Three mic demo... AT2020 overheads, and an Audix i5 is the room mic. Please don't mind the flubs, I was just trying to play everything on the kit to get a full drum soundcheck deal going.

I've struggled with room mics before, tried but didn't get anything that sounded very good. But thanks to some ideas I gleaned from a Tape Op article Chris or Snaxie dug up (I don't recall whom?) I managed to find a nice spot - halfway between the kit and the wall, pointed at the wall that faces the kit.

The concept I've dreamt up during my infinite daydreaming at school was to have the overheads be uncompressed and thin, and quite bright, and quite wide (stereo wise). The room mic would in contrast be rather compressed, quite dark, quite saturated, and totally mono. Theoretically they'd compliment each other in this way, sort of a Yin Yang thing. In order to get the room mic dark enough I actually put two socks on it. Also darkened it with some EQ. Compressed it with Blockfish. Overheads I EQed all the lows off of and brightened. All EQ on these mics is via the Jesusonic RBJ 1073 plug that came with Reaper. I'm pleased to say that I think I've nailed it!

http://soundcloud.com/geoffhodsman/room-and-overheads

At 2:00ish I muted the room mic so you can hear how damn thin the overheads are on their own. And at 2:20ish I shut off the overheads so you can scope the room mic.

I like it.

This way your cymbals are pretty clear and not too smooshy smashy, but you can bring in the room mic for a bit more of the smooshy vibe. For metal, it will probably also be handy to have so little kick in the overheads, should you care to modify them.

It would be interesting to see how the sound would change with a mic other than the i5 as the room mic. I wonder if an omni condenser or something wacky like a figure eight(for instance: a ribbon, because you are using it set darker and thicker anyhow) might be interesting.

Sounds pretty doap. The real test is in a full mix, but it sounds like it will be good.

Indeed, the i5 is a last resort sort of thing. I could borrow girlfriend's dad's SM81s theoretically and then use an AT2020 as the room, but in the end I think I'd rather not bug him to do that when he also has goals he wants to accomplish this summer with them. Out of all my dynamics, the i5 is the least 'lo fi' sounding in this role, so it got the pick. I kind of like the dirt anyway. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to pick up a new condenser or a ribbon or something, but I don't gots the cash.

I popped an SM57 on the snare and the sound is coming together. I won't bother making a demo of it because I think you'll know basically how that sounds.

It's just a matter of making my attenuator for the tom mics, reskinning the snare (and toms? I don't know!) and getting my drum brain over here and I'm off to the races.

http://soundcloud.com/geoffhodsman/kiddie-diddler-drums

There's a full drum mix. One down, twelve to go!

Kick: Yamaha DTXplorer
Snare: SM57 through one of those cables with the resistor inside for the impedence. Brand new EVANS Power Centre head...
Toms: Avantone ATOM second generation through homemade pad. New EVANS G2 clear heads...
Room: Audix i5 with socks on it
Overheads: AT2020s spread wide six feet up.

I am really pleased with this drum sound. It has depth I've never gotten before. It sounds... like the basement I recorded in... the overheads are wide and dry, but then right down the centre is all the reverberation and stuff, which is basically the situation with the long and low basement. No reverb added.

I like it. The snare is especially nice- consistent, too, even during the blasts.

If you don't mind my asking, could you post the room mic on its own?

Classy song title too.

I can do that the next time I go home. With the compression and EQ or as is?

Our old bass player wrote it and has a habit of naming things after nearby inanimate objects... Kitty Litter... someone renamed it Kiddie Diddler? Ehh, we really just go with it.

With, I guess; I'm just curious to see what it's doing in context.

http://www.mediafire.com/?84gqx57mu1q878v

There's just room, then the mix without room, then with.



You can see the i5 with socks on it to the left.

Very clean without the room mic; that really trashes it up quite a bit. I wonder what some bottom snare action would sound like with that snare- it really is tuned pretty friggin' high! You'd need another channel for that though.

I think I'm hearing some mistriggers/double triggers on the kick? Not horridly noticeable, but I swear they're there. A sensitivity settings thing? Or a burying the beater thing?

If I may ask, why the 57 vs. the i5 on the snare? Too bright with the i5 and a higher-tuned snare? Just curious.

My channels are maxed! So none of that. Double triggering? Maybe not, though you can hear the room mic picking up the kick impact a fraction of a second later.

I chose 57 because it's the most lo fi sounding mic of the ones when I demoed the three mics. The last time I recorded my drums it came out pretty nice but wayyy to clean sounding. This time I want it to be a bit earthy and dirty. My reference seems to be Nails - Unsilent Death, though I won't let the compression on the drums pump like it does there.

Yes the snare she is hella tight. I came home today and tried to record some more but just wasn't feeling the result. Why? Turns out the snare loosened itself, so it just wasn't cracking like it did before. So that real tight sound is apparently going to be pivotal to this recording. If you've seen the power centre heads Evans has there's that extra thing in the centre, and you know you're tightening that snare when a crack of clear plastic begins to show around its edges...

That's the "problem" with the Saffires: the mic preamps are too usable. Kids These Days just don't know what they're missing.

Getting the drums uglier/more violent is definitely do-able, though. You can add a hella lot of grit to things if you do it right and still keep it from sounding like a complete mess.

I can whip up a quick before/after clip of DM drums one of my friends did to illustrate. Filthy'd 'em up quite nice.

It is what it is, demo fuckery. But it illustrates well. Clean for a minute, filthy for a minute: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/13184331/dmdrums_nofilth_filth.mp3

It doesn't really register as distortion- it's all tape and preamp sims (MPX and Decapitator) driven along with a really ugly compressor (Valley People Dynamite, the Softube modeled version) but it uglied the drums up something fierce. Kick/snare/OHs; no tom mics. Whatever he did nastied it up well enough I think?

The thing with the Saffire is you can't really drive it, not as far as I can tell. It always stays polite. (The big 2-rackspace 2-channel ART box I have is a fine companion for two more ins on SPIDF. Not too 'spensive, highly user-tweakable and goes from glossyshiny to square wave hell without clipping in the 'puter.)

Yeah, the distortion really gave the drums the cajones they needed in that clip.

I'd very much like one of those ART boxes. I think the current version doesn't have the SPDIF though, so I guess I'd have to be obtaining it used.

Fixed some off-sync stuff with the guitar track I put on, tweaked some levels, added a little rough master EQ

http://soundcloud.com/geoffhodsman/piss ... ck-nipples

I rather enjoy the tuning pitch of that snareyo.

Song wants basstho.

In time all will come together! The entire CD is like 35 minutes of 1to 3 minute grinders. Our bass player has pretty decent tone so I'm looking forward to actually using mics to record him. Guitars, I'm going to see if I can get my HM-2 clone layered in there somehow...

It's gonna kill.

Yeah, that snare sounds fucking sick, bro. Trey Williams mode.

I must have spent a month on this, but yeah I'm done the drums now... 38 minutes of tupa-tupa-tupa and the such, oh boy.

Guitars next.

Rhythm guitars are getting did. Here's one of them:

http://soundcloud.com/geoffhodsman/brea ... les-guitar

Combination of 5150 and the HM-2 clone...

5150 was miced with 57s with the Fredman technique. Right guitar had a tubescreamer in front, left has a Digitech Metal Master.

The HM-2 clone went direct to the computer and then I fed it into Poulin Hybrit.

I'd like to hear more of the HM-2 but the guitarists don't want it to get quite that filthy...

AH FUUUUUCK! Sounds fucking gnarly, dude! I really love this tone!