Nordstrom Toms

[Ermz]

I was listening to 'Colony' and it just hit me that from record to record, I love how this man gets toms to sound. The attack is beautiful and the only resonance is the punchy low-end. Fantastic.

Anybody here have any idea on what his general techniques are to get such a sound? I'd assume the right skins, tuning and hitting intensity are crucial.

 

[Nebulous]

You're trully obsessed man, haha. Though I dont blame you.

 

[kev]

yeh, clayman and colony... album tone to kill for !!!

 

[TheStoryteller]

I can tell you how he worked with us:

- New skins/heads (what's the proper term in english?) is a necessity.

- rough tuning, and then STAND ON THEM with all your body weight. I thought all the heads would break, but none of them did.

- really careful and precise tuning, by ear. It took several hours.

- re-tune after each song if needed

- He uses the same mic techniques as everyone else I suppose; nothing special there. I've seen him use SM57's as well as lots of other mics.

- Focusrite Red 8 preamp

 

[trym^^]

talk about obsession. hm storyteller tell us some more stories about the whole fredman studiosession. did you get any insights on how he mixes his guitar tracks ? sorry for being ot, maybe you did already describe this before ?

 

[kev]

methinks we need to pay our Fredirik to do an undercover documentry in the Fredman studio next time he's there!

 

[TheStoryteller]

talk about obsession. hm storyteller tell us some more stories about the whole fredman studiosession. did you get any insights on how he mixes his guitar tracks ? sorry for being ot, maybe you did already describe this before ?

The guitar recording method is very straightforward; often recorded with two SM57's. At least quadrupletracked of course (wow, what a word!), often with two different amps. On our albums he used his 5150 and ENGL Savage, two tracks of each. The ENGL tracks are panned like 90% L-R and the 5150's are panned 75% L-R, or whatever sounds best. More mids and less gain on one of them, usually the 5150. Almost no post eq, some slight compression if needed.

Now that I think of it, I don't think we used the 5150 at all on the first album... it was just the ENGL, but with 2 different settings.

 

[Ermz]

I can tell you how he worked with us:

- New skins/heads (what's the proper term in english?) is a necessity.

- rough tuning, and then STAND ON THEM with all your body weight. I thought all the heads would break, but none of them did.

- really careful and precise tuning, by ear. It took several hours.

- re-tune after each song if needed

- He uses the same mic techniques as everyone else I suppose; nothing special there. I've seen him use SM57's as well as lots of other mics.

- Focusrite Red 8 preamp

Thanks man!

Is there any particular brand of skins he prefered using?

What's the purpose of standing on the heads? To break them in so they don't lose tuning?

The tuning of the toms... was it done to be in the key of the songs, or to just generally give a nice, even, interval between toms?

Appreciate it!

PS. About those guitars. Was it the dual mic method used? I could imagine quad tracking with that would give one a lot of guitar tracks.

 

[metalkingdom]

- rough tuning, and then STAND ON THEM with all your body weight. I thought all the heads would break, but none of them did.

 

[Mark_Palangio]

methinks we need to pay our Fredirik to do an undercover documentry in the Fredman studio next time he's there!

+1

Do it!!!

 

[TheStoryteller]

Is there any particular brand of skins he prefered using?

Not that I know of...

What's the purpose of standing on the heads? To break them in so they don't lose tuning?

Yes, exactly

The tuning of the toms... was it done to be in the key of the songs, or to just generally give a nice, even, interval between toms?

AFAIK, never in the key of a song... just an even interval that sounds good.

PS. About those guitars. Was it the dual mic method used? I could imagine quad tracking with that would give one a lot of guitar tracks.

Yeah, dual mic. But Nordström always mix them together before they are recorded, so there will be the same amount of guitar tracks no matter how many mics he's using.

 

[Ermz]

Thanks for that info!

 

[KeithRT99]

i think daniel uses 12/13 toms with pinstripes (i think). i've gotten similar sounds with that setup.