Hi hat too loud in overheads

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DM1

New member
Are there any tips or tricks for reducing the level of the hi hats in the overhead mics? Like, is there a dampening or shielding technique, or maybe an OH configuration that tends to pick up less hat than others?

I've only got C4's to use as overheads, and they're top-heavy to begin with. I'm already playing the hats (AAXs) as softly as I can, but they're cutting through just too much .. And if I shelve off some highs, I lose the cymbals too.
 
You might need to dampen the room with some acoustic treatments. A really live room can make the hats sound pretty loud.

You can also try compressing the OH's. That can help smooth everything out.
 
My band has had the very same problem in all of our recordings, bar the one we are doing ourselves at the moments. Our drummer uses the hats a lot and has them pretty much fixed partly open, and they get picked up by everything. And the very simple solution we found was...

Get quieter hats!

We borrowed a much thinner, lighter set and it makes a world of difference. To my ears they sound different, but just as good, and they don't bleed all over everything else.
 
Sounds like a good idea to me. Failing that, just have your cymbals higher and your hats lower - how close are your hi-hats to the nearest cymbal?
 
Hmm, in the short-term, I only have access to two sets of hats, the AAXs being the quieter of the two.


MadAudio said:
Hit everything else harder?
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Heh, it's actually one of the things I tried. A little skinny nylon-tipped stick on the hat, and a big fat hunk of wood for the snare ... Didn't help so much though.


MadAudio said:
Seriously, though - How do you have the the overheads set up?
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I've tried a few setups. Standard X/Y 4' over the kit, a few variations on Glyn Johns. The one that sounds best is a spaced pair, with the left mic positioned such that the hi-hat is "hidden" by the crash cymbal.

Still not great, though.


TexRoadkill said:
A really live room can make the hats sound pretty loud.
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Hmmm, that's definitely an issue here. But then wouldn't close-mic'ing help the sound? For me, it definitely makes the hats louder. (Like micter mentioned above.)


Elton Bear said:
how close are your hi-hats to the nearest cymbal?
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About a foot away from a crash. Is the logic there that the hats cause resonance in the other cymbals?
 
Yup, what everyone else said. Also, I think wood tips tend to give a softer sound compared to nylon, which is brighter and more cutting to my ears. The Vic Firth SD4 maples are very soft (probably break easy, too), but have a very nice sound on the hats.
 
giraffe said:
quieter hats will help, ultimately though.....
it's a problem of technique.
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Sure is. I've developed a nice way of teaching drummers how to play drums for recordings without hurting their feelings or trying to change their style too much. I immediately explain common problems in drum recordings where the player had poor technique and I explain that I'm just trying to give them the best recording possible and they usually listen. I drill into their heads constantly, quiet on the cymbals, loud on the drums. Mic techniques can be just as important too, get them both down and say bye bye to runaway hihats.
 
I think there's a good general consensus there.


You can get quieter hats, however, I don't really beleive that would fix the issue. I think it would have to do more with how the drummer plays them.


If someone dosn't have finess in thier playing style, then it becomes difficult to hide that in the mix. The best studio drummers would have you think they hit the cymbals hard, but that's opposite the case. They actually play the cymbals soft, but move them in such a way that they come off impactful in the mix.

So it takes practice. Also, tracking that playing style properly would be extremely important.


If retracking the drums are out of the picture, you can try to EQ out the hi hat frequencies relative to the entire drum mix. Probably not the best option, but it would be one of the only ones you have.
 
DM1 said:
Hmmm, that's definitely an issue here. But then wouldn't close-mic'ing help the sound? For me, it definitely makes the hats louder. (Like micter mentioned above.)
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Close micing won't help the overhead mix.

Try some compression. It will bring up the volume of everything else in relation to the hats.
 
I've had a similar problem (cymbals in general are difficult) which was largely solved by moving the overheads forward. This wasn't a total fix but it helped.
 
LeeRosario said:
I think there's a good general consensus there.
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Ya, agree in general too.

Though in this case, the drummer is me, and I seriously was playing the hats as quietly as I could. I've got decent technique, and the cymbals sounded great through the OHs .. It was really just the hats.

I'm saying that in the past tense because I managed to fix the issue. In one of those forehead-slapping "why didn't I think of that earlier" moments, I just moved the drum kit to a different part of the room. Problem solved!! I must have been getting nasty reflections off one of the walls.

Anyway, thanks everyone for the thoughts.
 
i would say raise them a little and angle them slightly towards the snare rather than at the hi hat. so angle them away.
 
I've been using "Recordermans" method and the hh and cymbals sound pretty balanced. Both OH's are pointing at the snare so maybe that's why.

Also, if you're using a snare mic, I'll angle my mic towards my floor tom to help keep the hh out of it.

Food for thought.
 
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