How I Use Pro Tools As My One-Stop Shop For Making Sampled Hip Hop Beats
A typical Pro Tools beat making session using my custom template.
My production methods revolve solely around the Pro Tools editing window full of a bunch of empty audio tracks and several aux’s. I am not using any cool midi instruments or sound libraries. The only pieces of outboard gear are my audio interface that I’ve had since 2004 and a turntable. The most used piece of gear: apple keyboard with 10-key. You read that right, not a keyboard or drum pad, just a qwerty keyboard. This common apple accessory is not meant to be a replacement for a MIDI controller but a controller for the myriad of quick key commands that I utilize to execute all of my editing functions. That’s right, I am not playing music, I am merely editing existing music until it transforms into a hip hop beat. Don’t get me wrong I have keyboards, controllers, and even an original MPC60 but I seem to gravitate towards my original methods. My full-time job at the moment involves video editing. I started making beats long before getting into video but my beat making approach resembles that of a video editor. I am cutting up the best parts to create a new complete picture. To be honest, I used to be terribly embarrassed about my style hence the long list of unused gear. Everyone else was making beats with drum pads and performing cool demos. Synths were the rage and so was Ableton Live. A while back I competed in the Scribble Jam producer competition where finalists had to dig through record crates and make a beat live on the spot. Humiliated by my strictly in the box style, I lugged around a MIDI keyboard just to fit in.So over the years I ended up with an MPC60, Emu Vintage Keys keyboard, MPC500, M-audio ProKey 49 for Logic Pro, Akai APC40 for Ableton Live, etc. But guess what? I learned that I don’t comprehend advanced music theory and I have no rhythm. As much as I practiced, I still did not produce work at the same level as the original sampling techniques that I developed when I first downloaded Sonic Foundry Acid Pro. Over the years I jumped from DAW to DAW and kept reverting back to my old reliable “editing” style. It wasn’t as sexy as finger drumming and knob turning you see on youtube but it got the job done.
Some might disapprove of my methods claiming that the drums should be played or sampling is cheating. But at the end of the day all that matters is how the song makes you feel. Leave all the technicalities to the purists who enjoy the traditional practices such as hitting tape and splicing samples in drums machines. Music is subjective anyways and an artist should not have to get caught up in all of the hypothetical b.s. and opinions of people who aren’t helping you make your shit. It’s like the popular Kevin Durant to the Warriors debate. “KD is cheating by getting a championship with the Warriors, he took the easy route.” People who say that probably never won a championship themselves and probably realize that you still have to play the games and actually win them. I played on a National Championship winning high school football team that went undefeated and blew out damn near every opponent. Was it easy? Hell no! A lot of hard work goes into making good music let alone getting people to listen. Improvement means experiencing failures. There is no wrong way to make your music but you will never know what is right for you until you actually try and fail with different methods.
So if I am basically pasting drum sounds onto the grid and step sequencing, I am obviously losing the ability to create a loose human-like groove for the drum beat, right? Not necessarily. If you study the look of “live-sounding drums” you will notice that the kick drum might lag a bit or the snare is rushed. I recreate this feel by using the nudge tool.
Adjust nudges to 10 samples to nudge your drum hits to a groove.
I will set my nudges to 10 samples so I can use the < and > keys to nudge the one shots slightly. The M and ? keys will allow me to do a much larger nudge of 100 samples. It sounds tedious but I will move the drums around until it feels right. Another method is stealing another beat’s groove. I can grab an 8 count from another song, time stretch it to match my beat, and place the track right above my drum layers in my Pro Tools session. Then it is just a matter of lining up my drum hits with the reference beat that I just imported. Sounds like stealing but it helps to borrow a tried and true groove. If you feel that you need to be original and there isn’t a groove out there that can replicate your intentions, I have another trick that requires a microphone. Once I have my drums laid out out and snapped to the grid, I will record enable a mono track, hit record and tap a rhythm onto the mic or on my desk. I have a Shure SM57 sitting on my desk for this purpose. I take the track with my rhythmic tapping and line up my drums to it. Again, this looks like a grueling process but if you practice your quick keys and shortcuts, you can get it done quickly.
Drum sequence in the edit window.
