Drum mixing tricks and methods?

[Dash]

Hello all.

I've been more into drum mixing lately and while I can get a pretty good drum sound for my goal I started listening to other mixes and a few really caught my attention (drum mix wise). Especially the snare and the toms.



(0:09 for example)

I'm not really into the whole "djent" sound overall but I really like the sound of this compressed drum sound, but it still sounds lively (a bit ). I'm guessing this is mostly parallel compression doing it's thang? Still, do you guys have any tips?

The software I have is:

Superior Drummer 2.0
The Metal Foundry (I think this is what both bands use in combination with the Avatar kit)
Metal Machine
Metalheads

 

[Purelojik]

check nolly's soundcloud page. hes got some screenshots of his settings and a link to his avatar preset. he uses mostly stillwell plugins(AWESOME) outside the avatar kit and his settings get some awesome punchy sounds. Give it a shot

 

[Dash]

Yea Nolly's S2.0/TMF sounds are great and it gives a nice start for a good sound but still, I think his drums sound really too produced or something, I can't put my finger on it exactly. What I like about especially Hacktivist's drumsound is that it sounds pretty natural and raw.

 

[Purelojik]

Yea Nolly's S2.0/TMF sounds are great and it gives a nice start for a good sound but still, I think his drums sound really too produced or something, I can't put my finger on it exactly. What I like about especially Hacktivist's drumsound is that it sounds pretty natural and raw.

for that you'll probably need to do the whole Multi out thing with SD 2.0 and then mix them individually which is actually quite rewarding after a bit of frustration. use the Systematic Mixing Guide and it'll walk you through it all

 

[octatonic]

Investigate sidechain compression, especially on the kick and snare.

I almost always set up a sidechain on the bass track that is keyed to the kick which allows it to poke through.
Quick attack and release but try to avoid a noticeable effect (keep threshold quite high).
A 2-3db dip is usually all that is required.

Getting the snare to fit usually requires a lot of massaging of rhythm guitars and anything else that is occupying 200hz up to about 2k.
The snare can easily disappear once 'big guitars' kick in, especially with modern, multi-tracked all to hell guitars.
I use the Waves SSL compressor quite a bit for this.

 

[Dash]

Thank you for both your very helpful answers. I will be looking into it. Sidechain compression is not the same as parallel compression?

 

[KingAenarion]

Sidechain compression is where you send one signal to trigger another compressor.

Parallel compression is, funnily enough, in parallel. As in 1 next to another running concurrently. So you send the signal to a separately compressed channel (or multiple channels... as many as you want really - I use up to 6 on vocals).

 

[Speculum Speculorum]

I will echo the statements already made here. Especially when you're going for that aggressive, new, hard style, learning about compression and how it truly works is probably one of the most brain-aching and important things you can learn about.

Just remember that compression is like an intense mind-altering chemical. Too little, and you're left wondering why the frick you even did it in the first place. Too much, and everything goes to Hell in a handbasket really fast. It's about finding that nice, goldilocks zone.

One little idea I learned over at Pensado's Place - Pensado's Place

When using parallel compression, try experimenting with using a very small delay (timed to your track) along with maybe even some slight stereo widening on your parallel compressed kick and snare channels. You don't want to overdo it, as both your kick and snare help centralize and gel the rhythm section. It can, however, really bring a groove to life and give the rooms an additional body that you don't get with your ambient mics. I'm messing around with it right now, actually.

 

[Dash]

Sidechain compression is where you send one signal to trigger another compressor.

Parallel compression is, funnily enough, in parallel. As in 1 next to another running concurrently. So you send the signal to a separately compressed channel (or multiple channels... as many as you want really - I use up to 6 on vocals).

Makes sense! Thanks!

I will echo the statements already made here. Especially when you're going for that aggressive, new, hard style, learning about compression and how it truly works is probably one of the most brain-aching and important things you can learn about.

Just remember that compression is like an intense mind-altering chemical. Too little, and you're left wondering why the frick you even did it in the first place. Too much, and everything goes to Hell in a handbasket really fast. It's about finding that nice, goldilocks zone.

One little idea I learned over at Pensado's Place - Pensado's Place

When using parallel compression, try experimenting with using a very small delay (timed to your track) along with maybe even some slight stereo widening on your parallel compressed kick and snare channels. You don't want to overdo it, as both your kick and snare help centralize and gel the rhythm section. It can, however, really bring a groove to life and give the rooms an additional body that you don't get with your ambient mics. I'm messing around with it right now, actually.

Yea I've been looking at it previously. Acle has a nice example of what parallel compression can do:

Drums by Acle on SoundCloud - Create, record and share your sounds for free

I like how the drum is punchy but still pretty natural and raw. Thanks for the info.

 

[shnizzle]

if you like here is my drum mixing tutorial. i know i do say side-chain compression but i got corrected afterwards that it´s not the same as parallel compression.

 

[Dash]

Nice! Gonna check it out.

EDIT: I think your videos explain it pretty good, still I'm not fan of the sound you got out of it. It's great for your music on your channel but your drums sound very processed unlike for example Tesseract's and Hacktivist's kits (I know they are too but they sound more raw). If you know what I mean. Now the music I make is nothing close to both Tesseract and Hacktivist (more post-rock/post-metal) but I really think the sound of those drums fit the music I am making. Of course I'm not looking for the EXACT same sound, that would be stupid.
Circle Of Contempt's new teaser drum sound is far more agressive and sounds more produced (imo) so I don't know if it fits my style well but I just liked the sound of it.

Nice music on your channel by the way.

 

[shnizzle]

yeah, i know what you mean. with SD it´s pretty easy to make it sound way processed. that´s why i use native instruments studio drummer now. it has that more raw kind of sound and i love it.

 

[Dash]

Another example. You can clearly hear that it's Superior Drummer 2.0 w/ The Metal Foundry. Even though it has a lot of compression, it still has a lot of body, especially the snare. Vildhjarta's drum sound is not as agressive as Hacktivist's and Circle Of Contempt's in my opinion but still it has that great big snare sound. As you can see a lot of new progressive metal / "djent" bands have this drum sound. I'm not looking to make this kind of music but I do enjoy their mixes.

But yea enough examples. I'm going to work more with parallel compression/sidechain compression and post my results and findings.