Question: How to get that "Slappy" tom sound

[shreddster]

What's up, guys?

Using superior drummer to do my demos and I'm having trouble with the toms. Just using the Avatar kit that comes with superior.

How would you compress and EQ the toms to get the supper prominent, "slappy" sound out of them?

Also, would you add FX to each of the toms separately in the superior UI or would you add the exact same FX to all of the toms on one bus in your DAW?

For an example of the sound I'm looking for, listen to "The Hell in Me" by Killswitch Engage (Sneap FTW)

Thanks in advance.

 

[Studdy]

No rules here. I would make sure you check the low end on the toms, you might be surprised how much low energy is there that is not needed. A starting point maybe; find the "attack" with a decent eq, chuck for "mud" and compress. Back off the attack time a touch to allow the initial "hit" through. I like the sound of toms in room mics as well. Perhaps allow more toms in the room mic a touch less snare and kick or automate. Good luck.

 

[colonel_claypoo]

I think it's also highly dependent on the skins the toms were recorded with. I think clear heads give more slap as far as I would define that term.
I have been struggeling with almost all tom samples to get the slap that I'm hearing in my head.

 

[Sloan]

Hit them hard and compress the shit out of the decay of the tom, leaving the attack, like you would a snare drum most of the time.

 

[Mago]

Get EZXMetalMachine (I think it's even on sale right now) and you'd be pretty much set for that sound I think.

Dunno if you'd get that kind of sound out of the avatar toms.

 

[cfh11]

+1

metalmachine is the shit

 

[Alphanumeric]

Metalmachine bubingas, take out low mid/mid-mids quite a bit, bell at 6K, compress like fuck on the side with some kinda of 1176 emu, add a little flux.

 

[amarshism]

Distortion.

 

[shreddster]

Hit them hard and compress the shit out of the decay of the tom, leaving the attack, like you would a snare drum most of the time.

Thanks for this. I was talking to a damn good engineer friend of mine and he told me to tune them low and hit them hard.

I didn't adjust the tuning of it in superior but I cranked the velocity of the entire MIDI track to 100%. That really brought my drums to life. The toms are very prominent now.

As a side note, do you all prefer mid scoops on your kick drums or do you boost the mids? If neither of those, what else do you do?

 

[tempe]

Distortion.

Damn straight, out of curiosity what distortion are you using? I'm running them through the input / output transformers of the compressor in my 6176 on 1/1 ratio or if I'm being lazy Decapitator.

 

[Mago]

^consider raping the shit out of VCC too...sometimes it works really nice, other times its pure dogshit.

 

[Unavailable]

Thanks for this. I was talking to a damn good engineer friend of mine

Hey brah

 

[amarshism]

Damn straight, out of curiosity what distortion are you using? I'm running them through the input / output transformers of the compressor in my 6176 on 1/1 ratio or if I'm being lazy Decapitator.

going into the converters hard through the chandlers and neves and also parallel compressing with the distressors in mix with lots of distortion. I set my preamp gain to max then step it down until the drum isnt just a total distorted mess, then back it down another notch and its usually just juicy enough on the harder hits

 

[amarshism]

ps i used to do that with my ua and noticed it adds alot of sub

 

[miguelrx10d]

I have found that the slapiness of the toms comes mainly from the room mics

 

[greyskull]

cut low mid, boost 5 k

 

[amarshism]

If you want more slap sample your toms through your overhead mics rather than the rooms and blend that back in. Instant slap.

 

[spencerlogan]

a lot of samples are pre-mixed, in which case you may be better off tailoring everything in your mix to fit around the drums.

 

[crillemannen]

What's up, guys?


For an example of the sound I'm looking for, listen to "The Hell in Me" by Killswitch Engage (Sneap FTW)
.

You call that sloppy? I feel they are very presence and snappy well well..


The best way for you to get that sound is to use Sneap Metalmachine and blend with some more samples to get a more unique sound. They really sound great!

 

[chdrummer]

You call that sloppy? I feel they are very presence and snappy well well..


The best way for you to get that sound is to use Sneap Metalmachine and blend with some more samples to get a more unique sound. They really sound great!

he said slappy lol