Treating Drums as a Whole

OK, I'll bite. In tracking, I almost always compress BD and SD. I feel that helps them to be present and drive the song. I have a two channel comp pretty much always patched into their channels, and I don't change the settings all that often. It's kind of obvious in solo, or whole drumset solo, but in context with the rest of the band, they just speak. I often EQ the inside BD and sometimes the outside.

For a long time, the Sennheiser e602II was my BD choice (and I know it will come back) but I got my D12 repaired recently and I'm having fun with it right now. I have a borrowed FET47 that is doing its thing outside the BD. I've been changing up SD mics a lot lately. MC012 in hyper (with pad) EV 408, Gefel 295 (I think that's the number), and my staple ATM23he all make appearances.

My room seems to like SDC more than LDCs for overheads. I can't quite explain it, but I'm usually happier with SDCs. I generally go with ORTF and use the diagonal line bisecting the SD and BD for positioning. For a long time I used Octava MC012, but I bought a set of Muro mics, and I like the way they image a little better. At times I'll use the Røde TF5s on OH as well. From time to time I'll put up ribbons. Bottom snare is an EV re10 for a while now.

Toms I like pretty close to the head, to give them a similar presence and feel as sitting behind the drums. Currently, I have sE X1d titanium capsule LDCs up, but I use M88s just as often. I used 421s for many years but sold them to a friend a few years back.

Room mics usually are up for a while until I get bored, or they bother me in context of what or who I'm working with/on. Right now it's a 12-Gauge Black stereo mic. It's got a cool brightness that, even if just peppered in adds a lot to the sound. The Rødes pointed at the wall opposite the drums sounded good (sometimes with a lot of compression...maybe too much), 4050 in omni on straight stands at the lowest was my staple for a long time, but really worked better on tape than digital. 635as taped to the floor are a really great room option as well.

Hats get an M201 or other dynamic. Ride cymbal, right now, is an MC012, but recently has been the Gefel, or a 414EB.

When it comes time to mix a couple of things happen as default starting points. I set up a drum parallel compressor with a UAD Zener and the Ryan Hewett "drum parallel smash" preset. It often gets tweaked, but it's a damn good place to start. I set up send on all of the drum tracks, but in digital world I mute OH, Room, and cymbal spots. Back in the tape days all the tracks into the parallel worked more often. I also made a preset for inside BD. It's the UAD SSL E strip and it's used pretty aggressively, EQ, gate, comp and filters all engaged. It also gets tweaked for the song, and sometimes even removed. Snare and toms EQ'd if necessary. I'll sometimes duplicate the snare to have separate snap and body faders. BD also might get dupes.

I sometimes delay the room mics, right on the channel insert. Kind of the Albini thing, though I don't think it sounds the way he conceptualized it, it can sound really good. Soundtoys Echobor JR is PERFECT for this because it's dead simple and sounds great.

Reverb is a total crapshoot. Often I don't use it, because I spend time with my room mics, and parallel compressor for both tone, balance, and feel. That said a few things in the last year or so had a reverb from the Eventide SP2016 or UAD Capital or Oceanway. If I'm not digging my room mics on a particular track, the OW can sometimes make me feel like I got a good/more fitting room capture.

Have been lucky to record some great drummers the last few years. Last thing I did was on a new Daking board, smattering of EQ and channel compression on kick and snare only. Zero outboard. Biggest improvements to the sound were made in tuning and damping. Yamaha Recording Custom kit. First time tracking one of those, very interesting and cool sounding drum kit. Drummer is an AE too and heard stuff (too much tom ring on other hits) I didn't even clock, but boy was it better when he fixed it. Great collaboration.

OH, Gefell pair— UMT 70s
Josephson e22s on toms.
Beyer m201 on snare
D12VR on kick in
Some kind of 47fet clone on kick out? (I forget, maybe Chad Kelly's mic)
mono room LDC 414EB
mono room dynamic SM57?(facing away from the drums)

Current rough mix has some ITB EQ and compression here and there, a snare reverb, not too much going on but it sounds great. Not even sure I have a parallel comp going.

