Review of the Traumah Drum Library

BEAT MUSIC MAKER :

For music producers today, it is essential that we use high quality drum sounds in beats and instrumentals. Many upcoming producers often buy drum sample kits with famous producer's names on them. For example, a beat maker may want to create an instrumental to sound like producer Dr. Dre or Timbaland so he/she will try to buy their drum sounds. Often times these kits will be labeled "Dr. Dre drums" or "Timbaland drum samples".

Review of the Traumah Drum Library

The problem with many of these kits is that the sounds are often recycled from stock drums in keyboards (Roland Fantom, Korg Triton, Yamaha Motif, etc). This can make a producer's beats sound bland and un-authentic. It also contributes to beats "sounding the same".

Welcome to the Exclusive Sounds

Since becoming a music producer in 2004, I have purchased plenty of drums and sounds, but in 2010 I was introduced to Traumahdrums.com. Traumah is a music producer that specializes in the engineering and crafting of unique drum samples. Upon visiting Traumahdrums.com, I signed up for his mailing list to download a free drum kit.

Over the course of the next year, I received periodic emails from Traumah with music production tips, videos, and plenty of free drums kits. After receiving tons of good information from Traumah I finally decided to invest in one of his drum kits.

The Traumah Drum Library includes 187 organic drum samples exclusively crafted for producers and beat makers. It includes "50 crispy ear stabbing snares, 50 back cracking gut punching kicks, and 37 foreign sounding percussion ranging any where from Western Indian influenced shakers to South African inspired Congo drums". The drum kit also features 30 unique drum loops.

Upon receiving my drum kit, I uploaded the drum sounds in to my music production software. I currently use Reason 5 to make my beats. I uploaded one of the kick drum sounds into the Redrum rack in Reason and was immediately blown away at the thickness and uniqueness of the drum sounds. I went through all of the kicks, snares, claps, percussion, and hi hats in the package and I could tell that each one had been crafted to "knock". With my production roots in hip hop, this was especially pleasing to my ears!

Compare and Contrast

To ensure that the sound I was hearing was not all "hype", I uploaded some of my favorite drum sounds and compared them to the ones in the Traumah Drum Library. Quite frankly, the sounds I was using did not cut the mustard! My favorite kicks, claps, snares, hi hats, and percussion instruments sounded weak compared to Traumah's kit.

I then began to ask the question. Why? Why did Traumah's drums sound better than my favorites? I sought to do an EQ analysis. I brought Traumah's drums and my favorite drums into ProTools to compare and contrast them.

When comparing Traumah's drums to mine I noticed that each drum sample was crafted to fill up the sound spectrum. Kicks had plenty of lift in the low end frequencies as well as some mid. Snares and claps hit hard! In addition, all of the sounds were pre-mixed which was huge for me!

The sounds I was currently using were not pre-mixed. Anyone one who's actually taken the time to mix instruments together knows that it can be an extensive process. The fact that the sounds were pre-mixed saved me valuable time in the engineering department!

Final Verdict

Overall, I am very pleased with the Traumah Drum Library, I use it often in my beats and instrumentals. Since using Traumah Drums, I've noticed an increase in beat sales as well as increased interest from independent artists. The drum library is well worth the purchase price. I would recommend the kit to any serious producer looking to enhance their sound and sharpen their skills.

Do You Ever Wish YOU Had The Ability To Make REAL Hit Music Like That?

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The History of Rap and Hip Hop Music

BEAT MUSIC MAKER :

The origin of hip-hop can be traced back as far as the ancient tribes in Africa. Rap has been compared with the chants, drumbeats and foot-stomping African tribes performed before wars, the births of babies, and the deaths of kings and elders. Historians have reached further back than the accepted origins of hip-hop. It was born as we know it today in the Bronx, cradled and nurtured by the youth in the low-income areas of New York City.

The History of Rap and Hip Hop Music

Fast-forward from the tribes of Africa to the ghettos of Kingston, Jamaica in the late sixties. The impoverished of Kingston gathered together in groups to form DJ conglomerates. They spun roots and culture records and communicated with the audience over the music. At the time, the DJ's comments weren't as important as the quality of the sound system and its ability to get the crowd moving. Kool Herc grew up in this community before he moved to the Bronx.

During the late sixties, reggae wasn't popular with New Yorkers. As a DJ, Kool Herc spun rhythm and blues records to please his party crowd. But, he had to add his personal touch. During the breaks, Herc began to speak to his audience as he had learned to do in Jamaica. He called out, the audience responded, and then he pumped the volume back up on the record. This call and response technique was nothing new to this community who'd been reared in Baptist and Methodist churches where call and response was a technique used by the speakers to get the congregation involved. Historians compare it to the call and response performed by Jazz musicians and was very much a part of the culture of Jazz music during the renaissance in Harlem.

Herc's DJ style caught on. His party's grew in popularity. He began to buy multiple copies of the same albums. When he performed his duties as a DJ, he extended the breaks by using multiple copies of the same records. He chatted, as it is called in dance hall, with his audience for longer and longer periods.

Others copied Herc's style. Soon a friendly battle ensued between New York DJs. They all learned the technique of using break beats. Herc stepped up the game by giving shout-outs to people who were in attendance at the parties and coming up with his signature call and response. Other DJs responded by rhyming with their words when they spoke to the audience. More and more DJs used two and four line rhymes and anecdotes to get their audiences involved and hyped at these parties.

One day, Herc passed the microphone over to two of his friends. He took care of the turn table and allowed his buddies to keep the crowd hyped with chants, rhymes and anecdotes while he extended the breaks of different songs indefinitely. This was the birth of rap as we know it.

Hip-hop has evolved from the days of the basement showdowns to big business in the music industry. In the seventies and eighties, the pioneers and innovators of the rap record was the DJ. He was the guy who used his turntable to create fresh sounds with old records. Then, he became the guy who mixed these familiar breaks with synthesizers to produce completely new beats. Not much has changed in that aspect of hip-hop. The guy who creates the beat is still the heart of the track. Now, we call him the producer. Even though some DJs work as producers as well as DJs (quite a few start out as DJs before they become producers), today's title "DJ" doesn't carry the same connotative meaning it did in the eighties. Today's hip-hop producer performs the same tasks as the eighty's DJ.

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