Feel the Beat! Writing a Great Groove

This is one of those irritating trends in popular music that can make or break a lot of songs. There was a fad going with some reps for a while that demanded that the basic beat of the song was done by the snare and in a really irritatingly loud manner. Some reps still adhere to that policy, so be warned. It may even be a good idea to do two cuts of your final drum track, one with your idea of a good snare volume, and another with it turned up a bit louder. Do your research before pitching your tune, and find out what the preference of the rep you want to listen to your work is, and play him/her that one.

Writing that line is the fun part, though. Sure, some rock and country has a pretty basic snare beats, but you can have a little fun with it if you feel it better serves your song to do so. The trend in pop, especially dance music right now is toward a ridiculously complex, fast snare beat—listen to as many examples as you can in the category your song falls into, and try to come up with one of your own. If you can dance to it, great, but I’ve heard several that are so off-beat they demand for you to listen, even if you can’t dance to that beat—and these songs became hits, some even chosen to become film background music. Danceable doesn’t seem to be as important as attention-getting of late, but that’s the current trend, and trends tend to change frequently. Don’t fall into the trap of just lifting a stock drum track from a song you like—the song could have been written 2 years or more ago, and it may be months before you finish recording and get that song to the pitching phase. If the music sounds too “5 minutes ago”, it won’t get picked up, and many trendy drum tracks fall into that category a few months after release. Always try to extrapolate to what you think people will like down the road—it could make the difference between a contract and another return trip to the drawing board.

Percussion—How Much is Too Much?

World music is incredibly popular right now, with lots of interesting instruments creating a rich sonic palette to paint from. True, the basic bass drum, snare and

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