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Post by MorEQsThanAnswers on May 5, 2019 16:53:43 GMT -6
Hey everyone!
I’m developing my philosophy on parallel drum compression.
There are some commonplace techniques that I’ve had success with, but I find myself using these more like “go-to tricks” than part of a tactical approach. I keep these 2 within a mix template and when one fails, the other usually works. I use one or the other in just about every mix (likely for confidence's sake).
When my kick needs to dominate the sub range, I’ll go with the classic Bob Powers trick in which you hit the kick with a DBX160 (ratio: 6 for about 5-6 dB) and then boost the lows with a Pultec (and I often attenuate high end too).
When my bass needs to dominate the subs, I boost what hits emotionally with a Kush Electra and then slam it into a nuked distressor (attack 10 release 1). While I could use the DBX here, I prefer how the distressor distorts and comparatively retains low end at 20 dB of reduction.
Once the kick is happy, I’ll copy the compressor to the snare (to homogenize the envelope) and then narrowly boost what’s emotional (kush).
These are obviously “punch centric” techniques, which tend to hold up well with hip-hop and pop, but it isn’t always the move with rock (in which I often see people compressing the bus for aggression, rather than individual tracks for punch). I also notice mixers talk about using this compression for sustain instead, which I have yet to make effective use of.
Could I get some food for thought? What kind of stuff do you guys think about when you’re doing this and how do you form a “tactical methodology.”
Thanks!
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Post by MorEQsThanAnswers on May 5, 2019 17:02:37 GMT -6
Wanted to add:
I'm using UAD emulations, not hardware units!
If I were to go the hardware route, I see myself with a stereo DBX160 VU before 2 distressors for bass tracking reasons. Change my mind, it means I learned something!
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Post by jampa on May 5, 2019 18:53:01 GMT -6
I basically do what you do. Typically just kick and snare, to same parallel bus, with a low end boost. Sometimes without the low end boost but high pass the bass guitar a little instead.
Lately I've tried clipping individual tracks and putting a comp on the drum bus (100% wet). Horses, courses, etc.
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Post by javamad on May 6, 2019 2:22:04 GMT -6
I am doing hybrid so I am using some HW as well as plugins.
I also have the kick and snare groupud together and coming out separately from the rest of the drums.
I generally get more punch using a Zener Limiter on limit with input driven a bit and fast attack and release and bringing that back in parallel at about -15 to -5 db.
I had the Zener out of the rack when doing a recall one day and set that up ITB with the UAD Zener and it sounded pretty good to me as well, maybe slightly less transients poking through.
I do like having kick and snare bussed together to get the timing of their compression working in tandem. That said I will sometimes add some light ITB compression on those tracks before they are bussed together using UAD 1176 on snare and UAD SSL bus compressor for kicks to glue the in/out mics together.
EDIT: Just to add... not parallel compression but lately I have been using FabFilter MB on the bass buss and setting up a low end band that is triggered by the kick and ducking the low end only of the bass with the kick, using the advanced side chain eq to duck it with the low end of the kick and I am really liking how it sounds like they are playing tighter than they actually are. My theiry is that this technique is giving the bass driver of the speakers simpler waveforms to produce in the low hits. YMMV
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Post by jampa on May 6, 2019 5:11:02 GMT -6
I hear that. I just tried that type of side chaining the other day and it worked a treat. I ended up with a crossover point much higher than expected - just below wherever it kept the gritty mids of the bass untouched.
I also like sending the parallel bus to a verb and sometimes eqing the verb.
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Post by schmalzy on May 6, 2019 6:54:51 GMT -6
Oh, man. Interesting discussion!
My drum parallel scheme is this: a "kit parallel" as well as individual kick, snare, and tom parallels.
I typically send all my shells and the rooms that seem appropriate to the kit parallel. It gets smacked pretty hard with something fun. Sometimes it's the Kush UBK-1. Sometimes it's the Boz +10db. I've liked Sly-Fi Deflector, too. I don't blend this into the drum mix until I've taken the drums as far as they can go without it. UBK-1 gets used when I need movement in the compression. Deflector gets used when I need dirt or to obliterate the transient. +10db gets used most often because it can give me smack or it can pull tone out of drums. What I need changes from song to song so I like to have those options. The +10db didn't come naturally to me right away - I couldn't figure it out - but I think I've figured out how it likes to work and how to use the sound that comes out. It's been my go-to kit parallel compressor for a bit now.
After I get the rest of the mix in and feeling good, I'll sometimes need just a little more transient or length from certain drum sources. That's where those individual parallels come in. They have a transient designer on them - most often the JST Transify (a multi-band transient designer). My most common move on those parallels is reduced sustain all across the frequency spectrum and added attack in the lows and in the "stick" part of the midrange (I hear that in the 1kHz to 5khz range). Push those faders up individually as needed to get stuff to speak through the mix.
