Drum Samples

1. You will need an audio editor. Some people will use a DAW but they are for making music not samples. Audio editors are better for tweaking the way drum samples sound.

2. When making kick drum samples it's important to make them loud because thats what most people will be listening for. Remember to never clip the signal. Stay below 0db. I've heard sample sites selling drum samples and their test demos clip. I laugh and think who would buy those. Answer NOBODY.

3. There are a bunch of ways to make drum samples...
Record live drum, record yourself hitting things like boxes and tweak them in an audio editor, run an old keyboard through a guitar stompbox, sample of of old records, layer two or more samples to make a new sample and use high pitched tone and then tweak the pitch to make thumping bass drums. There are more ways... i'll add them when i update this page.

4. The Chopping....
When people chop samples from records it seems they forget to envelope the front and tail end of the sample. I hate hearing clicks at the start, top or tail end of a sample. Remember to envelope the sample to a zero point so it doesn't click.

5. EQing...
A lot of people forget or don't bother with parametric eqing but they are fools. Your audio editor has grapic EQs and a parmetic EQ... use them both.

When downloading drum samples the best sites tell how many samples are in a sample pack and what bit they are (16-bit or 24-bit). I've seen some sites SELLING that don't even have how many samples are in the sample pack. That's dumb. I'd never buy from a site like that.

IRKS... I dislike the download one at atime websites but they are handy if in a bind. The reason they are download one at a time is they are user contributed sites. In other words it's anyone can upload a sample. There is good and bad to that. The good is those sites usally have a lot of content. The bad it's not all good content, lol.

1. Drum Samples (dot Org)
Easy to download. All in zip. Tells how many in each pack. Has extras like bass and dj samples.

...more to come :)