Here is a quick teaser from the drum session I had with Breathing Awaits. The band is really young (17-19) and play progressive modern metal, so I reserved 3 days to record the drums for 3-4 songs because I thought the drummer is going to be like your average drummer that is going to need some serious editing. But something unexpected happened. We used 1 day to setup the kit and mics (that is what it usually always takes for me when we are not in a hurry), but then the next day we finished tracking all the tracks in like 6 hours, including the lunch break :zombie: I mean, when I heard he was 17, I was like 
but when I heard him play, I was like He has played the drums for 11 years and I think if he gets some really kick-ass band under him, you're all going to know him one day.
We first used like 3 hours to setup the kit, put new heads on the snare and toms (he had like 4 day old skin on the kick so we went with that) and tune the kit. After that we tried out like various different mikings for the drums, for example we tried out 5 mics for kick (D112, B52, D6, SM7b, e901 and I think a subkick too) and like 7 different mics for the hihat and 4 for snare, 3 for toms, ride and china, tried out different angles like 0 vs 45 vs 90 etc, we had 4 people in the room and then we voted on which one we always liked the best, me and the drummer had the veto vote and in the end we ended up with this channel list:
01 kick in (Sennheiser e901, at the bottom of the kick drum)
02 kick out (Audix D6, at the hole)
03 snare top (Shure SM57, ~20° angle, 2" height)
04 snare btm (Shure SM81, 90° angle, 3" depth)
05-08 toms (Sennheiser MD421, 45° angle, 3" height)
09 hihat (AKG C451, over the hihat, almost 90° angle pointing slightly toward the drummer, 3" height)
10 ride (AKG C451, under the ride pointing at the bell, 45° angle, 5" depth)
11 china (Rode NT5, over the china, 45° angle, 5" height)
12-13 overheads (AKG C414, cardioid, ~2m high, pointing down, spread far and at about over ride and hihat)
14-15 room mics (Karma Silver Bullet, omni mics, ~3m away from the kit, pointing at the two opposite corners of the room)
16 Ambience (Shure B52, this is pretty rad, positioned in the room at the point with the biggest bass build up, pointing away from the corner)
17-22 triggers (ddrum trigger on kick snare and toms)
The cymbals he used were less than stellar, but the fact the he was amazingly good and tight drummer for his age with an awesome touch made up for it. I only edited him so that I comped the takes into a master take and honestly think the performances are tight enough that I most likely won't even slip edit them. And how often does this happens? Well... RARELY.
But anyway, this is the sound that is coming straight from mics to preamp. No eq, no compressor, no sample replacement, no other processing when tracking and no editing. Only post-processing is:
- setting levels and panning
- a limiter on the master bus
- clipper on kick + snare to get the balance and loudness right
- the triggers are not in the mix tho, in case you were wondering
Also do note that the guitar and vocal tracks in the clip are just one take guides for the drummer, they sound like shit. Preamps were nothing special, just the 16 channels that are in Command 24 (I think they are some cheap Focusrite ones?) and then Focusrite octopre for the mono room ambiance + triggers.
Questions or comments?
but when I heard him play, I was like He has played the drums for 11 years and I think if he gets some really kick-ass band under him, you're all going to know him one day. We first used like 3 hours to setup the kit, put new heads on the snare and toms (he had like 4 day old skin on the kick so we went with that) and tune the kit. After that we tried out like various different mikings for the drums, for example we tried out 5 mics for kick (D112, B52, D6, SM7b, e901 and I think a subkick too) and like 7 different mics for the hihat and 4 for snare, 3 for toms, ride and china, tried out different angles like 0 vs 45 vs 90 etc, we had 4 people in the room and then we voted on which one we always liked the best, me and the drummer had the veto vote and in the end we ended up with this channel list:
01 kick in (Sennheiser e901, at the bottom of the kick drum)
02 kick out (Audix D6, at the hole)
03 snare top (Shure SM57, ~20° angle, 2" height)
04 snare btm (Shure SM81, 90° angle, 3" depth)
05-08 toms (Sennheiser MD421, 45° angle, 3" height)
09 hihat (AKG C451, over the hihat, almost 90° angle pointing slightly toward the drummer, 3" height)
10 ride (AKG C451, under the ride pointing at the bell, 45° angle, 5" depth)
11 china (Rode NT5, over the china, 45° angle, 5" height)
12-13 overheads (AKG C414, cardioid, ~2m high, pointing down, spread far and at about over ride and hihat)
14-15 room mics (Karma Silver Bullet, omni mics, ~3m away from the kit, pointing at the two opposite corners of the room)
16 Ambience (Shure B52, this is pretty rad, positioned in the room at the point with the biggest bass build up, pointing away from the corner)
17-22 triggers (ddrum trigger on kick snare and toms)
The cymbals he used were less than stellar, but the fact the he was amazingly good and tight drummer for his age with an awesome touch made up for it. I only edited him so that I comped the takes into a master take and honestly think the performances are tight enough that I most likely won't even slip edit them. And how often does this happens? Well... RARELY.
But anyway, this is the sound that is coming straight from mics to preamp. No eq, no compressor, no sample replacement, no other processing when tracking and no editing. Only post-processing is:
- setting levels and panning
- a limiter on the master bus
- clipper on kick + snare to get the balance and loudness right
- the triggers are not in the mix tho, in case you were wondering
Also do note that the guitar and vocal tracks in the clip are just one take guides for the drummer, they sound like shit. Preamps were nothing special, just the 16 channels that are in Command 24 (I think they are some cheap Focusrite ones?) and then Focusrite octopre for the mono room ambiance + triggers.
Questions or comments?
