How do you treat your overheads and why?

[Greg_L]

Drum miking is somewhat blown out of proportion, but only because people constantly fuck it up. The act of miking a kit is relatively complex compared to miking anything else, but it's not rocket science. It always goes bad and gets looked at like some voodoo secret because people overthink it and overcomplicate it. Look at some of the responses in this very thread. To each their own, but in my opinion most of it is pointless overkill and just DAW entertainment.

 

[Rod Norman]

If you have a mic on the snare it should overpower the overheads. If it sounds like doo doo, then the snare sounds like doo doo. Fix the snare. I place the mics left and right, slightly over four feet apart and measure them to make sure they are the same height. I use small diaphram condensers for clarity and accuracy. I add nothing to them. They are there to capture the true sound of the drums. To mix, I add in the BD and get that right. Then I bring each of the other mics up slowly. Good Luck,
Rod Norman

I'm curious how people here place/eq/phase align their overheads. With the glynn johns method I get good sounding toms and cymbals. But when they are loud enough in the mix the snare starts to sound like doo-doo. Therefore I am trying a spaced pair next time. Do any of you phase align drums to the overheads or roll off lots of lows/mids and use the overheads as cymbal mics? Just curious how other people skin the cat.

 

[JG96]

Yeah I suppose you cant eq the overheads to improve the sound of a bad snare the way you can with a close mic. Things should improve once I am working with a good snare.

 

[Guitargodgt]

I use a spaced pair with the mics equal distance from the snare and the kick, everything else lands in the stereo image where it be. Tried XY and didn't like it, tried ORTF didn't like that either, tried Glynn Johns and that works good but I didn't care for it on larger kits. Don't have the right mics for Blumen or mid side.

I also start with the overheads and then close mic whatever else I need to. The one thing I have never understood is why people are willing to cheap out on OH mics, they are the most important mics on the drums even over the kick IMO.

 

[Guitargodgt]

Spaced pair
No EQ - although sometimes I'll notch out the muck in the low end for a tighter punchier sound. Not usually though.
No phase alignment
No compression
No reverb

This.

Although I might be more agressive with the eq than Greg might be. I want that space under 200hz.

 

[Guitargodgt]

Yeah I suppose you cant eq the overheads to improve the sound of a bad snare the way you can with a close mic. Things should improve once I am working with a good snare.

I wouldn't rule out the head on the snare. Even cheap snares can sound good if you nail down the right drum head for it.

If it's old and worn out or dimpled replace it. If there is to much overtone to it go with something dryer (reverse dot, genre dry etc...), if you think there isn't enough to it try something simple like a coated emperor.

 

[miroslav]

I want that space under 200hz.

What are you going to do with it.....rent it out to a family?

So what are you saying...you EQ the kit to remove the stuff below 200 Hz, and save for other things...or that you use it mainly for the kit, and you punch it up in that range?

 

[sixer2007]

Interesting that people aren't liking reverb on the OHs. I send some of the OHs to my main "blend" verb on nearly every mix. I find that if I do that, it makes the whole kit sound more like it was tracked in the same space, even if it wasn't, without too much reverb on the other mics.

Also, I don't use a dedicated snare verb anymore (because I felt that it was just overkill), so I don't need nearly as much of my blend verb on the snare if the OHs have it already. win-win for me.

 

[mixsit]

Interesting that people aren't liking reverb on the OHs. ..

Don't sweat it. If taken literally, and if 'O/H's = the kit' then that's a bit if a one dimensional perspective. I.e. either style wise, or perhaps your recording in nice spaces where the space' offers all the ambiance needed, then sure, 'no verb' on the drums.

 

[Greg_L]

Interesting that people aren't liking reverb on the OHs. I send some of the OHs to my main "blend" verb on nearly every mix. I find that if I do that, it makes the whole kit sound more like it was tracked in the same space, even if it wasn't, without too much reverb on the other mics.

By all means do whatever you wanna do, but what you're saying makes no sense. How the hell are you getting less room in the overheads than in the close mics? So you add some reverb to the close mics, right? Sure, fine. Then add even more to the overheads to make them "match"? Unless I'm misunderstanding you, that seems completely logically ass-backwards. The overhead should naturally be more "roomy" than the spot mics unless you live in some bizarro world or just love slathering reverb all over everything.

I do just the opposite. I'll send my kick, snare, and toms to the same mild reverb, but not the overheads.

 

[grimtraveller]

Interesting that people aren't liking reverb on the OHs.

I don't mind some reverb on the overheads but it really depends on the effect I'm going for. I have no hard and fast rule for it either way.

it makes the whole kit sound more like it was tracked in the same space, even if it wasn't,

I don't ever recall hearing a set of drums in any song at any time and thinking to myself "this doesn't sound like it was all tracked in the same space". Indeed, I just don't think that way about songs per se. The fact that different instruments were tracked in different studios on the same song is kind of irrelevant to me. Whether 4 or 8 or 16 mics were used, I couldn't tell and I'd never know unless you told me.
When I'm listening to drums in a song, all I hear are...........drums.
It's all Moroccan roll to me.

 

[miroslav]

With the M/S pair as my OH, and their position, and my room....I never add reverb to them.
There is always a nice natural room sound that comes through.
I may add some reverb on the Snare spot mic for some things, if I want that longer sounding "pop", but it's no more than just to lift it up a bit.

