Working with the bass

The partnership of kick drum and bass (be it synthesised, electric or acoustic) is absolutely central to any beat-driven track, from pop and RnB to hip-hop, house and breakbeat. The hi-hats and snare ticking and slamming away above, as important as they may be, are very much secondary in terms of defining the pulse and groove of a track. Programming the kick pattern in any drum beat, then, has to be done with constant consideration for the bassline – it’s good practise to keep the latter playing most if not all of the time while working on the note placement of the drums. The kick should follow and punctuate the bass, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the two have to actually hit at the same time all the time. The heaviest notes in the bassline (the downbeat, for example) always benefit from being underpinned by the kick, but the less important ones can be woven around the kick so that each fills the gaps in the other, keeping the low end solid and consistently present throughout the track.

Of course, there are exceptions. Consider the offbeat basslines of classic trance, for example, where the notes fall in between the kicks; or the countless tracks out there in which the kick sticks to the bass notes like glue, perfectly effectively. As with all things in music, it’s all about finding whatever’s best for the track, but the key takeaway is that the kick and bass should always work together and never fight each other for space.