How important is that the kick is in key with the track?

[Paul Arcane]

I produce trance & progressive, but of course this can apply to any other genres
How important is that the kick is in key with the track? Should it be ALWAYS in key?
By key I mean the main key of the track, in trance you know the key in the first drop of the track which is usually the key of the sub bass

Curious to know your opinion about this!

[TheAGNO3]

It depends on the type of track you're producing. This forum seems to be generally geared toward electronic music, in which case I'd say it's pretty important to have it in tune with your song, because otherwise your drops will be sort of confusing to listen to.. The pounding of your kick will imply one tone, whereas your bass etc will imply another. This kinda thing is far more evident over PA's, club monitors, etc.. and that's what you've got to consider when making electronic music. Check the "Mastering" section on here, I just posted a wiki article on Fletcher-Munson curves which kinda relates to this.

[Arrient]

^

[Anuma]

Always sensible to keep it in key, but as with most things if it sounds better to you somehow in a different key or you don't notice it then go with that!

[lyteside]

Should it be ALWAYS in key?

Curious to know your opinion about this!

With EDM, should almost always be in key, but doesn't need to be in THE key. Its the dissonant fundamentals in the kicks that cause problems. So if your song is in the key of C, for instance, your kick can have a fundamental of something like a G note, and you'll get by just fine (unless your kick has long tails and/or creates your bass sound, or if a bass change will sound ugly with it).

That all being said, if you are intentionally breaking the rules to get add some angsty-ness, then sure... why not?

[Paul Arcane]

Thanks for the feedback, I have some of my tracks that the kick is not in key and I don't even notice, maybe because is too low

[manducator]

Imagine a rock group, tuning the kick drum for each song they play. 

[wayfinder]

Maybe a rock group writing all their songs in the key of the kick drum instead

[VOIID]

Not very important, my kicks are never in key (or at least I dont try to tune them so theyre in key) and I've never had any problems tbh xD

[Wontolla]

Imagine a rock group, tuning the kick drum for each song they play. 

Rock groups don't have a sub bass.

[manducator]

Imagine a rock group, tuning the kick drum for each song they play. 

Rock groups don't have a sub bass.

No, but it's all about kick drum tuning. Human ear almost can't hear a tone in sub bass:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sub-bass

[Wontolla]

Right, but when two sub frequencies are out of tune, you can hear the beats from when they come in and out of sync. That's where the mud comes from.
Listen to a typical trap beat. Trap kicks make a point of only having one sub frequency going at a time. You get a nice clean sine wave that you can bump in your car. Then, compare that to this. That sub kick's made from two detuned subs, and you get a nice wash of noise (except they did it deliberately).

[Kenny Troy]

Importance is tricky; It isn't necessary to have the kick in key, but it may improve your harmonics.

Let's say you find the "perfect" kick for your track.. but it's not in key. Could you use it anyways? Yes of course. Rather than searching for a near identical kick drum that is in the key you are looking for, you could take the route of tuning the kick drum to the key of your track.

There is an excellent ADSR Course video on how to do this, which is the video I suggest you watch.
There is currently a free seven day trial of ADSR Courses, sign up!
https://www.adsrcourses.com/subscribe

If you don't want to watch that one, there's a few other good YouTube videos to check out.
https://www.adsrcourses.com/subscribe

[Marrow Machines]

I think you can tune things relatively close to what you want it to be and still have it sound good.

It's highly in efficient to tune your drums every single song if you're doing this live. unless you have resources that negate the inefficient behavior of the time consuming task.

But this is from a rock and roll philosophy. it could tighten up your drums a bit more, yes, but overall it might not make that much of an impact.

I think tuning the layers to make one drum hit is more important than locking in on a key. it's the imperfection that some times makes music interesting.

[Cosmic Fugue]

It really depends on the type of kick. There are three basic types of kick sounds in EDM -- at least this is how I categorize them.

1. The tonal kind, with a long tail and a clear sub note (like a distorted 808 kick)

2. The more noisy kind, covering a large frequency with no clear note (like some acoustic kicks)

3. The ones with a really strong pitch envelope, that almost sound like a "laser zap" noise (like a lot of classic drum machine kicks)

Some EDM genres use one particular type. In house and trance I've heard all three types.

Type 1 has a clear note, so you need to be aware of which note it's playing. It doesn't have to be the root note but you probably don't want a super-dissonant tone.

Type 2 usually doesn't have a recognizable note. If your ears or a tuner can't find a note, this is probably the case. In this case, it's probably not necessary to tune it. (This is why rock bands don't worry about tuning kicks).

Type 3 can have a recognizable pitch, depending on how fast the pitch envelope is. You might have to tune those too.