My reference microphone technique can also be applied to tuning basslines. As I mentioned earlier, I do not play instruments. I don’t load instruments into my sessions because I am used to using slow computers and synths typically bog down my CPU usage. So I learned to develop workarounds such as recording myself singing or humming melodies and using melodyne to transcribe the notes. I then take my 808 bass and use melodyne to tune it to the same notes I hummed. The technique can be applied to any other sample as well. Melodyne coupled with elastic audio makes Pro Tools a powerful tool for editing samples. The possibilities are endless.
The beat making techniques that I present are a bit unconventional but it works for me. In several aspects of my life I often try to take the less obvious route. No one wants to be a sheep and it is often difficult to stand out in a sea of trend chasers. I try to be honest with myself to like what I like with conviction. This is not always the case but I keep the importance of being unique in the back of my mind with all creative choices. For example, with sampling for a hip hop beat, I’ll stay away from chopping up the intro, at first. It’s common practice to find a section of the song that does not have vocals or drums. I don’t care. The more vocals, drums or distractions, the better for two reasons: 1. It will be a selection that is overlooked by other producers and 2. It will be more challenging to chop up.
Cutting the original sample into multiple layers and grouping regions for organization
For these reasons, the completion of the beat will be much more rewarding and you may develop a few new tricks in the process. This is exactly why I prefer the Pro Tools edit window for editing and laying out my tracks for my beats. I can see the entire song, quickly cut the parts I like, and try many different sequences until I am satisfied. The Pro Tools time stretching engine makes it easy to manipulate samples. I will cut samples into bars so that I can time stretch sections into the desired tempo of my beat. This simplifies the process of moving parts around and experimenting with different combinations. This is another one of the processes that I have developed to help me make fast decisions. Always remember, the idea is to sound unique so it is crucial that you take the time to explore who you are, what you like, and what your strengths are. Having a strong foundation in knowing your personal sound will help you make quicker decisions in the beat making process.
I deploy a specific process but I will eventually alter and improve it as I get inspired and evolve my sound. For now, I want to maximize what I already have and if I find success, I will reward myself with some new gear. Dan Lok mentioned that his sifu made him practice a only straight punch for weeks until he mastered the move. When pitted against another trainee who was at a higher level he was able to defeat him with his one single straight punch move. I strive to master my current process first before I move on to playing my own instruments or learning new programs. There is a significant benefit behind working with limitations. If I had all the instruments and all the plugins in the universe, where would I begin? I’d probably start with just one and mastering that first. That alone tells me I am better off with what I have right now. I have an original MPC60 which has 5 sec sampling time limit. I bought the sampler back in ‘03 because it was the weapon of choice for DJ Premier who has countless hits. Limitations force you to think creatively so I have learned to embrace using an outdated laptop top and so called “crappy” DAW software. When I first started engineering at 17 Hertz Studio I was recording paying customers on an ancient Mac g4 tower (the model right before they used metal casing) and a bootleg Pro Tools HD system. The CD burner didn’t even work so I’d have to transfer files to my laptop, a process that took nearly 20 minutes when some clients were only booking 1 hour sessions! With that shitty set up, I learned how to manage my time creatively. Let the purists and production snobs be haters. The real reward is in personal growth and inspiring others.
In addition to its creative limitation (the limits that I give it), Pro Tools offers numerous benefits for the overall music making process. Each track that I lay out in the session is already tracked out and ready for mixing making it easy to mix as I go. Since I am making beats with the intent to have an artist record over it each session is ready for the recording phase. The beat can also be sequenced for the artist right on the spot. My template is designed in a way that streamlines the mixing process as well.
Pro Tools beat making template with empty elastic audio enabled audio tracks routed to master aux.
Mixing engineers loved to work with session files from 17 Hertz Studio because we all used a similar template for recording where our sessions were meticulously organized. Every single file has a distinct name and every track, aux, and even internal routing had appropriate names within the session as well. Being creative is a difficult task so I try to do everything I can to make all of the technical crap simple for myself and anyone else who would be involved in creating a finished song.
You can use any program or tool to make beats. I make the case for Pro Tools because I have over 10,000 hours of experience in the program from engineering to mixing to beat making. The ability to time stretch and conveniently edit sounds in the multitrack window work well for my style. Working directly in Pro Tools means that it’s immediately ready for mixing which is an added bonus. Most importantly, the flexibility it provides ensures that I can constantly tweak my workflow and methods to be unique and creative. As I continue to build my home studio and integrate outboard gear that I have accumulated over the years, Pro Tools will most likely remain at the core of my production process.
