About the 7 Angels 7 Plagues thing... When we thought of and ultimately decided to choose 7 Horns 7 Eyes, oddly enough, none of us had even heard of the similarly named band before. It still completely baffles me how that's even possible. But, since we've committed to our name already we don't really have plans to change it. I kind of wish we'd known at the time though
Thedeloshimself said:
i love the toms. are they fake?
Because I absolutely hate having to deal with cymbal bleed, the toms were tediously replaced 100% with samples of the exact same velocity as my drummer played them...but they are in fact, samples of his own two toms. We bought brand new heads that day. Recorded with MD421s, and in the mix I didn't do anything except EQ.
As for the other details, let me know any specifics you want. I'll share it all, but the basics are:
Kick drum: replaced 100% with a sample of a band's kick I recorded previously. SUPER NICE sounding kick drum to record, that helped more than any other factor. Audix D6. I used three EQs in mixing to get it to sit just right, and I played with a compressor for a while but ultimately decided against it...so like the toms, it's just EQ. For some reason I only used one sample, despite having a whole bunch to use, but it still sounds pretty good.
Snare: tediously replaced 100% with samples of the exact same velocity as my drummer played, from a band's snare I recorded previously. Tape on the top head to kill a lot of of the offensive ringing. Audix i5. I had about 20 different velocities to work with, all of which were used. I picked my favorite "hard" sample and used it as kind of the "main" snare sound. Like the kick, I used three EQs to get it to sit just right- one for taking out about 10 or so little notches of nasty ringing tones, and then the other two for more broad EQing.
All cymbals: just a spaced pair of large diaphragm condensers, a model called an LD-ONE. In Seattle the top audio store is this place called Pacific Pro Audio...it's totally on the 5th floor of an office building downtown, it's pretty sweet...and they sell a few of their "own brand" mics. I don't know the details of who manufactures them or anything, but for $100 a piece the LD-ONEs are an extremely good buy. Anyhow...I wish I'd payed a little more attention during setup, because the snare sat significantly more towards the right than the left, and I found it to be somewhat distracting even with the big center snare samples thrown on...so I best solved this by rolling off around 1000hz. I also had virtually no kick bleed after that, being that I used the Devin Townsend approach I read about on this forum and covered the kick with a sleeping bag! My little method of getting the cymbals all big and level (and actually reducing snare bleed at the same time) is throwing the Bombfactory BF76 plug-in on there. It makes a HUGE difference.
Guitars: Rhythm tracks are my 5150 on the clean channel, with a Maxon OD808 in front, the lead and clean parts are my Krank Revolution. My 4x12 cab is a Marshall 1960a Lead, so I don't even have the Vintage 30s that everyone raves about, but I make it work. It was miked with an i5 and MD421, both pretty much off axis. It's primarily i5 with just little bit of the MD421 blended in for some extra body. The lead parts are actually just i5. Also, I like to EQ guitars on the way in to my DAW because I like the extra assurance that I like the sounds I'm about to lay down, so I scooped out a modest amount of low mids and rolled off the extreme highs a little bit, through a plain ol' dbx two channel 31-band EQ. In mixing I EQed things a little bit more but overall I had the sound captured right up front.
MartysPooh said:
Not really feeling the guitar tone, too grainy gainy, not defined enough... works in the mix though.
I know what you mean here, man. I should have backed off on the gain a bit more on the amp. This is probably my least favorite attribute of the mix. Some of the guitar parts definitely could use some more definition.
Bass: direct signal through a SansAmp RBI. The bass was the least thought out thing of the entire mix, and I may retrack the bass with a blend of real amp so I can get some bite in the tone...but it's not too bad as is. Tuned to the guitars, not to a tuner. In mixing it was smashed pretty good with a compressor and EQed a bit.
Harsh vocals: SM58, in the control room/my bedroom...haha. EQ and compression. That's about it.
Clean vocals: LD-ONE in my bedroom. EQ and compression. And yes, I am a terrible, horrible human being and I used pitch correction
What can I say- that's the sound I'm going for.
Mastering: I finally got to use the TC Electronic finalizer I snagged on e-bay for $425, and it's REALLY fun to play with. It really put the final touch on the drums, as well as smashed the whole mix, obviously. I only played with it for about 20 minutes though and there is much tweaking and learning left to do...different ways of hitting the limiter and such. The softclipping is absoultely ideal for saving the snare drum.
That's all for tonight...but like I said, let me know if anyone wants more specifics!
