"Kick Drum 'o' Kick Drum"

I am sucking on my kicks. i layer em, compress em, shower em then send em home in a cab and still they are weak. any tips on putting together a nice sounding kick? I usually try to layer an acoustic drum with a synthesized drum then add compression but am always unable get nice round n punchy kick sound.

So aside like a dirty whore, how do you treat your kicks?

Any tips are appreciated...
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* This helped me out a bit and gave me a good idea how to start out my drumz...Now i use a combo of using this and alot of layers of drums. peep the link, if your not using Ableton, the idea still applies i guess...this has helped but not the cure all...im sure there are other tips out there.

http://sonictransfer.com/kick-drum-design-tutorial.shtml

* You have to choose a nice and round subby kick, make sure it doesn't sound muddy, if it does, EQ to fix it. Then for the attack choose a kick by your choice, but filter the low end, you can also use a short hi-hat over the while thing. Focus on the EQ though...

* Also, look into key-inputting a 50-65 hz tone through a gate. This oscilated tone can be triggered by your kick, emitting the LFO tone and it'll suppliment your low end nicely.

* I've found you can't just layer em at will.. if the tunings of multiple kicks don't line up right you'll end up with phasing problems, which reduces the low end.

If you have low end heavy speakers you might not be able to tell this is happening, listen through headphones to see how the sound changes as you play the layers together versus separate. Finetune the tunings so that the samples sympathize with each other. Also, make sure the kicks are starting at the same point (no space up front), this can effect phasing as well.

It's also important to keep the faders of all your tracks somewhat low. The most important thing to getting a big kick is to turn it up in relation to the rest of the tracks, but as you build a track the kick can get lost. Just turn it up..

Sometimes it is also helpful to roll off the low end of a kick... the real subs, like below 50hz with a tight Q. This let's you bring up the volume of the kick in a meaningful way. Also, don't put compression on it unless you're after something specific, like the attack is too clicky. Try to get the source - the actual samples - to be as good as possible without compression first.

It can also be helpful to roll off the high end. This gives the kick a warmer sound, and can make a track sound less cluttered, but it depends on the track.

Always be careful that you're not clipping. If your source is a sampler, and you have layered a few samples, you are probably clipping the output of the sampler. Bring the main volume within that sampler down... The kick track's fader position should not match the kick track's volume readout.. ie: if you have the fader at -6 db, you shouldn't see the volume of that track hitting -6 db, it should be less. Clipping like this will make the sound less smooth and natural.

* I always use a 909 kick (recorded from my hardware novation drumstation) for the low end. remove some of the mid and top from this one. Then add a kick on top for the mid and highs (eq lows out). tune it until they match and then gentle compress the 2 to "glue" them.

In a track I always program a close hat on all the counts (1 5 9 13) to add some extra highs. (or a short open, tambourine ect)

In a track, if the mid is a bit muddy, eq some out around 250 - 300 hz. the kick gets "rounder". also eq some of the really lows out to make room for your bassline.
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