I have raw drum tracks...now what?

M

mm2k5

New member
I have a snare, kick, and overhead tracks. All of them just as they were recorded, no effects or anything. I am using Cakewalk..how do i go about getting that tight studio sound? Do I using Gates and Compression? I know the basics of recording...but now our band has got the spotlight to make some radio play..so we're hopping on the wagon. Long story short..i have tracks i wanna get them all tight sounding. How do I do this in Calkwalk.

PS I only have Cakewalk and Goldwave to work with, but still good results.

Thanks in advance!!
 
ummm... the tracks have to sound tight BEFORE they're recorded.... if they don't sound good in front of the mic, they sure as hell won't sound good "on-tape!"

Tightness doesn't come from recording/engineering, it comes from musicianship.....
 
ok i guess i just forgot to mention that...my bad...they sound good what i recorded they are tight...i just thought there was a way to get the overall sound a little bit tighter. I am mainly wanting the little extra punch from the kick..and a little bit more pop from the snare...and the crisp of the cymbals...make any more sense? or am i still rambling...
 
Who's this bloke with the sore head then?

Blue Bear Sound said:
ummm... the tracks have to sound tight BEFORE they're recorded.... if they don't sound good in front of the mic, they sure as hell won't sound good "on-tape!"

Tightness doesn't come from recording/engineering, it comes from musicianship.....
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...which is why you became a recording engineer, was it Blue Bear?
 
It's a cheap shot, Bear. Kind of a variation of "Those who can't do, teach." Just ignore it.
 
punchy bass drum, snappy snare, shimering overheads

if you want to fatten up the kicks, you can compress, you want to compress the meat of the kick,you can set the compression at around 1:10
to really hear it working then lower it to taste(less is more)and further emphasize the whack by increasing the attack time,longer attack times let more of the thwack.same with snare compression ratio is how much the track gets squished threshhold is at what volume the squishing starts...-6 threshhold squeezes any peaks that are at -6 db or more up to loudest,0 db.
so....you can compress to get more oomph out of sounds
heres how you compress individual drums in a drum track(a whole kit on one track)
eq find the frequencies you want to compress,(the low part of the kick,the snap of the snare,the crispness of the cymbals)raise the levels of these frequencies about 6 db (watch your meters)then compress at -6 threshhold or lower-10 at around 1:5 lower or higher use your ears go back and increase or decrease eq levels etc...then you can pick what part of the sound gets the most compressed or set the threshold high and only compress the peaks.
whew compression, the steriods of sound.
p.s. 80's drums? just compress alot 1:12 ratio short attack(let a little snap through) low threshhold around-14 db and pour on some big verb man!!!
 
mm2k5 said:
but now our band has got the spotlight to make some radio play..so we're hopping on the wagon. Long story short..i have tracks i wanna get them all tight sounding. How do I do this in Calkwalk.
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Hard and true answer 1: YOU DON'T.

Let's look at it another way: you are saying you are getting a chance to have your music played on the radio and you want to leave the production in YOUR HANDS? It's obvious you can't create professional audio because you admit that you don't know what you're doing yet by asking simple questions a pro already knows the answer to and has a biased opinion towards. :)

Hard and true answer 2: YOU STOP BEING CHEAP AND GO TO A PRO STUDIO.

The truth is that the listening audience doesn't care if you recorded on Pro-Tools, Vegas, "Calkwalk" (sic), Radar Nyquist or a 2" Otari RTR... they only know if it sounds good or like crap.

Whatever you record on, or whatever you do with your music just don't make it suck. The audience doesn't want to hear an excuse why something sounds bad, they want to hear good music with good sound.
 
I agree and disagree with that last post. Yes, if you're going on air, I believe that you should go to a pro studio. If you can't afford that, just do it yourself and do the best you can (IF YOU ABSOLUTELY MUST). Why? Because as a working-band musician, I can say from experience that a mediocre recording on the air is 10 time better than none at all. 50 % of the audience is too dense to know a difference between a good basement tape and studio work anyway! Seriously, I've fooled so many people with demos....DEMOS I've done in an evening. "That's awesome man. Who is this? Where can I buy their CD?"

It's true.

Back to the point at hand. My advice is to do a rough little mix (using little or no EQ or effects) of what you have recorded and post a link here so we can hear it and give you subjective advice. Without that, all the advice in the world isn't going to help you if you don't know what to do with it.
 
Yeah but everything ultimately comes down to HOW GOOD you are as an AE. A good AE can make-do with sub-standard equipment and get things sounding passable; someone that doesn't have a clue is sunk without professional assistance.
 
True. However, if they post an audio sample here, perhaps they can get that professional assistance. Isn't that what we're (not that I'm a professional!) here for?
 
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