I have a few times used a parallel "cymbals" bus made up of overheads (that were placed to reduce the shells' presence) and spot mics. The cymbals in a track decayed more quickly than I thought served the song. Fairly fast attack and long-ish release to pin it in place and then I could push the cymbals up to make them feel longer.
I find myself more and more often only needing the kit parallel bus to get my drums moving and exciting enough to live with the rest of my mix. Those individual parallels are end-of-mix options that aren't regularly needed but are fantastic when I need the thing they give me!
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Post by svart on May 6, 2019 8:37:21 GMT -6
I'm doing parallel on drums as well these days, mostly kick, snare and toms.
I send them to an SSL bus compressor and hit them HAAAAARD, like 10:1 or 20:1, doing something like 15-18db GR at slowest attack, fastest release so I just get the first POP and the tail. I mix this back in with the mix to get more attack and more apparent sustain than is doable by compressing each one alone. That way I can tailor the amount of pop and sustain I get without monkeying around with body of the hit.
This can things sound funny when solo'd but it can make drums pop out in a dense mix without resorting to a lot of automation and EQ.
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Post by schmalzy on May 6, 2019 12:22:33 GMT -6
I'm doing parallel on drums as well these days, mostly kick, snare and toms. I send them to an SSL bus compressor and hit them HAAAAARD, like 10:1 or 20:1, doing something like 15-18db GR at slowest attack, fastest release so I just get the first POP and the tail. I mix this back in with the mix to get more attack and more apparent sustain than is doable by compressing each one alone. That way I can tailor the amount of pop and sustain I get without monkeying around with body of the hit. This can things sound funny when solo'd but it can make drums pop out in a dense mix without resorting to a lot of automation and EQ. Are you running this inside or outside of the drum bus (which I assume would have a compressor - if no compression, I guess it doesn't really matter)? I go back and forth between my parallels being inside and outside my drum bus. I like 'em in because I like how it can pump my drum compressor. I like it out because sometimes I want the drums to be more exaggerated by the parallel buses. |
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Post by svart on May 6, 2019 12:43:52 GMT -6
I'm doing parallel on drums as well these days, mostly kick, snare and toms. I send them to an SSL bus compressor and hit them HAAAAARD, like 10:1 or 20:1, doing something like 15-18db GR at slowest attack, fastest release so I just get the first POP and the tail. I mix this back in with the mix to get more attack and more apparent sustain than is doable by compressing each one alone. That way I can tailor the amount of pop and sustain I get without monkeying around with body of the hit. This can things sound funny when solo'd but it can make drums pop out in a dense mix without resorting to a lot of automation and EQ. Are you running this inside or outside of the drum bus (which I assume would have a compressor - if no compression, I guess it doesn't really matter)? I go back and forth between my parallels being inside and outside my drum bus. I like 'em in because I like how it can pump my drum compressor. I like it out because sometimes I want the drums to be more exaggerated by the parallel buses. I don't really run another drum bus. It's straight tracks with some processing on each, and then this parallel is a drum bus. Even though it's greatly exaggerating the attack and tail, when combined it still thickens the body of the drums too, and gives me something akin to the "glue" that drum bussing does, but with adjustable spank. I might bus up certain things, like toms all end up on a bus in the DAW and get some gating and a little compression (SSL channel strip) just to even them out a little and round the attack so it's not just pure transient. I know it sounds kinda strange to round off a transient just to suppliment it again with a slow compressor, but it results in a longer and rounded attack for more of a splatty sound, rather than sharp peaks that need to be tamed to get more level. I used to believe that fast and clean were the only ways to get that POP on the drums but I've found out the hard way that fast transients kill your ability to hit things hard and maintain a good high level. |
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Post by schmalzy on May 6, 2019 14:39:06 GMT -6
I know it sounds kinda strange to round off a transient just to suppliment it again with a slow compressor, but it results in a longer and rounded attack for more of a splatty sound, rather than sharp peaks that need to be tamed to get more level. I used to believe that fast and clean were the only ways to get that POP on the drums but I've found out the hard way that fast transients kill your ability to hit things hard and maintain a good high level. I'm 100% with ya' on that stuff! I'm saturating and doing some clipping to make my transients less pokey and longer. Everyone I've talked to about it have looked at me like I'm crazy when I say I'm trying to lengthen my transient (before I compress the master and/or the drum bus). The pre-clipped drum transients still seem to push really hard to me even though they've had the loudest parts of the poke shaved. |
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Post by svart on May 6, 2019 14:48:25 GMT -6
I know it sounds kinda strange to round off a transient just to suppliment it again with a slow compressor, but it results in a longer and rounded attack for more of a splatty sound, rather than sharp peaks that need to be tamed to get more level. I used to believe that fast and clean were the only ways to get that POP on the drums but I've found out the hard way that fast transients kill your ability to hit things hard and maintain a good high level. I'm 100% with ya' on that stuff! I'm saturating and doing some clipping to make my transients less pokey and longer. Everyone I've talked to about it have looked at me like I'm crazy when I say I'm trying to lengthen my transient (before I compress the master and/or the drum bus). The pre-clipped drum transients still seem to push really hard to me even though they've had the loudest parts of the poke shaved. If you can, try an SSL gate on them. Keep the range down so that you get around 10-14dB of reduction during quiet spots and turn up the threshold as high as you can without it getting too weird. Hold and decay set to fastest. It'll make those edges round right off. |
