Let's talk snares

[jaydot]

A lot of (even major producers) snares these days seem lazily processed. A snare in my book should be fat and reverbed and sound a little different to the others, even if you use a clap. If you listen to a lot of snares from major producers and amateurs alike you'll find that they do sound the same and a lot of the time are too weak. What makes a unique snare? How would I go about getting a nice fat sound apart from reverb, compression, EQ and layering and more importantly (newb question slightly) is layering a snare just a case of putting two or three of the same (or differerent) snares on top of each other? How do you make yours?

[constrobuz]

i think a nice snare or any drum sound is all about heavy EQing and tweaking it just right. also pitching it correctly is a big part. layering is not important and most of the time, it's more work to get something that sounds right when you're working with 3 or 4 samples instead of 1. i think a lot of producers just pick a drum sound that sounds nice by itself (and not in the track) and that's it, maybe compress it a little bit and add a little reverb.

[jaydot]

i think a lot of producers just pick a drum sound that sounds nice by itself (and not in the track) and that's it, maybe compress it a little bit and add a little reverb.

I think you're probably right. I just find a lot of major producers are lazy when it comes to snares. And snares give the tune the step and should be like CUTSSSSSSSSSSSH.

[Ongelegen]

A snare in my book should be fat and reverbed

really depends on the type of tune imo, ambient oriented stuff won't need a in yo face snare etc.

I layer my snare, if i find it needs it. Play with the amp envelope a bit. Always almost add reverb, the amount depends on the sound i'm after. Sometimes add distortion, or a little bit of delay. Combine snare with clap, or add some white noise. Compress if needed. nothing special really

[JFK]

A trap I used to fall into a lot was not paying attention to the transients of the layered sounds.

I used to stack 5,6,7 snare samples on top of one another and sit there crying tears of frustration because the thing sounded weak as piss when I played all the samples together. What I didnt know then was all the big transient sounds hittimg at the same time were pretty much cancelling each other out.

So now a days I use 3 samples maximum to make one snare and they sound much better.

[jaydot]

A snare in my book should be fat and reverbed

really depends on the type of tune imo, ambient oriented stuff won't need a in yo face snare etc.

I layer my snare, if i find it needs it. Play with the amp envelope a bit. Always almost add reverb, the amount depends on the sound i'm after. Sometimes add distortion, or a little bit of delay. Combine snare with clap, or add some white noise. Compress if needed. nothing special really

Yeah you're right about ambient tunes and snares. Distortion....hmm that's an interesting one I never thought about that.

[gonzodj]

A snare in my book should be fat and reverbed

really depends on the type of tune imo, ambient oriented stuff won't need a in yo face snare etc.

I layer my snare, if i find it needs it. Play with the amp envelope a bit. Always almost add reverb, the amount depends on the sound i'm after. Sometimes add distortion, or a little bit of delay. Combine snare with clap, or add some white noise. Compress if needed. nothing special really

Yeah you're right about ambient tunes and snares. Distortion....hmm that's an interesting one I never thought about that.

a lot of actual dub reggae uses slight distortion on the snare so i've heard

[deadly_habit]

pendusnare standard
200hz

[JemGrover]

RIm shots > Harsh white noise snares anyday

[Lethargik]

pendusnare standard
200hz

so out dated, its all about the 160hz snare, don't even bother pitching up the 707

[Wikum]

i've found myself using a different technique. first i lay my kicks out in 4/4 house style. then instead of layering snares, i've been using just a simple clap with a slight reverb, then putting that on top of the kick on the 2 and 4. if you get the right kick then it sounds really good...sounds more tribal rather than too housey. maybe even nudge the snares slightly left or right so they're more humanised too.

[lowpass]

In regards to producers picking one snare sample instead of 5, if it sounds good then that's all that matters. Don't need to layer 5 snares if it sounds good with one.

As for the more Rimshotty/clappy type samples e.g for ambient stuff. Don't think that just because the music has more space and is more laid back that you can just stick a weak sample in there. The "Snare type sound" may have a different tone but you will still want punch from it, if that makes any sense?

- Distortion works wonders on snares
- If you are aiming for the ridiculous pendulum style snares then don't be afraid to mess around with limiting. With that much harmonic content you can afford to mangle it up a lil more
- For more rimshot style sounds, I still like to layer, maybe an amen snare or something underneath (but again if it sounds good with one then why layer eh?)
- When layering, compressing, parallel compressing etc it is important that you A/B at the same levels. with these techniques it's so easy for the gain to go up and all of a sudden it "sounds" better

[legend4ry]

Gawd, a good snare isn't about processing!

A good snare is about the right recording!

If you're not making your own snares and layering stuff, then you want high quality sounds thats it, you want clean, precise EQ cutting so they sit together nicely and thats "all" you should need to do... Character compress to make them blend together a bit better IF needed...

A good snare is about good dynamics and a GREAT sound!

