8 Simple Tricks EDM Artists Use To Make Their Drops Sound More Powerful
And how you can use them yourself.
It was a particularly uneventful winter. I was bored and frustratingly cold when I decided to download a free music production software, believing that it couldn’t be THAT hard to become a renowned musician. The first handful of tracks I made were composed of simple four-chord loops, which became excruciatingly repetitive until an overtly distorted drum beat emerged to dominate. If that doesn’t sound bad enough, a lead synth that reeked of cheesy 90s club music penetrated the mix, both off-beat and off-taste.
Luckily, these first “songs” didn’t see the light of day, but they did kickstart my quest to improve and become a reasonable producer — for fun, not for fame. During this journey, I have noticed eight universal techniques which producers, especially those in EDM (electronic dance music), use to radically improve their drops (A.K.A. choruses), making them sound bigger, fuller and better.
All of the below can be done through automation in every major DAW, I.e. changing a variable over time, whether that is for a specific instrument, the entire master track, or anything in between. The overarching trick here is to “thin out” and create tension in the track right before the drop hits. If your buildup is as complex, full and loud as your drop, it won’t hit as hard.
1. Reduce the Volume (or Gain)
Automate down the volume just before the drop by -2 dB or -3 dB. As simple as this sounds, when the drop then hits at 0 dB this will make for a subtle yet powerful change in volume which tricks the ear into thinking that the drop is larger. Likewise, ensuring the verses and bridges are a little lower in volume than the chorus also works well.
2. Throw In Percussion
The beat is instrumental (pardon the pun) in building euphoria in electronic dance music. As the buildup progresses, increase the number of kicks and snares in each bar and throw in percussive FX or foley as ear candy. You can also increase the pitch right before the drop to raise the tension. If using a kick before the drop, make it a lighter one vs. the harder kick during the drop. You may also choose to remove any drums for a few beats before the drop, which we will touch more on in point seven.
3. Get Involved With Frequency Shelving
This sounds more complicated than it is. Filter out the low (bass) frequencies and/or high (screaming child on an airplane) frequencies before the drop, then bring them back in as the drop hits. This is the most obvious “thinning out” that the average listener tends to notice.
Combining frequency shelving with altering the stereo spread (more on that below) on the global output track leads to sense of increased confinement which will work wonders when removed upon the drop. I suggest not using sub bass (anything below roughly 80 Hz) until the drop itself.
4. Add Reverb
Try more reverb in the buildup to make the overall mix sound more distant/lighter. At the drop, lower the reverb levels to make the track sound more direct and in the listener’s face. This can be applied either to the entire mix or single instruments.
5. Insert Risers & Impacts
As a buildup reaches its crescendo, inserting a white noise riser (or “lifter”), or any sound that sounds like it’s “rising” in volume or pitch, will increasingly intensify the buildup. On the other side, when the drop hits, add an impact sound (or “boomer”) to make it hit harder. I suggest you ensure that the impact sound isn’t too dominant as this will make the rest of the drop sound weaker as the impact fades away.
6. Decrease the Stereo Spread
This refers to how spatially-wide a track sounds. Consider how different instruments are panned to the left or right. If all of these become increasingly centred up until the drop (by decreasing the stereo spread), then the restriction is suddenly removed, the drop will sound more expansive as the stereo width suddenly widens again. Make sure to keep the bass centred, and if you feel experimental try the reverse: pan out various sounds so that it feels like everything is becoming distanced from the middle during the buildup. Drums and percussion tend to work best for this panning-away-from-the-centre technique.
7. Silence Is Golden
This is probably my favourite technique. Using a short silence, or cutting a selection of instruments, before the drop means that all the content in the drop will hit the listener like a ton of bricks, in a good way. I suggest removing the bass and kick drum here, which will largely be done anyway if using technique three on the lower-end frequencies. In this pre-drop silence, a short drum fill can be added to tease the imminent drums.
Please note that cutting some electronic instruments may still lead their audio to spill over into the silence due to other effects such as reverb, which you can remove by automating the gain from 0 dB down to -∞, then up to 0 dB again if making a reappearance.
8. Tease the Melody
Teasing the drop’s melody in the buildup is a fantastic way to make smooth transitions between a verse/bridge and the chorus. You can auto filter the main melody used in the chorus so it’s a redacted, more subdued version until the drop hits and the auto filter is removed so the full extent of its splendour is revealed.
Similarly, a vocal sample works well for this by either playing it in full just before the drop or gradually hinting at it as the buildup progresses. This keeps the audience listening throughout the breakdown, and signals that something big is around the corner.
There are many other techniques out there and this list is by no means exhaustive. Remember that building tension, and release, both play a big part in making any EDM drop sound powerful. It would be great to hear from you if you have any other tips.