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Post by MorEQsThanAnswers on May 6, 2019 23:09:09 GMT -6
I'm 100% with ya' on that stuff! I'm saturating and doing some clipping to make my transients less pokey and longer. Everyone I've talked to about it have looked at me like I'm crazy when I say I'm trying to lengthen my transient (before I compress the master and/or the drum bus). The pre-clipped drum transients still seem to push really hard to me even though they've had the loudest parts of the poke shaved. If you can, try an SSL gate on them. Keep the range down so that you get around 10-14dB of reduction during quiet spots and turn up the threshold as high as you can without it getting too weird. Hold and decay set to fastest. It'll make those edges round right off. Clever! Another thing I was taught if you have an ADC with a soft limiter is that you can drive your inputs to the point of "clipping" from the start of the mix. Your DAW will read 0 and you'll print a square'd off waveform, but you won't "hear distortion" (granted you are using the right kind of ADC). Throughout your mix, you'll end up building these transients back into your track, which will already be at "mastering loudness." Since there's no need for a mastering limiter, you won't later lose punch to one. My mentor leaves his bus compressor's make-up pinned and laughs when the interns go bug-eyed on their first day. It was something he picked up directly from Joe Chiccarelli. Sounds crazy, use with caution, and probably check with your mastering engineer first! I personally don't use this method because I'm not as experienced and need QC from my mastering guy, but if you've been doing this for a while and your mixes don't need much mastering, it's an awesome trick! |
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Post by MorEQsThanAnswers on May 6, 2019 23:31:56 GMT -6
Deflector gets used when I need dirt or to obliterate the transient. This is what my original question is most directly asking about. Could you talk about a musical context in which you are trying to obliterate a drum transient? This seems like a counter-intuitive idea at face value, so I'm having trouble forming a philosophy on when to do this. Seems like something you'd do to bring sustain or overtones out of an 808, but on a snare, I don't understand the reasoning. If you can avoid the obvious example of when a drum is just plain "too pokey" I'd appreciate it. Thanks! |
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Post by schmalzy on May 7, 2019 15:06:31 GMT -6
Deflector gets used when I need dirt or to obliterate the transient. This is what my original question is most directly asking about. Could you talk about a musical context in which you are trying to obliterate a drum transient? This seems like a counter-intuitive idea at face value, so I'm having trouble forming a philosophy on when to do this. Seems like something you'd do to bring sustain or overtones out of an 808, but on a snare, I don't understand the reasoning. If you can avoid the obvious example of when a drum is just plain "too pokey" I'd appreciate it. Thanks! You're going to hate this answer: I crush the transient when it's too pokey! What I'm REALLY looking for when I'm using Deflector is more tone. Sometimes it's just some grit, distortion, and some pumping but often it's for the tone of the drum to speak (audibly) longer. Same thing you'd do with an 808, I imagine. I don't really work a lot with 808 drums and - when I do - I'm often saturating/distorting for some harmonics and using a limiter (which pins it down). I work primarily in rock/heavy music. If the drummer played well and smacked really hard (or the samples I'm using to reinforce the performance have a lot of attack) I might not need the extra front edge poke/snap/attack I'd gain from a parallel compressor set with a transient-exaggerating slow attack time. Pushing the attack down and using a quick release can give me the tone of the drum I sometimes want more of. I find a snare drum without any ring or tone/note to sometimes disappear in a mix. Pushing an attacky kick and/or snare into a parallel Deflector can lop off that attack and give me some note length from the drums. Putting a few drums into that parallel bus makes 'em all feel similar like they belong together and are behaving that same way. When I'm going for that, I sometimes even mix a little short shell-mic-only reverb into the parallel channel to even further supplement the length I'm looking for. Fast attack, medium-to-slow release, gentle-to-assertive ratio with not a lot of reduction on the other hand seems to push stuff down and make it simmer. Kind of always moving up and down without ever getting too out of control. Kind of like someone's riding the fader up right before the next beat and bringing it back down at the start of the beat but coming down fast enough that the attack doesn't leap out. That ends up feeling a lot to me like the sustain is evened out because as the natural source's sustain is dying off this parallel sustain is pushing up. Sometimes I'm just looking for some distortion and aggression out of that parallel. Deflector has some distortion modes (like a Distressor) and can really mess up your drums in an aggressive, interesting way. The louder I push into the parallel the more the sustain starts to get distorted. There's a point where the transients are just distorted and flattened but the sustain isn't effected too much. That's a nice spot because it leaves the sustain natural (but louder/more audible) but gives the attack aggression and the sound of exaggeration without the extra level from the transient spike. Any of that make sense? I'm not even sure if it makes sense to me! I just turn (digital) knobs and listen! |
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