 

[RAMI]

My tracking room is also my mixing room, so I have it treated more as a mixing room. Because of that, there's not a lot of natural reverb in the room itself. So, I add reverb to my overheads as well as my snare and less to my kik. I don't compress my overheads, though. Just my snare and kik.

 

[bouldersoundguy]

I start by listening to various combinations of tracks and go from there. It may lead to nothing but kick and untreated overheads to a full blown processed drum mix with eq, compression and reverb on the overheads. I don't start with assumptions about how to treat them.

 

[mixsit]

I start by listening to various combinations of tracks and go from there. It may lead to nothing but kick and untreated overheads to a full blown processed drum mix with eq, compression and reverb on the overheads. I don't start with assumptions about how to treat them.

Why, that's.. just crazy talk!

My drum bus lately- is two pair for 'kit mics (tired of semantics' but one pair would be the low beefier picture and the other above and front. Wana get sticky about yeah the 'fronts do the top end sparkley', but sometimes they are 50% or more of the 'kit'. Spots kick, snare, hat (typically.
The first place I look if space' is needed would be the drum bus. (Sometimes this is the same space we're using on other instruments. I think this is probably what he meant Greg.
Now we get to an interesting turn. To me the kick triggering this 'space added is the one more apt to be problematic having this on it -as you pass from small ambiance around the kit to anything med-to larger 'rooms, with noticeable pre delay times etc- that sort of gets contrary to a 'kick forward placement ie, often.
For a guy stuck doing drums in a 'front room' for the duration one really cool thing to catch- sort of off the 'adding verb' track but is all about it too, is that really nice effect of a kit played hard sort of gets one drum shaking the rest. That combining with even our smallish rooms + maybe some bus compression-- is sweet!
It occurred to me that this effect (the natural kit sounds ringing') is actually part of what I was missing in this current problem' project. For the styles of music I record for the most part, I don't want 'snare hit, nothing, kick hit, nothing..etc. I want to hear' the kit setting there in the sound stage.
It's partly illusion sure.

 

[Greg_L]

I think this is probably what he meant Greg.

Probably what who meant? Are you actually talking to me? Reading through and trying to decipher that post reminded me of this....

Mr. Madison, what you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

- Billy Madison, 1995

 

[sixer2007]

My thoughts are this:

If I add some fake reverb space to my close mics, they're no longer going to match the room sound of the overheads that yes, obviously have more room sound in them. I mean, sure, I can try to make that fake room sound as close to the OH room sound as possible, but it's never gonna be the same. So, why not add some of that verb to the OHs too, to make all the mics sound as if they're in the same room again, rather that sounding like 2 different rooms?

Idk, it sounds good to me for now, so fug it I suppose.

 

[Greg_L]

My thoughts are this:

If I add some fake reverb space to my close mics, they're no longer going to match the room sound of the overheads that yes, obviously have more room sound in them. I mean, sure, I can try to make that fake room sound as close to the OH room sound as possible, but it's never gonna be the same. So, why not add some of that verb to the OHs too, to make all the mics sound as if they're in the same room again, rather that sounding like 2 different rooms?

Idk, it sounds good to me for now, so fug it I suppose.

I see, now you're making some sense. I get that. I don't think it's that difficult, but I see what you're saying. I do something similar with panning my toms. I listen to where they are in the overheads and pan the close mic tracks accordingly.

 

[RecordingMaster]

Interesting stuff. I never phase align stuff myself. RecordingMaster: Interesting how you use 2 separate reverbs for the reflections and actual reverb. Are each 100% of one or the other or a blend? I never send overheads to revebs but I would definitely be interested in trying that on close mics.

Learned it from Fab Dupont. Watch from 5:50 - 11:30. Mixing the Band with Fab Dupont - Part 3 of 4 - YouTube

Forget about 100% this or 100% that...Put it this way...each reverb plugin is on it's own stereo aux, set to 100%. You can send how ever much of each instrument to these reverbs as you want. For the record though, I personally like no pre-delay on the "Room" reverb, but I like a little bit on the plate - enough to very subtly hear it groove in time with the hi-hats. It adds space and thickens things up. I usually tune my reverbs to get them to sound best on drums, because that's the hardest thing (imo) to make reverbs sound good on. Then once you send vox or guitars (or anything) to those, they will just fall into place and the verbs will sound fine on those sources. The goal is (in most cases for ME), is to not really "hear" any reverbs working (unless I'm mixing an 80's Mariah Carey tune), but more so to sense a bigger overall space around the image.

Let's face it, reverb is still used to some degree in almost every pro mix you hear. It's not a sin to use it and most definitely not a sin to use on drum overheads recorded in a modest home studio. We're not recording at Fairfax studios here and we don't have multiple sets of stereo room mic tracks that we can use to blend in natural ambiance to make things sound huge. Unless you're going for a dry punk sound or a 70's Hall and Oates Sarah Smile sort of thingy (which can be awesome!), you'll probably want a little ambiance if you recorded them in a home studio (provided you don't have cathedral ceilings). Or you could go the System of a Down Toxicity thing and use absolutely no reverb on anything for an entire album.

As always, YMMV

 

[Guitargodgt]

What are you going to do with it.....rent it out to a family?

So what are you saying...you EQ the kit to remove the stuff below 200 Hz, and save for other things...or that you use it mainly for the kit, and you punch it up in that range?

Space for the bass, kick, body of the snare (direct mic) and the toms.