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Thanks to VXST's work, I've got the Amen break in usable chunks that sound great. It's no problem putting them in a D&B style arrangement, add a few semi snares and the odd offbeat skip.

What I'd like to know is how to get from this to a beat that's sufficiently jumbled up to sound good and also no longer like a variation on the D&B pattern. VXST's jungle loop is a good example.

Is it trial-and-error and ears-to-the-speaker until you've learned how to get the loop to sound right? Are there rules to this/shortcuts that can be followed? Also, does software play a part in this? Right now I'm using MadTracker for this. Is there something other tools provide that would help with this kind of beat?

All help much appreciated!

sounds like he just chopped up the amen break (if even that) and simply rearranged it all hit for hit. pretty simple. you need to listen to the style of music you want to sound like-and learn where hits should be. its part ear part personal preference. start with trying to copy his examples. also, each one of them breaks has some sort of effects on them in one case he used the glitch plug in to get that glicth going on.

so lots of plugins will help. do a search for glitch-there's one out there called the dbgllitch (something like that db blue glitch? i'll look when i get home i have it) its pretty solid for tweaking breaks. but overall looks like he simply chopped up the break and played back the hits differently then the original.

by the way his breaks are pretty tight-so you should start by trying to copy his style. contact him ask how he did it. i'm sure he'd be happy to give you some advice.

Thanks LS, will do!

The best way is to go for the offset trigger Oxx to jump to select points in the break, a long line of offsets will also get that flangy/delayecho effect. It should be documented inside Madtracker as it was in fast/impulse tracker.

I'd spend usually 3-4 hours on a single pattern, resample your breaks and mix in some slight background noise to the break or effects (in the day we used .txt files and chop them in at points. Start off with a lot of the cymbal work and work in your sub bass until your happy. Give yourself at least 4 channels and use the volume commands, it's quite effective.

supatrigger!

http://bram.smartelectronix.com/plugins.php?id=6

- bram

Thanks! That's really helpful.

VEXST's drum loops (and hits) are sweet! And top words from TheRockSolid.

I would suggest you make a drum beat thats at the tempo you want, then resample it and chop medium sized chunks that have more than one hit on them. Resequence the pattern and you'll get the Jungle vibe

Thanks Walter: that's what I'm working on right now. One major irritant is that MadTracker's ogg export truncates the output, so I'm having to export everything twice and cut all individual parts in CoolEdit (and finally the loop itself, too).

Perhaps I'm being paranoid, but it seems as though they're trying to force users to buy the wav export filter...

For me the most important thing is that rocksolid spoke of hours of work: it's the same for me and I was just getting worried that everyone else does these in a couple of minutes...