Quarantine Sample Packs and Beats: Kitchen Racket

This Sample Pack is one of four in a series inspired by the sounds heard while being stuck at home during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sounds, artwork, and page created by Cindy Hernandez, Chapin scholar.

Kitchen Racket

by Cindy Hernandez

During this quarantine I have spent a lot more time in my kitchen than I usually do. There’s a lot more dishes to wash when the family is not eating out anymore. I’ve been able to experiment with new things like baking bread. Because of that the sounds of my kitchen are more familiar to me than ever. For this sound pack, I decided to record these sounds that have probably become too familiar to many of us right now. Since I thought of recording these sounds while washing the dishes, many of my sounds are related to that as well as the sound pack’s cover art.

I decided to record isolated parts of the overall Kitchen Racket that we hear, helping me appreciate each sound a bit more and hearing their natural rhythm. I recorded things such as hitting a spoon against a cup, the sink running and a tin hitting something. I then edited each noise a bit, but not too much so that the sound was unrecognizable. I played around with increasing and decreasing the pan, bass, and reverb, until I felt the sound might be more useful in creating a beat or in music. You can see where I was able to do that before.

I made sure, however, to not edit the noises too much so that the sound was unrecognizable. The best part of the sound pack is the subtle familiarity of all these noises so to alter them too much would defeat the purpose. I also played around with different types of voices that Soundtrap has available, such as Lo-Fi, which you are able to see below.

I hope this sound pack can help those who are hoping to add a subtle familiarity to what they are making and maybe lead them to making their own sounds at home too.