Live cymbals over MIDI drums :-)

[mickrich]

I know this is a pretty common thing to do but tried it today for a 1 man project I was recording for a customer.
The SSD drums weren't sounding great so I set up the kit and overhead mics and got him to "overdub" crashes and chinas' leaving the hats and ride as SSD.
Totally brought the kit to life.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifKvILewB3g&feature=youtu.be

 

[Spectivum]

I kinda expected that those live hits would replace the midi but it seems it is an additional layer and many times sounds parallel to hh/ride... if I am not mistaken.
Not necessarily a problem just if you want to be very realistic. Nice sound overall.

 

[Behind]

Completely unrelated but... I love that clean guitar sound during the intro. Could you please give some details about it?

 

[mickrich]

Cymbals are overdubbed rather than replaced so there are some clashes but nothing too bad.
The guy isn't a drummer and we were pushed for time.
Made a big difference to the dynamics and made it less MIDI.

Clean guitar is Agile 7 string into Mesa MK4 channel 1 in class a mode with a bit of amp verb.
MK4 clean is superb!