This Ableton Drum Compression Tutorial shows you how to add groove and punch to your drums. This technique works equally well for Deep House, Tech House and any other electronic dance music genres.
We are adding compression using a drum buss. To create this in Ableton Live 9, either group your drum tracks or create a new audio track and route your drums to this.
After adding the compressor the first step is to set the threshold nice and low so it’s easy to hear how the attack and release effect the drum loop. The second step is to increase the release until the punch of the kick, snare drums and claps can be clearly heard. Be careful not to go to far or the body of the sound will come through and the enhanced punch will be lost.
Next up the release parameter is set so that the compressor pumps in time with the music.
At this stage you might decide to back off on the ratio and stick with your existing settings. We chose to us the sidechain EQ to roll off some of the kick drum so the percussion had more of an impact on the sidechain circuit.
Finally be sure to level match and a/b your results. This is the best way to get compression settings that are perfect for your drums.
A killer groove is vital in electronic dance music.
The next Ableton Live tutorial will be posted same time next week
