If you want to successfully layer drum samples together to make new ones, you should be aware of all the technical aspects and techniques and methods the end result can be achieved. Knowing the history of drum samples – from their sampled nature in the 70s and 80s and even today, to their electronic synthesis over the same timeline – will help you a lot in really being a master of the subject. Live and synthesized drum samples are out there, and hybrids also exist. The latter seems to be dominating songs as of late.
When trying to layer drums of any type, you should watch the volume and clipping meters. Samples will often contain many common frequencies, and by layering these you run the risk of clipping or distorting the sound. So keep an eye out and maybe adjust volume before the actual mixing process. Be proactive about combating the issue.
The start of any drum sample is called the attack. This is the initial phase and is responsible for the sound coming through and shining despite many other sound layers that may be pushing the drum track down naturally.
The middle of a sample is what sustains it. A drum sample with a boomy middle, like the 808 kick, for instance, may have a slow (soft) attack, so its announcement is not as pronounced as a snappy snare to give an example. But you can sure feel it, and this is what has made it such a cultural phenomenon since the 80s.
The end of the drum samples is up after the sustain. So we’ve gone from start to middle and now to end. The only thing to really worry about here is that your sound does not clip as it stops. A lot of truncations can cause this sound due to sudden cuts in volume. To fix a clip, use the filter that would have come with your audio editor or fix it yourself by fading out the last few milliseconds. The end of a drum sample is not that important and is mostly determined by the sustain of said sample, so don’t worry about it too much and focus on the earlier stages.
Layering is not as hard as it is said to be. Much of the time, you can’t just combine two samples after lining them up. What you should concentrate on is combining the phases of different samples. So if one particular kick drum has a great middle but lacks a punchy entrance, take the entrance from another sample and mix-paste the wave forms to form a hybrid that please the ear both through its announcement and guest talk, so to speak. When it comes time to ‘leave the party’, the drum sample can simply be faded out or have a reverb tail it out. The possibilities are endless.
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