Multi band or other compression to even out cymbal performances?

Greg_L said:
I'm negative towards "alternate methods" of recording in some cases because at this point, with what we already know, it's pointless to fight what actually works. We aren't in the 50s and 60s anymore. We aren't all collectively feeling our way around in this new world of multitrack recording. You're not breaking into some new frontier of music, you're trying to record acoustic drums. This shit has been done and perfected thousands of times over by people way better than all of us. Learn from them. Listen, it will take far less time to just set up your kit and overheads properly and record the whole kit at once - with better results - than it would do figure out the "best" way to record just the drums and cymbals separately. Seriously, that's just silly.

But hey, it's your stuff, knock yourself out.
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This is one of your better ones.
 
You may want to try copying the overheads to a new track in your daw. On this new track roll off all of the drums with a low cut filter so you are only left with the cymbals. Compress these pretty hard like 8:1 with a quick fast and release, and do a high shelf boost to bring out the sparkle frequencies. Then mix these in to taste with the entire mix. This is sort of parallel drum compression, but only for the cymbals. It will add in a nice top end sheen.
 
First, it's not the recording, it's your playing. Second, compression on overheads with such high frequencies with low frequency overtones can lead to pumping. Third, this lack of consistency shouldn't be such a concern if the rest of the drum tracks are good. It sounds like you need to re-track the drums and concentrate on consistency.
Kapo_Polenton said:
Something that is stumping me and I have been googling for the better part of this evening.. is a multi band compressor what I would want to work with if I have a left and right drum overhead mic setup and I want to bring some consistency to the volume peaks in the performance? So for instance I hit the cymbal harder in a few spots and I wish to tame this so it more or less is perceived as an even performance, how does one approach compression to do this? Obviously I want to concentrate on the upper frequencies which affect cymbals and not the lower end but can someone explain to me how threshold and attack would relate to my situation? IThanks!
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Is the offending overhead on a dedicated channel? If so, would some limiting and creative eq on the offending overhead channel work? I'm certainly a novice, but that's the first thing I would try apart from playing with the faders on the drum mix. Someone please point out why he shouldn't do that if limiting is a technically wrong approach. To me, it would have less of an impact on the dynamics compared to a compressor, and would forego the need to retrack the part.
 
The problem isn't going to be so much that the hit is actually that much louder than the rest. A cymbal sounds different when you hit it hard than it does when you hit it soft. You can fix the volume pretty easily, but it will still sound just as out of place.
 
Farview said:
The problem isn't going to be so much that the hit is actually that much louder than the rest. A cymbal sounds different when you hit it hard than it does when you hit it soft. You can fix the volume pretty easily, but it will still sound just as out of place.
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Those are my thoughts exactly at this point... I could probably double tracks and dick around but why not just spend the time to re-record it. I'm in no rush, I can record whenever I want at home and they were just scratch tracks to set my levels anyway. I now know to lay off the crashes and to apply more or less even pressure. I think if i had more inputs, I'd probably just mic the hats and ride but i am one short so I'll prob just add a room mic and go for a more vintage sound.
 
Kapo_Polenton said:
I'm in no rush, I can record whenever I want at home
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Awesome! I wish more people thought like you. I've never understood why people look for a million stupid different ways to try to fix something that can and should simply be re-recorded properly.
 
MrWrenchey said:
You could just use a normal compressor. I dunno why you'd need a multiband if all you're trying to do is level out the performance.
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Because typically the snare is the loudest thing in the oh's and he likely is not wanting to fuck up it's balance in the overall drum mix. Some cymbal hits are louder than others, it happens no need to re-track if they are manageable. Instead of a "maul-the-band" comp, try a de-esser tuned to the frequency that is really piercing your ear when that loudest cymbal hit comes in. Chances are you don't need the entire cymbal turned down, but rather just taming the pianful frequency you are hearing (if it's a bright crash cymbal, chances are it's anywhere from 5-7khz). Just a little bit of GR on it to keep it natural. Automate it to come on only on those super loud hits if there are only a few of them.

Alternatively you could just automate the volume of the oh track to duck down slightly on those loud hits, but if it is ever hitting at same time as snare, then you'll be throwing off snare balance. The de-esser might surprise you.

Maybe I just made Greg throw up a bit in his mouth or even projectile onto his Marshall cabs! :p

I wouldn't call it clownfuckery, but surgically dealing with something you may otherwise not have the chance to fix in certain circumstances. All these guys on here always say re-track. Well yeah, that's a no brainer. But some projects are on a time constraint. Others it's budget. Sometimes both! If you expect to be able to move up anywhere in this industry other than your momma's basement, it's probably a good idea to get better at dealing with certain issues by developing some mixing skills that can "fix" certain problems. It's never ideal, but the pros have to fix shit too. They just don't talk about it much - that's what their assistants are for! Well for now, you are your own assistant. Do you think CLA would call up Shinedown to re-record a track that had too loud of some cymbal hits? Fuck no! Why? Well besides the obvious budget and time constraints, he is competing with probably 3 or more other mix engineers they sent the same exact shit to. Who do you think they'd choose if he called up their producer bitching about re-recording stuff. C'mon man.

