've no control over this - it's just randomly picking some stuff - it sounds like it's deliberate but the machine is just picking stuff. But the machine does weird stuff by itself if you just program a pattern and let it drift - after a few minutes it starts to become relaxed and groovy all by itself.

I haven't been able to integrate my MC 505 with my DAW set up. I'll figure something out eventually.

cloudydsound

imo IDM producers, well the main protagonists anyway, relied hugely on hardware set ups

just basically hands on tweaking the **** out of things that shouldn't be tweaked that way!! and connecting things that shouldn't be connected with eachother

but yeah using hardware rather than software is a biggie, im not saying thats how it goes for all the idm out there obv

midi/pc set up's just aren't the same no matter how much you match your controller parameters up with your vst's and stuff

Zyts

cloudydsound wrote: »

but yeah using hardware rather than software is a biggie, im not saying thats how it goes for all the idm out there obv

My friend uses a Roland HPD-10 and Korg pad kontroler.
Amazing to watch him play the drum pad live but a pain in the arse to mix with it in the background!
If your anyway good with rhythm it's a great way to use a hands on approach production wise.

Bipolar Joe

Step 1: Load VSTs into Audacity as RAW files. Cut, slice and chop them into hits and stuff.

Step 2: Get Battery and Randomid.

Step 3: Make a Battery patch using the samples from Audacity.

Step 4: Route Randomid to Battery.

Step 5: Press play.

Instant IDM!

Carl Sagan

After looking at this thread, I found dbGlitch(It was free!) and put it to use. I've no idea how to use it but it's already going to town on a simple beat I made.

electrogrimey

Carl Sagan wrote: »

After looking at this thread, I found dbGlitch(It was free!) and put it to use. I've no idea how to use it but it's already going to town on a simple beat I made.

Annoying it's only for Windows...

Chloroplast

SugarBytes Effectrix

same layout a glitch, only better automation features and presets, for mac too.

electrogrimey

Chloroplast wrote: »

SugarBytes Effectrix

same layout a glitch, only better automation features and presets, for mac too.

dbGlitch is free though. Looks like Mac are getting a raw deal.

Chloroplast

electrogrimey wrote: »

dbGlitch is free though.

its also buggy and doesn't automate properly in Cubase, unlike Effectrix

Bipolar Joe

dbGlitch is a terrible, terrible plugin. It's ridiculously easy to hear when it's been used on a track, and it's boring. It's fun to go in and program the hits, and then you get it sound how you like. It's time consuming, but worth it.