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How To Make Your Kicks Cut Through the Mix!

Get The Kick Right

The kick drum is arguably the most important part of a dance music track. Whether it's a chunky house thump or a breaksy jungle affair, the kick needs to fulfil several functions - from providing the low-end weight to grounding the pulse of the track and being audible on laptop speakers. It can take a lot of work to get right. So read on, as we take a look over the essential tactics in getting your kick drum sounding crisp!This week I was asked by an up-and-coming producer how to make a kick drum really slice through the mix. He had burned a load of his new tunes for a gig, tried them out on a big system, and been disappointed that the kicks tended to get lost in the low-end rumble. It's a common problem, especially when you're writing in the field of sub-heavy music, as he was. And since bass music has started to converge with house and techno recently, it's become an ever-trickier field.So first, you need to pick the appropriate type of kick for your track. It's useful to have a decent library of kicks before you start on this, and frankly the best way to get that is just to buy a good sample pack. A decent pack of kicks will have hundreds, if not thousands inside and picking a kick that's nearly right to start with will save a lot of time compared to trying to hack something less suitable into a tune. What is 'right'? This depends on the type of track you're writing. If you're writing dubstep, garage, or other sub-heavy music, then you'll need a kick that's punchy and doesn't have too much sub in it - as this will conflict with the sub in the bassline. If you're writing trance or house then you can have a much heftier kick - as in general, the basslines in these genres sit a little bit higher, around 100Hz and above. If you're writing minimal music, be it techno, Dirty South hip-hop or Mount Kimbie-style electronica, then you can go as crazy as you like; the space in the music should give you license to use anything you like without clashes.So let's consider the different types of kick. In general, a 'punchy' kick will have most of the energy clustered around 100-200Hz. The impact will be at around 140Hz and if you want to hear an example, try listening to a classic 909 kick sound. Not too subby, loads of punch, it cuts through the low-end of a mix with ease, and you can cut below 100Hz without losing too much character.

The High End

Volume Envelope

And Finally...

If you've got a sub-heavy mix then this is what the low-end of your kick should be doing; sitting just above the sub-bass and not interfering too much. You need plenty of the 140Hz component and less of the sub. It may be worthwhile side-chaining your bassline off the kick - but you shouldn't be relying on this for clarity. A better option is to write around the kick - by avoiding having both kick and sub playing at the same time (use sharp volume envelopes and fine-tuned MIDI programming) you can solve a lot of these issues. If you have two heavily subby things competing for space in your mix (remember that sub-bass uses a lot of volume headroom) then when the track comes to be mastered, these two will combine to dominate your mix, make everything else quieter and clutter the bottom end. The result will be a quiet, muddy mix with no clarity. And nobody wants that.A 'subby' kick would be something like an 808-style kick - a whole heap of sub-bass and just a high-frequency click at the top for definition, with very little in the 140Hz area. These completely dominate the low-end of a track and the fact that many producers like Julio Bashmore use them for basslines, rather than actual kicks (note that in a typical Bashmore tune the kick has almost no weight at all, simply providing character and pulse), demonstrates how a subby kick is not really compatible with a sub-bassline.So now consider the higher frequencies; this is what will make the kick audible at lower volumes and help give clarity. You need higher frequencies in a kick to make it come through amongst the rest of the percussion and synth sounds. The click in an 808 doesn't really cut it unless, again, you're writing minimal spacious-sounding stuff. Otherwise, it can be too short, too quiet and too subtle. Many old drum machines have a good toppy click in them, while a kick from a sampled break is also ideal for this. You could even just layer in a hihat, but if you're layering up another kick, you can high-pass it at 500Hz or so - it's literally just for the top end.Another way of getting some top-end presence in there is a tight reverb (think a small plate or room reverb; try a reverberation time of around 0.3 seconds) - but remember to high-pass it aggressively. As with all reverbs, you don't need any low-end in the sound as this will just muddy the spectrum. Distortion or overdrive can help bring out some higher frequencies too, but be gentle with it as you can easily end up with a noisy mess. Besides frequencies, you need to consider the volume envelope. One of the characteristics of 'punchiness' is a short attack and a bit of a transient. This, again, is important for music with subby basslines, as the punch contrasts with the lengthy sub notes, helping give clarity. Use an envelope-shaper or sample editor to make the kick tight and quick and it will not only cut through the mix more effectively but will also avoid clashing with the bassline so much. For bigger kicks in house and techno, the opposite holds; since the kick usually contains most of the track's weight, it can be longer and chunkier.A compressor will help here, by bringing up the tail end of the kick so that it's louder for longer. When mixing down, a compressor across the whole drum buss will also help bring the kick out a touch, since other parts of the drums will duck to make way.We could write all day on the subject of mixing kick drums; it's genuinely something that takes years of practice to get right. But to summarise; get a good sample library, pick the right kick for your track, make sure it's not clashing with the bass, has some top-end character and the volume envelope is right for the track. It's not easy, but it's possible. Now go and make that dancefloor shake!