What makes a song groovy, rhythmic?

[johnb820]

In salsa it's called clave, in goa trance it may be called triplets. That irresistible syncopation on and off the beats that makes the kick drop, and the snares snap. But which part or element of the track should utilize this beat pattern to maximize the groove and rhythm? Also which combination or style of kick, bassline, snare, and high hats produces the perfect balance? Many times I listen to a song for the first time and then later on when I start to focus on certain elements suddenly the song loses its groove. I get driven into hearing static beats rather than fluid rhythms.

 

Many people listen to psy trance and immediately they hear boom, boom, boom when of course to those of us who listen carefully understand the rhythmic depth of well crafted melodies, unique bass lines, etc. Is there necessarily something objective that makes one song groovier than another or is it totally dependent on the listener? Of course this is not restricted to psy trance, but for a genre that is built upon trancey dance beats it should something you want to dance to right? Why dance to psy trance but not rock music?

 

 

I realize that was a lot of questions. Sorry.

[BraneFreeze]

I wish more goa / psy music would leave the dancefloor behind and incorporate greater rhythmic complexity and polyrhythms. So many songs are ruined by predictable kicks, overloud high hats, and static BPMs. For me, this is one of the largest weaknesses of this otherwise great musical genre.

 

As a counter-example, one album I've always enjoyed for its greater rhythmic variety is Slackbaba - And The Beat Goes Om.

 

http://www.discogs.com/Slackbaba-And-The-Beat-Goes-Om/release/720017

 

 

 

 

[radi6404]

Great Thread, I usually don`t have a lot of problem with th rythm and grooth of oldschool goa, but with the very fast bpm of newschool goa I do have a problem. Great rythms in my opinion have old Electric Universe tracks with interesting percussion from the 808 drumset and really fitting bassline to kickdrum and percussion, he was one of the best. Another example of great rythm was Simon Posford, who really created some crazy sounding tracks like Horrorgramm, Fluoro neur shponge or Deranger who all had very advanced and interesting percussion. Psychaos did not have impressive grooth for example, some tracks were a bit boring in that account like Sciense Fiction for example. The Israeli artists were moderate at it and had normal grooth, they did nto pay too close attention to it but as they created the tracks they are great anyway, so I like teh grooth of AP and MFG aswell, AP mostly uses great and fat claps with a lot of reverb, which I really like.

[Purple Sunray]

Many people listen to psy trance and immediately they hear boom, boom, boom when of course to those of us who listen carefully understand the rhythmic depth of well crafted melodies, unique bass lines, etc. Is there necessarily something objective that makes one song groovier than another or is it totally dependent on the listener? Of course this is not restricted to psy trance, but for a genre that is built upon trancey dance beats it should something you want to dance to right? Why dance to psy trance but not rock music?

 

 

I realize that was a lot of questions. Sorry.

 

It's because of the nature of trance music, it's made to dance =)

Every genre follows certain pattern and rules. Trance, or in general edm is design to be 'dancable'. I can't say much about rock music, but they for sure don't think a lot about how people will dance to this track while composing it. It's more about lyrics, melodies and accords, while a trance producer will be much more focused on rythms an athmosphere of a track.

 

That also kind of explains already why some only hear BOM BOM when listening to trance, while others only hear ugly e-guitar noise when listening to rock.

If you are used to pay to attention to lyrics and melody and you suddenly switch to a genre that has much less focus on it, you will find it boring. What you hear first is the most prominent part of the track.. the BOMBOM on trance. That's same the way arround. I don't listen to rock at all and never did. If there is some on the radio or so I just find it boring.. there are the same 4 instruments playing on every track, no driving rythms and I don't care about the lyrics.

 

A verry good example is traditional chines music - if you'r a europian or american. They'r using different musical scales than your music does. If your are listening to such a track you only hear random bling bling that doesn't sound harmonic or melodic at all, while for chines ppl this is perfeclty harmonic - because they are used to.

 

And about the first question.. what you need to do to be danceable/grovy. Listen to some of your trance tracks and find out on your own 1 kickdurm ever 1/4 bar, with 1 to 3 bass-notes in between, a closed hihhat playing on every kick, a snare drum on every second kick ...

 

 

btw. you can even see this 'used to' effect inside that tiny psytrance community already. I can't have goa at all, because I never really listened to it. Coming from the oldshool trance/techno scene.. so I rather think.. go use that sound spectrum from 20Hz to 18kHz and impress me, not interested on your glitchy acid linies - while others hate this inflated fullon type of sounds.

[Imba]

Hi John.

 

I was started new stuff today, a bit experimenting with drums and percs:

http://www68.zippyshare.com/v/44630619/file.html

 

 

What i used to make more drive or just what i think makes drive better is:

kick - actually 2 but thats normal, one is low and fat and higher just because of click

snare/clap - 2 snares and clap, one fat snare, one longer with reverb and same i cut lower freqs on this one, same about clap

open hat - one main and one subtle with reverb in background on some parts

closed hat - one main and one subtle with reverb in backgroudn on some parts

bass - one normal bass and 2 bass follows/supports, first follow start on 1:15 and second on 1.22 which have chorus and makes atmosphere more fat,

 

Ofcourse volume levels are not proper right now because i just started this... i hope one day i will test it on some party and see how it works.

 

I love to use multi drums/percs. I never use just one kick or snare, always make combination of 2 or more. Also love to use reverb, it could make nice atmo too.

[johnb820]

Hey Imba I like what you have there. Radi mentioned AP using fat claps with a lot of reverb. I think getting a proper balance between where your high hats are and where the loudest part of your snare/clap is makes a big difference. The big clap sound of AP would not sound good without the same big open wet open hats.

 

Likewise in bass it's important to have good interaction between kick and bassline at the lowest end first and foremost. Secondary to that is a balanced volume level of the mid frequencies of kick and bass. Maybe one of the reasons why I don't like clicks in kicks is because it starts to defocus the listener towards the high end of the mix. And that's where kick|highhat|kick/snare|highhat|kick starts to become static. At that point the listener is required to listen to other things in the mix in order to feel any rhythm. For example, I love Filteria but not much of his music makes me want to dance except for a couple tracks on Sky Input.

[Ormion]

A good snare and a fat hat.

[LuisBSF]

It's a hard question to answer as different people respond in different ways to the same groove. I avoid straight machinegun-like rhytmic patterns if I can help it, at least not on all elements at the same time as I find it sounds flat. Silences I find personally important for groove, especially when on unexpected notes, on any of the frontline elements of the mix, eg, stuff that makes the same noise on every 16th note. Either way, a good kickdrum, a warm bassline plus attention to detail on all the percussive elements go a long way to get my arse moving when listening to dance music.