Is there a trick to this?

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soundprizm

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Alright, I think I posted this in the wrong forum originally, the drums forum, so sorry for double posting. Here it is:

I'm recording one of my songs. I have 8 tracks of drums. Kick, Snare top, Snare bottom, Hi Hat, Rack, Floor Toms, and 2 overheads. I cannot, for the life of me, get my kick to sound the way I want it to. Every way I eq I cannot get the sound, and same thing with compression. Is there another plugin or something that people use? I'm looking for a Vinnie Paul or a Ray Herrera kind of sound. You know, that great big dddsh! I'm using Cubase eq and Waves C4 Compressor, btw. Any help?
 
No trick, really, just a great sounding kick hit by a great sounding beater in a great sounding room recorded by a great sounding mic the pre perfect distance and angle away through a great sounding pre. Maybe two mics, even.

I'm really not trying to be flippant. No amount of eq or compression can completely fix some things.

A great kick is hard to find. It may be that the original recording is holding you back.

That being said, it's pretty common for me to add somewhere between 60 and 90 Hz for thud, to scoop out some 300 or 400 to get rid of boxiness, and to add 1-5kHz for snap. I use compression to tame overall player inconsistency and to bring the "woof" up in relation to the click.

There are no magic settings because all kicks are different. Everyone's views will be slightly different, but if you don't get any closer working with these suggestions, you probably have a bad kick in the first place.

Ken Rutkowski
www.OuterLimitRecordingStudio.com
 
The sound I'm getting is an alright sound, just not what the song is calling for. The sound is very dead sounding to me. Just a plain ol thud. I wanna really beef it up. A hit that has some sustain to it. Like the difference between dddsh! and dd.
 
Did you record it in PC/DAW ? What software do you use to multi tracking ? SONAR ? CUBASE ? PROTOOLS ? Perhaps using sound font will help. Check out many thread related to soundfont for details... Use search to find 'em...
 
Yeah... I recording on my pc/daw through my tascam TMD1000 to my mixtreme. I'm tracking on Cubase SX. How will a soundfont help me? I do have an Audigy card onboard also.
 
You could try a little bit of gated reverb to fatten it up. You might try backing the mic off a bit and it will give you more body but less beater attack.
 
Well, first of all you need to make your kick drum sound pretty much like you want it in reality. That is, you need to tune the kick so it has a nice "boom" to it.

Then you need to find the best place to mic it, which could inside the drum through the sound hole, or outside the drum aimed at where the beater hits the drum, to get more of the kick, or it could be anywhere else.

If you don't want to rerecord the drums now (since that typically meqans re-recording the whole song), sample the kicksound you like and put it in it the right places wiuth a sequencer. :)

No amount of filterning will get you sustain that isn't there.
 
I'm not familiar with soundfont, so maybe this is the same advice, but have you considered triggering a kick sample and blending or replacing your recorded kick with it?

It's kind of cheating, because it's not helping you get a great recorded kick sound, but it may be the answer to salvaging the tracks you've already recorded. I'm not proud, myself. If that's what it takes to make a great track...

And some of the top engineers on some of the biggest selling CD's these days are doing the same thing...
 
Thanks for all the help guys. I posted this in the drums forum and got some replies there. My eqing techniques were just lame. I was told to take out 250hz-300hz, boost 80hz and lower, and boost 8khz and higher. I went into the eq for the kick channel in Cubase. You just cannot do that with the eq that cubase gives you. It just lets you do curves. So, I looked around and found a very sweet graphic eq. It came with my Sonic Foundry Sounde Forge. The envelope in that eq plugin is just superb. You can cut boost any which way your lil ol heart desires. :D Got me the sound I was looking for. Thanks again guys. :)
 
Uh... I'm glad you got the sound you were looking for, but that eq that "just lets you do curves" is really what you should be using. It's called a parametric eq and will give you much much more flexibility than a graphic eq once you get to know it.

Do some studying on various eq schemes and you'll be much happier.

Ken Rutkowski
www.OuterLimitRecordingStudio.com
 
Hmmmm.... I just don't see how that is. I mean, with the cubase eq, I'm not even sure if it's parametric. The graphic eq that soundforge gave me was very accurate. I could pick whatever frequecy I want. I was using the envelope that came with it. With the cubase eq, I could not get an exact frequency cut. It takes the frequency I want and kind of rounds it off. Doesn't seem to be that accurate. Is there a certain parametric eq plugin that you use?
 
All parametrics work with the same basic principles. The frequency "curve" is SUPPOSED to be rounded. It's very rare to need a spike, and when you do, you can build one by narrowing the "q."

Here's why the gradual curve is desirable: Imagine that you REEEEEALLY like 380 Hz in the bass guitar, so you notch out a very narrow band at 380 and raise it 10dB. Now imagine that the bass line starts three notes below and plays a scale through whatever note fall there. That note and that note alone (assuming the "q" was only a semi-or whole-step wide) would be 10dB louder than the rest. This is generally not what we're looking for. The gradual curve on both ends makes it much easier to get a nice, musical sounding result.

This is less apparent with a relatively static sound like a kick drum, but it's still pretty rare to use a sharp boost or cut. Try out the parametric again and give it a chance. You'll never go back.

Ken Rutkowski
www.OuterLimitRecordingStudio.com
 
I understand what your saying Kendog. I guess there's a certain tool for everything. I think for the kick the graphic is perfect since the notes do not vary, same goes for all percussion. Now, for bass and other instruments in which the notes vary a parametric eq would be ideal. Very good point. Thanks for the input. :)
 
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soundprizm said:
I understand what your saying Kendog. I guess there's a certain tool for everything. I think for the kick the graphic is perfect since the notes do not vary, same goes for all percussion. Now, for bass and other instruments in which the notes vary a parametric eq would be ideal. Very good point. Thanks for the input. :)
Click to expand...

Well then we'll agree to disagree. I can't personally live without completely variable (not "set") frequencies and variable "q", but if it works for you... cool.

Ken Rutkowski
www.OuterLimitRecordingStudio.com
 
sjoko2 said:
ehhhhhhhhhhhh the first thing you see right in the middle of their front page is????



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Click to expand...

True, but nonetheless, and I quote:

Unfortunately, ChannelStrip
only supports the Macintosh operating system at the time. Please let me know
if you have any other questions.

Best regards,
Matt

Matthew Nelson
Metric Halo

:( Sad, but true.

David:(
 
Just go out and buy a Protools rig and use the soundreplacer plug in and you done. Ta da! Works great for replacing a weak snare pretty well.

TTFN
SoMm
 
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