Sorry end rant
 
RecordingMaster said:
Because typically the snare is the loudest thing in the oh's and he likely is not wanting to fuck up it's balance in the overall drum mix. Some cymbal hits are louder than others, it happens no need to re-track if they are manageable. Instead of a "maul-the-band" comp, try a de-esser tuned to the frequency that is really piercing your ear when that loudest cymbal hit comes in. Chances are you don't need the entire cymbal turned down, but rather just taming the pianful frequency you are hearing (if it's a bright crash cymbal, chances are it's anywhere from 5-7khz). Just a little bit of GR on it to keep it natural. Automate it to come on only on those super loud hits if there are only a few of them.

Alternatively you could just automate the volume of the oh track to duck down slightly on those loud hits, but if it is ever hitting at same time as snare, then you'll be throwing off snare balance. The de-esser might surprise you.

Maybe I just made Greg throw up a bit in his mouth or even projectile onto his Marshall cabs! :p

I wouldn't call it clownfuckery, but surgically dealing with something you may otherwise not have the chance to fix in certain circumstances. All these guys on here always say re-track. Well yeah, that's a no brainer. But some projects are on a time constraint. Others it's budget. Sometimes both! If you expect to be able to move up anywhere in this industry other than your momma's basement, it's probably a good idea to get better at dealing with certain issues by developing some mixing skills that can "fix" certain problems. It's never ideal, but the pros have to fix shit too. They just don't talk about it much - that's what their assistants are for! Well for now, you are your own assistant. Do you think CLA would call up Shinedown to re-record a track that had too loud of some cymbal hits? Fuck no! Why? Well besides the obvious budget and time constraints, he is competing with probably 3 or more other mix engineers they sent the same exact shit to. Who do you think they'd choose if he called up their producer bitching about re-recording stuff. C'mon man.

Sorry end rant
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Shinedown, whoever the fuck that shit is, probably wouldn't need to retrack because their drummer probably doesn't suck.

The rest of your post is clownfuckery.
 
RecordingMaster said:
Because typically the snare is the loudest thing in the oh's and he likely is not wanting to fuck up it's balance in the overall drum mix. Some cymbal hits are louder than others, it happens no need to re-track if they are manageable. Instead of a "maul-the-band" comp, try a de-esser tuned to the frequency that is really piercing your ear when that loudest cymbal hit comes in. Chances are you don't need the entire cymbal turned down, but rather just taming the pianful frequency you are hearing (if it's a bright crash cymbal, chances are it's anywhere from 5-7khz). Just a little bit of GR on it to keep it natural. Automate it to come on only on those super loud hits if there are only a few of them.

Alternatively you could just automate the volume of the oh track to duck down slightly on those loud hits, but if it is ever hitting at same time as snare, then you'll be throwing off snare balance. The de-esser might surprise you.

Maybe I just made Greg throw up a bit in his mouth or even projectile onto his Marshall cabs! :p

I wouldn't call it clownfuckery, but surgically dealing with something you may otherwise not have the chance to fix in certain circumstances. All these guys on here always say re-track. Well yeah, that's a no brainer. But some projects are on a time constraint. Others it's budget. Sometimes both! If you expect to be able to move up anywhere in this industry other than your momma's basement, it's probably a good idea to get better at dealing with certain issues by developing some mixing skills that can "fix" certain problems. It's never ideal, but the pros have to fix shit too. They just don't talk about it much - that's what their assistants are for! Well for now, you are your own assistant. Do you think CLA would call up Shinedown to re-record a track that had too loud of some cymbal hits? Fuck no! Why? Well besides the obvious budget and time constraints, he is competing with probably 3 or more other mix engineers they sent the same exact shit to. Who do you think they'd choose if he called up their producer bitching about re-recording stuff. C'mon man.

Sorry end rant
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Holy shit. Dude. Do you ever not write a fucking novel?
 
Greg_L said:
Probably wouldn't need to retrack because their drummer probably doesn't suck.

The rest of your post is clownfuckery.
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Well now that's an assumption. And we all know that assuming makes an ASS out of...never mind. :p

Call it what you will, but sometimes you need to fuck a clown or two to get the job done. Take one for the team if you will.

De-essers are actually great for those tiny oddball things that sometimes pierce out of an otherwise well-recorded (by the musician and the engineer) take. Aside from sibilant vocals, odd cymbal hits come to mind as well as the odd shrieking sound from the string noise on a chord change on a guitar - in the cases where it would sound unnatural to duck out the entire guitar signal at that split second.
 
Greg_L said:
the "best" way to record just the drums and cymbals separately. Seriously, that's just silly.
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I'd never do it, but Josh Homme makes his drummers for QOTSA record drums and cymbals separately. Very unorthodox. I wouldn't want that drum gig!
 
jonny deep said:
Isn't that the producer and recording engineer's jobs, though - to make sure it's recorded well enough ready for the mix engineer?
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Sure it is. That's not to say that those humans don't fuck it up either though. You hear pro mix engineers say stuff all the time "well sometimes when i get something that's been badly recorded I have to resort to this..." or "sometimes I get something that was played way out of time and I have to resort to quantizing", etc. Not sure how it happens, but apprently it does in the Big Leagues too. Go figure
 
Greg_L said:
I mean, I get it if you're handed a bunch of poorly done tracks and have to make-do with it. It's a pain and you sometimes have to resort to some clownfuckery to make it work. I do get that. But fuck, if you're tracking the stuff yourself, do it right.
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I'll just leave this here.....
 
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