Not a general-purpose technique, but I’ll describe how I recorded a free jazz drummer on a recent session. The player and the musical style implied the best approach would be to capture the kit as a single instrument. Just two Beyerdynamic M160s: one at drummers right shoulder, pointed at the snare, and a second in front of the kit on the drummer’s left side, a mid-snare height, angled between kit and snare. Both mics the same distance from snare center.

In mix, the two mics panned maybe one-third L and R, but aince the kick was mostly in the front mic, every thing below 400hz was made mono. Across the drum bus, tiny subtractive EQ cuts and some preamp saturation. Very small amount of parallel 1176 all-buttons-in; Neve 33609 across bus at 2:1, fastest release, no limiting, doing maybe 2db gain reduction; SIR clipping, only hitting the exceptional transients. A touch of Bricasti room reverb and the tiniest hint of a 5-second cathedral verb — barely noticable if you mute/unmute it.

I enjoy fewer mics when the drummer is not performing the function of “timekeeper”. (I guess that means…jazz, or something like that.)

Different every time.

Sometimes stereo, sometimes mono. Sometimes a big kit in a big room with lots of spot mics, sometimes dead dry in a booth with a miking scheme that favors a couple of mic capturing the overall kit. It all depends on the song.

Mic choice depends on desired result. I spend a good bit of time treating the source... getting the right drums, right tuning, right combination of dampening, etc... If you do that and the drummer has a good self balance, very little processing is needed on the way in.

I often EQ on the way in, but rarely compress anything other than the room mics and maybe overheads. I personally find its better to EQ and gate before compression for reasons pertaining to bleed as well as doing clip gain as needed to keep the compressors in their sweet spots.

The treatment of the drums and the player make all the difference. That was very obvious this week, during set up we had one drummer, and it turned out he had to bail, so someone else came in his place. Same kit, same mics, same room…totally different sound (for the better)

I think what I’ve learn makes the biggest difference in clarity/seperation is packing the lugs of old kits and snares to get rid of any spring rattles and noise. I took all the internal mufflers and accessories mounts off stuff because they usually just make noise. The more shit you have rattling around the more you’ll pull your hair out. The tuning of the drums and head choice is super important. I’ve found for most snares I like 12 or 16 strand wires, it just seems more controlled in the studio.

I don’t compress much to tape but I’ll usually do some EQing. At least in my space I find I’m usually taking out a little around 400Hz in overheads to get rid of boxyness in toms and or snare, and if I use a ribbon I might boost a little 12K/wherever the stick on the ride sound is if it’s lacking. I usually use a mic with a low cut filter on the hi hat and find myself cutting around 500Hz to 700Hz to take out some of the snare bleed. Inside kick similar in that there’s usually not anything I want around 300-500Hz so I’ll dip around there. A little 36Hz from an API 560 can really be nice, sometimes a bit of 3-5K for attack. Room mics I have some omnis on the wall up high and again usually taking out some of that low mid boxyness and I do like to compress those with my Compex. It’s great for that because I can control how much I compress the room with just the gain of the preamp…it doesn’t really get any louder it just gets more compressed. So, you can dial in what feels appropriate without being fooled by volume.

Inside kick I like my old Sennheiser e602, outside changes but lately it’s been a Beyerdynamic M380, snare top and bottom I’m in love with the Shure SM57 with the Crimson Audio White handles, toms either Josephson e22s or AKG C414B-ULS, hi-hat AKG C480B-ULS, overhead is usually a Royer SF-12, and rooms are Line Audio Omni1.

Sometimes it’s fun to throw up a “trash” mic. I got an Ampex 1101 which is cool but I think the Shure Green Bullet is a bit more fun/extreme

I have also long accepted to treat drums as a hole in my pocket