Recording drums for my son's college projects.

Bubba po

Bubba po

Tiny Stonehenge Moment
This is an original song by his college band. I was sent a stereo wav file of his band's demo minus the MIDI drums. This is a mix of the original file plus real drums recorded by Frank and myself.

Comments welcome, especially to do with the drum recording/production.

 
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I will say this...
You have really come a long way on your drum recording from a few years back when I first reviewed your stuff in the clinic. This drum recording is excellent. Clean as a bell, no swishiness on the cymbals, great tone all the way around. the reverb on the snare sounds killer IMO. There isn't much to nit pick here. The only suggestions I have are mostly personal preference things.
The kick is just a hair too loud IMO. It matches the bass guitar perfectly, volumewise, so I would say to bring the bass guitar and the kick both down a hair...in equal increment. that would put the snare where it needs to be volumewise with the kick to suit my taste. Also, the toms sound fantastic but I think they could come up just a hair.
By the way, it's a great vocal too. The dude has a really good voice and he can sing.

Very pro sounding man!
amazing job!
 
Thanks, Jimi, great comments. :)

I've been recording drums in the same space with the same setup for about a year and a half. What has changed recently is that I rearranged my space in the tiny room I record in, so as to get a proper studio desk in. The kit got moved around to the corner. Subtle as it is, it's had an effect on the clarity of the recordings and some boxiness in the kick has been reduced. I suspect I was getting some kind of standing wave/phase problem right where the kick mic was.

Also, I've recorded eight songs recently and I've spent time tuning, tweaking and changing the damping on the kit. I've got much more adept at EQ, gating and mic placement, too.

So, I agree the kick can come down and the toms up. I was so pleased with the actual kick sound, I made it too upfront! Thanks again.
 
Bubba po said:
Thanks, Jimi, great comments. :)

I've been recording drums in the same space with the same setup for about a year and a half. What has changed recently is that I rearranged my space in the tiny room I record in, so as to get a proper studio desk in. The kit got moved around to the corner. Subtle as it is, it's had an effect on the clarity of the recordings and some boxiness in the kick has been reduced. I suspect I was getting some kind of standing wave/phase problem right where the kick mic was.

Also, I've recorded eight songs recently and I've spent time tuning, tweaking and changing the damping on the kit. I've got much more adept at EQ, gating and mic placement, too.

So, I agree the kick can come down and the toms up. I was so pleased with the actual kick sound, I made it too upfront! Thanks again.
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Yeah, the kick sounds really good. You drums are tuned right too. Greg helped me with choosing heads and tuning my kit. Taking time when tuning the kit and not settling for just "pretty good" is the best investment of time you can make on improving drum recordings. I have my kit sounding really good, but, the snare though good isn't stellar. Yours is. What mic do you have on the snare? Also, are you panning your overheads hard left and hard right or closer together in the mix?
 
jimistone said:
Yeah, the kick sounds really good. You drums are tuned right too. Greg helped me with choosing heads and tuning my kit. Taking time when tuning the kit and not settling for just "pretty good" is the best investment of time you can make on improving drum recordings. I have my kit sounding really good, but, the snare though good isn't stellar. Yours is. What mic do you have on the snare? Also, are you panning your overheads hard left and hard right or closer together in the mix?
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I don't know what to say about the snare other than I gate it so that I can EQ it strongly without affecting the hats. I use a very strong hi shelf from about 5 k upwards and I also put a peak in at 7.5k. I scoop it at around 3-400Hz and put a boost at 100Hz for the punch. All Frank's snares are very good ones, which helps. This one happens to be a Mapex Black Panther Blaster. It's a 13" x 7.5" walnut shell. I use spaced pair configuration on my overheads with Rode NT-5s, an SM57 on the top snare head, and a generic dynamic mic on the snare bottom. I also boost the 60Hz on the overheads, cut the low mids and place them at 80% left and right.

I remixed it with more toms, a quieter, deeper kick and a sweetened hi-hat.

 
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I thought it sounded really good. Reminds me of the Pixies (the lead guitars and recording style) + The Clash (guitar upstrokes).

The kick in mix 2 sounds "technically" better, but it pops out of the mix. So I would go with mix 1 or lower it a bit in mix 2. Other than the kick I don't hear any problems, and that kick should be easy to fix.
 
This sounds real good. I love that echo-y clean guitar in the intro (OK it's elsewhere too).

Vocals sound excellent.

Love the reggae guitar on the right.

Bass to me is a little rumbly. A little too much low end.

Drums sound excellent except the kick. It's got that bouncy-ball sound to it. Too much low end and too little low midrange I think. But a cool drum part.

That's a very good singer. I liked him anyway.
 
I like the tom tom level now...just right IMO.
I think the kick drum sounds great. The level may still be a touch high but the tone and tuning is really good to my ears.

It's subjective on stuff like that.
Outstanding recording all the way around IMO.
 
Nice recording (latest one from post #5). Guitar reminds me of Minus the Bear or even David Gilmour. Bass might be a bit loud in spots.
 
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