Any metal drums mixing course you would recommend?

[Antiphase]

Metal drums are so hard to me to mix properly, so I`d like to know how to do it. Youtube videos aren`t that helpful, lots of amateurs pretending like they know what they do but their results are rather average at best and not appliable to different mixes.
So I`m looking for complete metal drums mixing course, video preferably, could be book as well, it would be awesome if you used it by yourself so you`ve got some feedback, thanks.
Also I`m working with samples only. Dry samples.

 

[lewis]

Metal drums are so hard to me to mix properly, so I`d like to know how to do it. Youtube videos aren`t that helpful, lots of amateurs pretending like they know what they do it but their results are rather average at best and not appliable to different mixes.
So I`m looking for complete metal drums mixing course, video preferably, could be book as well, it would be awesome if you used it by yourself so you`ve got some feedback, thanks.
Also I`m working with samples only. Dry samples.

I use drum VSTs that are basically "mix ready" right off the bat.
The Solemn Tones Mjolnir sound pretty mix ready right away.

And Im planning on adding the EZ Drummer II plugin with some of their expansions for more mix ready drums. Normally their presets are good enough for me.
Afterall they were made by the "experts" who know way more than I do.

(sidenote if you want Mjolnir Drums, you can use "Fluff15" for a 15% discount at checkout I believe.)

 

[Antiphase]

I use drum VSTs that are basically "mix ready" right off the bat.
The Solemn Tones Mjolnir sound pretty mix ready right away.

And Im planning on adding the EZ Drummer II plugin with some of their expansions for more mix ready drums. Normally their presets are good enough for me.
Afterall they were made by the "experts" who know way more than I do.

(sidenote if you want Mjolnir Drums, you can use "Fluff15" for a 15% discount at checkout I believe.)

Thanks, I`ll have a look at that vst. But I really want to learn how to mix`em. I have some several drum plugins that give me mix ready tones but not those I`m lookig for. I already mix everything pretty successfully, I think, so drums are kind of weak point that I want to fix, and i have time now study and learn

 

[USMarine75]

The Superior Drummer PDF?

 

[DudeManBrother]

URM Academy is probably what you’re looking for.

https://offers.nailthemix.com/get-enhanced-trial-2019

 

[Joshua Woodard]

JayPostones !

 

[jvms]

I second URM's Nail the Mxi and Enhanced programs. Tried learning how to mix on my own between 2013 and 2019 with very little success. The first 3 months in NTM helped me make more progress than all those years trying to learn from YouTube and forums. You should look into it.

 

[bostjan]

Most reliable way to mix the contents of a metal drum.

Oh wait...

You mean audio?

I've tried bus mixing them before, but it usually ends up all getting undone. The only advise I can offer is to adjust everything as an entire mix - levels, panning, EQ, everything. It seems daunting, but just start with everything dry and 0 dB and work little by little until it starts sounding better, then keep going until it sounds the way you want it to sound.

I usually put compression on the kick and snare, and EQ the cymbals (overheads) until there is virtually nothing other than high frequencies. I'll isolate each track briefly and find the frequencies that sound gross and scoop those right out and then everything else I take in subtler increments.

The drums might sound icky without the rest of the instruments in the mix, but I'd say less apparently than guitar or bass, but the trick is to get a nice shimmery tone out of them without overlapping all of the meat of the guitar and bass with the drums (mainly the snare drum, which I struggle with more than any other thing in the mix).

It also helps a lot if the drums sound good to start. If the drums are cobwebbed and out of tune, there's probably no amount of mixing that will save them - so maybe convert the audio into triggers if you can and start over with all samples.

Otherwise, if something in particular sounds weird or dull, and EQ doesn't seem to ever get it better, just convert that particular item to trigger and then feed that trigger into a good sample.

If you are already working in all MIDI, then disregard all that stuff about triggering - the hardest part is done, just try to mix the samples until it sounds lively.

As with any mixing, save multiple scenes as you work. Don't delete them even if you are certain you found something better. Then after your ears have reset (could be the next day, maybe much longer), give another listen to each scene and you might be surprised how the high end creeps up and up as you get tired. Maybe that first or second scene you saved sounded the best. Keep that in mind as you get back to work.

 

[Drew]

Drums are hard enough in less dense mixes, and in metal are a goddamn nightmare.

My suggestion, honestly, if you're working with samples, and there are a lot of in-the-box mix options, is to start with a good-sounding preset that's most of the way to what you're looking for. I'm picturing something like Superior 3 here - very few of the presets blow me away, but a number are quite good and they're very often very good sounding for the particular genre they have in mind.

Now, I'm not saying just USE the preset - you said you want to mix your own, and that's a copout.

Rather, use your drum synth in multi out mode, send each peice to a channel of its own and bus them all back together in your DAW... and then flip over to the internal mixer, and run through THAT track by track, seeing what effects they're using, and how they're using them - where their compression threshold is, whether it's being used to just lop off errant peaks or if it's set for deeper, more funamental tone shaping, what EQ bands are being hit, where and how hard, etc etc etc. You've selected a preset that you think sounds pretty good, so these are probably sensible production moves for the sort of mix you want to make.

Take that mix, in the box, and start bypassing FX commponents and recreating them in your DAW using your own tools and whatever tweaks seem like they make things better to YOU. Above all else though, focus on figuring out WHY a given FX is being used, why its set the way it is, and what it's doing to make the mix better.

Do that with a couple different presets, taking the preset in-the-VST mix and recreating it in your own DAW, and you're going to learn a LOT about how to shape drums. Honestly, now that Superior 3 really and truly sounds like unprocessed drums if you load a kit with no processing on it (well recorded, but zero processing), it's almost as good a learning tool as it is a recording and writing one.