how compress and eq a natural bass drum?

[manegarm666]

any can give me an idea.?. thnkssss


i want buy the steven slate drums 4. but i play in my natural drums. can i get a better sound using samples mixing with the natural bassdrum for example?

 

[szymon]

Well... http://www.ultimatemetal.com/forum/...ng-series-2-soviet-russia-drums-slam-you.html this is a very good starting point. There was also a plenty of threads discussing this topic.
cheers.

 

[manegarm666]

thnkkssss

 

[ThatGuitarGuy]

Once I get things to a point that I'd feel comfortable posting, I'll let you hear a drum mix of mine and you can tell me what you think. The key for tightening up the kick drum is the editing. You can compress it all you want, and keep the release long as much as you want, but there's too much that can jack up the sound with resonating heads, etc. Just cut out EVERYTHING you don't want even between each kick to get rid of the reso head sounds, etc.

EQ out what you don't want. Boost last if you do, which I would say is okay on kick and toms and nothing else. If you do boost, don't go crazy, SUBTLE.

 

[Trevoire520]

It's hard to give a definitive guide as it all depends on the kick, the mic, the drummer, the room and what kind of sound you're aiming for. I'll have a go at giving you a rough guide though.

Start by cutting your mids, somewhere between 300-500hz normally has some boxy crap that needs attenuated, get this right and you shouldn't need to do as much boosting in other areas.
Now go after your beater attack. Normally I'll pull up the high shelf and also do a bell boost around 3-5k.
Last up you want to get your bottom end sorted out. I prefer a bell boost here. How high/low you go depends on your kick and how you want it to translate. A modern approach seems to be to pull this low (50-60hz) as it can sound "bigger" on systems with decent low end, but on poorer/smaller systems that don't go that low you can easily find that you end up with no appreciable low end left on your kick and all you hear is your high clacky/slappy stuff.
I prefer going for around 80hz as most systems will reproduce this and it sounds a bit tighter, though at the expense of the size of the kick.

Once you've identified the areas of energy you want to cut/boost you just need to play the bands against each other and see what sounds good in your mix. Of course you'll need to go for some gating aswell to eliminate cymbal wash etc and increase the perception of the drum's attack. Don't be afraid to get aggressive with this as chances are once you've boosted the highs to where they sound nice and clicky you'll have alot of cymbals coming through.

Compression wise I like a DBX 160 or something similar. Basically you want to let the attack through to give the kick more punch/attack.

Give that a go and see how you get on. Like we know every kick and every mix is different so alot of this is down to experimenting yourself and seeing what works.

 

[Terminus]

/\ damn good tips.

Also remember to hipass the kick so your mix is not getting overloaded with extreme sub bass every time the kick hits.

 

[bryan_kilco]

I always struggle with natural kicks. They always seem to sound muffled and lifeless. I can boost a zillion dB in the 'click' area and still not get anything close to useable.

A huge problem I always run into is the drummers left foot being weaker than the right, so in a mix, you hear more right foot than left.....usually in slower double bass parts. I cannot even them out with any type of compression or transient designer, and feel like I'm missing a really important element there.

*punches self in face*

 

[Trevoire520]

I always struggle with natural kicks. They always seem to sound muffled and lifeless. I can boost a zillion dB in the 'click' area and still not get anything close to useable.

Wrong kick/head/beater/mic/drummer (normally it's the last one)
If the guy doesn't hit the kick hard you're never going to get decent attack out of it.

 

[ThatGuitarGuy]

I always use a beta 91 for an inside mic to get the attack/click

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

Post a sample of the kick, I'll process it and post the screen shots.

Throwing out generic settings is only so helpful, seeing what others do on material that you both can listen to with and without processing is the best way to learn this shit.

 

[Trevoire520]

+1 to both those last two posts.

 

[bryan_kilco]

Post a sample of the kick, I'll process it and post the screen shots.

Throwing out generic settings is only so helpful, seeing what others do on material that you both can listen to with and without processing is the best way to learn this shit.

Was this aimed at me or the OP?

and Trevoire - I think it may be mostly head/tuning in my case. I usually only record our drummer and no outside drummers/bands, though I did record a buddies drums once for shits and giggles and his kick drum sounded GODLY.

Our drummer uses the Axis Longboard pedals, so I'm assuming the beaters are plastic...never really checked them out, and he has a falam pad on the batter head....but it still doesnt get the 'clicky' attack I'm always looking for.

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

Was this aimed at me or the OP?

and Trevoire - I think it may be mostly head/tuning in my case. I usually only record our drummer and no outside drummers/bands, though I did record a buddies drums once for shits and giggles and his kick drum sounded GODLY.

Our drummer uses the Axis Longboard pedals, so I'm assuming the beaters are plastic...never really checked them out, and he has a falam pad on the batter head....but it still doesnt get the 'clicky' attack I'm always looking for.

Anyone that wants to. No it wasn't specific.

 

[Seizure.]

Once I get things to a point that I'd feel comfortable posting, I'll let you hear a drum mix of mine and you can tell me what you think. The key for tightening up the kick drum is the editing. You can compress it all you want, and keep the release long as much as you want, but there's too much that can jack up the sound with resonating heads, etc. Just cut out EVERYTHING you don't want even between each kick to get rid of the reso head sounds, etc.

Say what? :/

 

[ThatGuitarGuy]

With a kick drum, there's usually a lingering ring or resonating sound that comes after a hit. This can make it sound really loose, muddy, etc. By chopping off the end of each hit where this happens, your kick ends up sounding way tighter.

I don't know if that makes sense...I can't really post much now since I'm nearing the end of the semester so it's crazy season. I'll get back to you when I can.

 

[Uros]

I know what you mean, that tail...cutting it out may give you tighter sound, but it also could result in removing all the manliness out of the kick too

 

[ThatGuitarGuy]

I wouldn't cut that much out of it lol. If you do too much then yeah, no balls.

 

[AllanD]

Does anyone Limit before the compressor, that way the compressor puts consistant GR on the kick/whatever?

 

[Plankis]

I find it's very important to EQ while listening to the whole band. I find it very hard to find the clicks sweet spot if the kicks soloed because the tone changes so much when all the other crap is sounding.

 

[Uros]

Does anyone Limit before the compressor, that way the compressor puts consistant GR on the kick/whatever?

Seems like a legit technique. If you are stacking samples, you will hardly need to reach for it tho.