The Dilla Feel ala (questlov/chris dave etc)

Dave_Major

Silver Member
Just wondering how many other guys are actively working on this feel?

It's a really tricky one to get down because various limps might be....for lack of a better expression drunk. There are so many degrees of it from just the drums to the whole band to one member (not just the drummer) but it's awesome and very hypnotic!

It a massive part of Questloves groove as well as Chris Dave.

I've been working on it for a year or so on my own and with my band and we are getting it. It's such a mental exercise as opposed to a mechanical or note based one.

Here are some examples

Think Twice - J Dilla
Dillalude #2 - Robert Glasper Experiment Main groove at 0.13
Pharcyde albums
Slum Village albums
seed 2.0 - The Roots
The Dreamer - Common - Bass on the beat/kit drunk


Love to know if anyone else out there is working it.

D
 
check out the GZA tune in my previous post .... beat by RZA

try emulating that beat..... much harder than it sounds to cop that feel due to the glitch .... great great stuff

RZA created that "glitch" style by accident due to an actual glitch in the software of the ASR 10

and what beautiful music that accident created

there is a member here named otb who is superb at this style .... you should check out his videos
 
check out the GZA tune in my previous post .... beat by RZA

try emulating that beat..... much harder than it sounds to cop that feel due to the glitch .... great great stuff

RZA created that "glitch" style by accident due to an actual glitch in the software of the ASR 10

and what beautiful music that accident created

there is a member here named otb who is superb at this style .... you should check out his videos

That one will take some work..

Beautiful accident!
d
 
Where exactly is the glitch?
To me the bass drum didn't line up with the rest of the beat/the snare correctly. Plus, they seem to have used a looped sequence because that same 'error' is continuing throughout the tune. Is that the glitch itself? Honestly, I wasn't nearly as much impressed as I assumed I would be when I clicked that link. I don't have much listening experience with that style though.
 
that is the glitch. The bass drum and hi hat doesn't line up quite as it should. I'm sure that GZA wanted the beat to line up perfectly but like the accident.

D
 
@tony

Just checked out OTB. He has it down!

Does a lot of similar things to what i do. Masssive head movements to keep in time. I view it and feel the quarter note as bigger and wider allowing me to move slightly within it's confines.

D
 
that is the glitch. The bass drum and hi hat doesn't line up quite as it should. I'm sure that GZA wanted the beat to line up perfectly but like the accident.

D

by the time Liquid Swords was recorded that had become part of what was recognizable about the RZA style.....so that track was probably purposefully done.

but earlier around the time of making demos for 36 Chambers and Meth demos they were indeed unintentional and equally as beautiful

I really enjoy how.... not unlike Jojo and KJ Sawka emulating the machines that created jungle and drum&bass...
guys like Chris Dave, Daru Jones, ?uestlove, etc are emulating the machines that made hip hop in the early to mid 90s

truly beautiful
 
by the time Liquid Swords was recorded that had become part of what was recognizable about the RZA style.....so that track was probably purposefully done.

but earlier around the time of making demos for 36 Chambers and Meth demos they were indeed unintentional and equally as beautiful

I really enjoy how.... not unlike Jojo and KJ Sawka emulating the machines that created jungle and drum&bass...
guys like Chris Dave, Daru Jones, ?uestlove, etc are emulating the machines that made hip hop in the early to mid 90s

truly beautiful

Cool man. Im gonna check those out.

Dave
 
I still struggle getting the Dilla feel. It seems the hi-hat is delayed by a 32nd note and the snare is also delayed. Am I correct?

Saw this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tB1B8vOZxRM

But I'm still struggling. Any tips?

Its a mentak thing. You have to listen as much as possible.

A great groove is the one i mentioned in dillalude #2. Its almost on its own and ypu can loop it and slow it down to get right into it!

So i slowed that down and played along just matching it as close as possible.

With the kick or snare try and play flams between the 2 limbs.

Another thing before really getting into this i had been working on lining everything up. After 6 months of work with new breed and others all my limbs are now defaulted to being together.

This has made it a lot easier for me to move each individual limb independant of each other.

Hope that helps

Dave
 
Its a mentak thing. You have to listen as much as possible.

A great groove is the one i mentioned in dillalude #2. Its almost on its own and ypu can loop it and slow it down to get right into it!

So i slowed that down and played along just matching it as close as possible.

With the kick or snare try and play flams between the 2 limbs.

Another thing before really getting into this i had been working on lining everything up. After 6 months of work with new breed and others all my limbs are now defaulted to being together.

This has made it a lot easier for me to move each individual limb independant of each other.

Hope that helps

Dave

Yeah, but I think this groove is overly complicated. The J Dilla feel can be achieved with simple 8th notes, that's where the magic is thus the hard part ;)

Curious I've been working on the New Breed for 6 months too and I'm only in the beginning :p
 
Yeah, but I think this groove is overly complicated. The J Dilla feel can be achieved with simple 8th notes, that's where the magic is thus the hard part ;)

Curious I've been working on the New Breed for 6 months too and I'm only in the beginning :p

I can see that in that groove. Helped me to go to the extreme and work back from it.
Check out Twice from Robert Glaspers Black Radio remix album/. There is a breakdown at the end which is a really subtle version. Again that's a groove that is really easy to chop up and loop in Audacity or something.

The biggest challenge I find with these grooves, especially when I am pushing one or two limps to the extreme, is keeping the tempo so I'm finding it helpful to play with a click that is straight 8ths and then I can move off of that with a bit more of a safety net.

In New Breed I got to system 20 or something like that. My sole aim with this was to lock in all my limbs so I set up a hi hat kit on my roland and just played each exercise at about 50.
I did 2 reading pages a day and that was it. Wasn't massively indepth but really helped reset my default.

Dave
 
Emulating the Dilla feel demands strong independence in the hihat hand. When the hihat is anchored dynamically and time-wise, the snare and kick can be pushed back and forth as required. Mega tough, Chris Dave has it down better than anyone. I wish Dilla had put together a live thing with him in it.
 
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