Negative Attention - with real drums

[antichef]

I posted this instrumental song some time ago, but that was back when I only had midi drums. Here it is again with real drums! I'd appreciate any comments on the tracking / drum sound / mixing. As for the drum performance, realize I've only been playing since Christmas, so don't expect too much.

 

[squibble94]

Cool song. I think the hi hat can come down a bit, or bring up the snare.

 

[zero00]

How did you record the drums? as squibble94 said turn down the hi hat. At first i thought the drums were programmed, but then i read they are real, so practice practice and practice.

Guitar needs some equalization, there're too much bass frequencies.

Those are my thoughts... keep rocking!

 

[antichef]

I went back to take a look - I got a lot of hihat bleed in the snare mic - I used an AKG D200E ( http://www.coutant.org/akgd200e/index.html ) for the top-of-snare mic, so maybe I should try another, or maybe there's a better way to place the mic -- I have it pointed down at a 45 degree angle toward the center of the snare, with the end of the mic body about 8 inches over the rim and the tip of the mic about 2-3 inches from the snare head.

You thought the drums were programmed at first? I want to take that as a compliment - was it the lack of fills? I'll absolutely keep practicing.

I'll go back and look at the eq on the guitars, too.

Thanks!!

 

[joeym]

I think you've gotta work on your timing a bit more, Chef, but I guess drums aren't your main instrument.....
Soundwise, it sounds like a low-fi kit, but that's not necessarily bad. The snare has a bit too much bottom rattle, but that could be my taste, I like less of that. Nice guitar playing.

Joey

 

[PoeticIntensity]

Ya know... Everything about the drums (except the timing issues), which I usually find annoying, I found kind of endearing in this song. The loud high-hat, and the crazy rattle on the snare... Yeah, I think it worked!

You've gotta get tighter in your timing, but the sounds of the drums worked quite well, in my opinion.

Keep at it!

 

[antichef]

thanks guys! I finally laid claim to a room in the house for my studio, but it's smaller than the one I had wanted and I ran out of remodeling money (I was going to tear down a wall to make it bigger, then re-work all the walls - later, I guess), so I'm still very much learning the room.

The drum playing's always better when a "real" drummer comes over, but maybe I'll get there eventually. Practicing is fun!

I'll definitely have a look at the snare itself and the snare mic technique I'm using - I think that's the key to addressing all the specific comments (except timing) that I'm hearing, since it's the snare mic in the mp3 that's the source of most of the hihat noise.

 

[TripleM]

A few timing issues. Not super huge, but noticable.

I agree on the hats being loud and the snare being soft.

Liked the electric guitar sounds. The acoustic guitar sound was a little tubby in the low mids - like somewhere around 500hz - 600hz.

Liked some of the lead and slide work.

What was that static from :42 - :49? A little background noise right after that.

 

[heatmiser]

Hey,

I actually kind of like the lo-finess of the kit on this tune. It seems to go kind of well with the other sounds. The playing is just a little hesitant...if you could just bang it out with a little more confidence and authority I'd be ok with the drums sound (on this tune anyway) with only minor tweaking. I like the way the little lead guitar bits kind of spring up here and there. Interesting and fun .

 

[guitar zero]

The things that jumped out to me have mostly been mentioned, like the timing issues and the loud high hat. There's an overall low end muddiness to the song and a little eq would solve that. Also, there's a dobro/resonator sounding part about half way through that sounds like it has way more reverb than the rest of the song. Felt a little out of place. Cool ditty though.

 

[Greg_L]

Lol. How do you get the hats louder than everything else?

Find more balance with the kit. The kick is MIA. The fat snare sounds pretty good. Timing is terrible, but whatever. Just practice more with a click.

Less hats, more kick, maybe more snare.

 

[Ninja_Drummer]

Timing isn't too bad for someone that's only been playing since christmas of last year. And the drums didn't sound overly too bad for a song like this. But when in doubt, use a metronome, they're annoying but they do nail into your head what's the different between an on an off beat.

Also, this is a pretty catchy and fun tune to play. Care to prove a track that I can drum along to personally? I won't post any recordings of my own on here if you wish, just like some songs I can just wail my drums to.