How you Equalize it?

[bahador]

Attached please find the kick sample and let me know,

If you had to (you don’t have the option to choose another sample) use this kick sample, how would you equalize it? What frequencies you would cut, how much and how wide or narrow you would cut and like wise what frequencies would be your choice to boost, how much and how wide/narrow (Q)?

And do you think it is possible to make similar kick sounding with FSM Kick XP?

[Mozart von Robot]

Depends on context. Might fade the release, might change the pitch, might EQ, might not, might do some additive compression, might not, might sidechain, might not.
But, as a general rule of thumb, kicks tend to need to punch at around 100Hz. However, sometimes it's as low as 60Hz, though this is usually if you're using sidechain compression to keep the bassline from getting in the way. Sometimes you want to boost the upper frequencies of the click, while other times not, and sometimes it's even a good idea to filter them out. It all varies. It seems to me that this kick is already processed to sound good without any meddling in certain contexts, but again, it depends what you're doing and what you're surrounding it with. Sometimes the click will get in the way of other percussion, and sometimes the lower frequencies will come in conflict with the bass, so it's really kind of impossible to tell you one single way to EQ this kick. Use your ears.

[bahador]

Assuming if you were to use this kick on a dance or house genre without any side chaining in E-major. The tempo will be around 126 to 130.

The problem I have with this kick is the low ends of it that has a very huge boom or oomf on it and when turning up the volume it sounds like you are blowing the woofer with some woomp sounding. Basically the annoying part is around 51k to 64k but by cutting that area you will loose the vibrating woofer sound. I’m not sure if my point is clear but just turn up the volume on your speakers and see how messy it gets when being played loud, the kick does not have a clear sound in brief and there is lot of nasty stuffs going on around 51 to 64k.

[Mozart von Robot]

Not entirely sure I'm following, but if you're having trouble after the punch, try fading out the release a bit, to make the bassy part shorter.

[Evelon]

Yeah, just shorten the tail with ADSR. No sustain, and then adjust decay to taste. If you have "Hold" (as in AHDSR) you can use a combination of hold and decay to get more control.

I usually tend to cut around 400Hz on many of my kicks. Not always, but I just don't like/need the 400 boxiness.
50-100Hz boosts (or cuts, depending on the kick sound and relative tracks/music). 2-4kHz boost for "click".

Compressors can obviously do nice things. Even two in serial. Overdrive can spice things up and enhance some harmonics.
Expanders (aka transient designers/shapers) can be used to either soften or enhance the transient.

edit: The kick you uploaded sounds fine on its own. It's when you add more and more elements to your track that you maybe need to edjust things (so that things don't overlap/clash to much). It's all relative, as Mozart Von Robot said.

[bahador]

Thank you so much guys the adsr trick was the only way to make it sound better and you were right the whole issue was caused by the tale of the sample and also the tale had an amplitude equal to the punch or beginning of the kick and they were both already distorted and I think the distorted punch is not something very problematic but the distorted tale can cause some unpleasant artifacts. So I decreased the volume of the tale in a stand alone wave editor and brought it back again to the sample table in buzz and the issue was gone. Thanks you so very much.

[Joachip]

It's a good kick, but I'd have to know what sort of music it's meant for to know.
It sounds like dance / trance to me, and I must admit that's not the genre I know best.

[Joachip]

For some reason, I ended up writing a dance track with this kick.
http://www.robotplanet.dk/files/music/D ... ttered.mp3

[Evelon]

Tail

Fixed.

You are welcome! Glad it worked out.

[bahador]

Evelon thank you so much brother. By the way meant to ask this sooner, by shortening the tail of the kick drum you will loose some of the sub-boomy part of the kick and as a result you will end up with a kick which is not quit sub-ish (I think sub-ish is the technical term for me I don’t know any better word to express my feelings about that part of the kick) so if you were to re-equalize the kick and add some sub-bass-woofer-blower to it what were the frequencies you would have boost for that sub-bass purpose with what amount of Q? (Assuming if you were not to do any side-chaining or add another sub bass to the kick)

Joachim have you shorten the tail of the kick? The kick sounds too tight to my ears. Am I right about shortening the tail?

And as you have mentioned the genre is going to be a combination of house and electro house.

[Joachip]

I compressed the whole track, which probably changed the length of the kick. But that's the only thing I did to the kick. I just changed the compressor btw., so download again if you liked the track.