[narcissus]

hmm.. i suppose snare is whatever you're used to ... i grew up listening to lots of soul and rnb... listened to a lot of hip hop as a teenager.. so snares to me should hit hard, be snappy, and not usually have a lot of echo.. (depends on the track and mood of course.. sometimes dubby delay is called for)

i usually leave 'em pretty dry.. maybe 2-5 sounds layered depending on what i want. tuning and volume decay can be used to fine tune the sounds so that they mesh together. usually filtering is done on some if not all of them to cut out bits that clutter the mix. for example if three samples have high end noise, it can sound cluttered, so lp 2 of 'em.. after mixing to taste, usually a limiter w/ short release suits me just fine. then perhaps send a little signal to my reverb bus, along with kick. gives it space to breathe but won't distract the ear too much so that it lacks punch. rarely do any EQ.


also... if you sidechain with the kick, also have the snare drive it a lil too.. will really make the snare stand out of if that's what's lacking.

[alphacat]

Another thing with layering - if you choose to do it - is being sure to avoid phase cancellation. If you don't know what that is and you're making music, you need to learn. Luckily it's easy to fix once you've learned what it is and how to check for it, though.

[Shekul]

Taken from the Magnetic Man interview that dude posted.... http://www.datatransmission.co.uk/Features/682/

Alright then let’s get down to the nitty gritty, kicks and snares, talk to me...

Benga: Kicks and snares…I guess you’ve just got to find the best packs you can, because when it comes to kicks and snares there can be so much processing that you’ll go round, and I guess if you just find the best recorded kicks and snares it’ll help you out so much.

Skream: It’ll save so much time.

Artwork: Yeah if you can get something, if you can get like a kick that sounds amazing without any EQ on it then you know you’re on a winner? Rather than getting one and thinking ah well I’m guna boost the bottom end, I’m guna cut that very low end off and try and find it in and so and so...

… you’re wasting more time…

Artwork: You waste a lot of time, yeah

Benga: And then again, sorry to cut you out, when you do EQ stuff, once you do find your way around EQ and stuff you have a sound, that’s how you get your sound, mix-wise...processing.

Do you guys kinda stick to a certain number of kicks and snares do you just always go back to (what you did) or do you look at new ones all the time?

Skream: I don’t I. it’s whatever mood I’m in really. If I’m in a tinny mood, if I’m in a 909 mood. I think it just comes down to what you want. Like you sort of know an area in the packs that I think you know you tend to work from a bit more than others.

[paravrais]

i think a nice snare or any drum sound is all about heavy EQing and tweaking it just right. also pitching it correctly is a big part. layering is not important and most of the time, it's more work to get something that sounds right when you're working with 3 or 4 samples instead of 1. i think a lot of producers just pick a drum sound that sounds nice by itself (and not in the track) and that's it, maybe compress it a little bit and add a little reverb.

+100

[Wikum]

i must say i get really pissed off with my snares when i'm going for pendusnare sound. i personally think they sound shit whenever i try them.

i'll usually use a couple of vengeance house snares and try to layer them together (i'm probably making a mistake here already because a lot of them sound sick on their own). i look for one with a punchy attack with a nice body of eq at 180hz, then i'll layer this with one that has a longer release (one that peaks at around 200hz).

maybe phase cancellation is one of my problems:

Another thing with layering - if you choose to do it - is being sure to avoid phase cancellation. If you don't know what that is and you're making music, you need to learn. Luckily it's easy to fix once you've learned what it is and how to check for it, though.

i understand the theory behind it: two sine waves playing the same frequency at the same volume will result in no sound. i've seen this used to take the vocals out of a tune and the opposite using phase inversion.

the bit i don't understand is how to check for it on snares and how to fix it for certain? (although i'm guessing all you'd have to do is lower the volume of one snare 0.1 db). can someone please elaborate on this?

[alphacat]

...i understand the theory behind it: two sine waves playing the same frequency at the same volume will result in no sound. i've seen this used to take the vocals out of a tune and the opposite using phase inversion.

the bit i don't understand is how to check for it on snares and how to fix it for certain? (although i'm guessing all you'd have to do is lower the volume of one snare 0.1 db). can someone please elaborate on this?

The easiest way to do it is just to flip phase on the channel and see if you notice anything; however, good monitoring is kind of the secret to really doing it right, and spectral analysis (watching for dropouts in a live view of the master channel) helps a lot too.

BTW, the button for phase usually looks like a nullset character (zero with a diagonal bar through it.)

[Wrigzilla]

Ok wikum here some things you can do to combat phase cancellation.

- Make sure that the snare samples are starting at the same time (ie line up the transients exactly, if you take a look at the waveforms of some random snare samples you'll notice that they don't all start at the same time).

- Invert the phase of one of them

- Make sure all the snares you're using are tuned to the same note (so say you're using two snares one with a huge peak at 200hz and the other at 180hz, this could end up with phase cancellation).


As for how to check it, use your ears: if the combined sound is weaker than the individual sounds then chances are phase cancellation is at play; is the snare sounds smeared or messy then again it could be phase cancellation. Try loading up two instances of the same snare in seperate tracks and move one subtly out of time with the other, that's what phasing sound like.

As a side note lowering the volume of one snare will not eliminate cancellation (with the classic two sines exapmle, if you change the volume of one then you'll start to hear stuff again, but there's still cancellation going on). I could get really technical and mathsy about this but noone wants to hear that.