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when you pan them out into stereo they will seem even better.
- Test a mix by listening from the next room with the door open, and by listening on different speaker systems and in
varying locations.
Unusual Arrangements
Songs such as 'Rock On', 'Say You Don't Mind', and 'Barbara Ann' are worth analysis for their unusual
arrangements. Sometimes, one instrument will stamp its sound on a mix and be part of what makes the song
memorable. Think of the clavinet on 'Superstition', the bass harmonica on 'The Boxer', the wah-wah guitar on 'Shaft',
the theremin on 'Good Vibrations', the sax on 'Baker Street', the synth on 'Baba O'Reilly', the harmonica on 'Join
Together' or the accordion at the start of 'Constant Craving'. Artists like Beck and Gomez are worth listening to for
the imagination they bring to arrangements.
The Drum Machine
For many songwriters, the drum machine is a necessary evil. It would be great to have real drums on our songs, but
we either can't play drums, don't have the room or find that recording a kit at home is impractical due to space,
expense and the neighbours. Enter the drum machine – a brilliant piece of kit (pun intended), even if it's no
substitute for Keith Moon, Mitch Mitchell or John Bonham. If you are writing dance music, then the artificiality of
the drum machine is part of the sound you want. But if you are writing pop, rock, soul, folk, blues or jazz songs, here
are a few tips on how to make a drum machine sound more "human":
- Copy real drum patterns from records.
- Don't use the pre-set rhythms. Write your own.
- When you select drum sounds, make sure they "agree" with each other.
- Use quantization sparingly. Quantization is a handy technical feature that enables drum machines to move your
tapped-in rhythm to the nearest beat or chosen division of a beat. But this is what makes drum machines sound
mechanical: they play strict rhythm. Quantization is especially noticeable on handclaps. - Use a variety of rhythms within a song, with plenty of small variations.
- Don't tell the machine to do things a drummer can't do. A drummer has only two arms and can, therefore, hit only
two things at once. Don't program the machine to hit the snare, a crash cymbal and a side drum all at once. - Avoid implausible bass drum patterns at faster tempos. The quicker the tempo, the sillier rapid bass drum patterns
sound. - If you want the drums to stop for a few bars, take care with the way they enter and exit. Use a fill to get in and a fill
to get out. - Don't put cymbal crashes only on the first beat of the bar.
- Change the parts of the kit within a song. For example, use a closed hi-hat in the verse and an open one in the
chorus – this gives extra intensity to the latter. - Flams on the snare – where the sticks hit a split-second apart – sound very "human".
- Time changes – going into half-time or double-time – also help to make the drum part less artificial.
Echo and reverb make drums sound more "alive". For a dance groove, write a simple drum pattern and then feed it
through a delay until a coherent pattern of delays emerges. You can make the echoes quieter than the main drum
part, if