song in the works (would love some suggestions)

[lolzgreg]

Try this, it may work it may not but regardless experimentation can lead to great (or miserable) results. Scratch the snare mic (oh gosh did I say that). I actually find that the room/overheads give me more of my snare than the close mic does a lot of the time. Use the 3:1 rule for the overheads, have them 3 times further apart than they are high from the highest cymbal (unless you have cymbals upside down on a rack blah blah blah, don't get me started aha). Place them above the kit, equidistant from the snare (take a string measure from OH Left to the snare and match that distance OH Right to the snare. Put a room mic about 4 feet infront of the kit (or to taste, move the mic/monitor with phones while someone is playing... see where the kit "opens up" in the room. Where it sounds powerful and full. I recommend keeping it perfectly perpendicular to the kick, as in that it is centered with the kick and only moves further away, not side to side. Put the kick mic INSIDE the drum, you can take off the front head, it doesnt do much. Put a pillow or two lightly touching the batter head of the kick. Put the mic inside close to the batter, off center (halfway between the beater hitting and the edge of the drum is a good point, then angle it toward the beater at around 30 degrees. Make sure its in the line of sight of the beater and not being obstructed by the pillow. Don't be afraid to tune your kit for an hour or two. Persistence (or luck) is the key to success.

Good luck my friend. If all else fails, ditch the room and put the snare mic back on. I'll walk you through compression and EQ when you're happy with your sound. The source is the most important thing. If the instrument/room sucks, your tone is gonna suck.

-Greg

[Jeff B]

great real piano sound !!! work some of that magic on the drum kit

[Powerpop451]

Thanks so much Greg, I will try that, It seems very scary to not have a snare close mic'd but I am willing to give this a shot. It just goes against a lot of what I have read and been told. Like you said though experimentation is sometimes what it takes. So yeah I will give that a shot when we track drums again which will be about a week from now due to upcoming shows we have. But once I do I will repost the song with bass and hopefully hopefully no more scratch tracks but the real mix in progress.

I would love your advice on EQ and compression when I get to that point.

Thanks for the offer and advice. I will let you know how it works or better yet you can hear for yourself.

Mark

[Powerpop451]

Originally Posted by Jeff B

great real piano sound !!! work some of that magic on the drum kit

Thanks a lot Jeff. I think recording piano is a bit easier than miking and recording drums, but hopefully one day soon I will be pretty good at that.

Glad you like the piano tone. It's amazing what a huge church room can do to a piano or any instrument for that matter.

Mark

[lolzgreg]

Originally Posted by Powerpop451

It's amazing what a huge church room can do to a piano or any instrument for that matter.Mark

Not to mention what happens to music performances in houses of praise =) I used to lead worship in a Pentecostal church and started off with 3 12 year olds who couldn't play a scale and a year later ended up with three astounding young musicians who helped open up services by inviting Christ in through worship.

-Greg

[foundexodus]

Try using the church room for drums if thats possible, it would really help give the drums some space.

[brandondrury]

On issue I am having is the snare mic is picking up way too much hi-hat so much so that I can't gate it out of the mix and So whenever I bring up the snare the hi-hat is right there with it which is a big issue.

I think the drums have a very pleasing old school vibe to them. The room these were recorded in appears to be pretty good. The snare mic is not there to get 100% snare and 0% hi-hat. It's there to highlight the snare by allowing you blend in a perspective that was "zoomed in" on the snare.

If your ears tell you that there is too much hi-hat in the snare mic, I'm curious why your ears aren't telling you that there is too much hi-hat/snare ratio in the overheads.

I didn't realize these were scratch tracks. These are EXCELLENT scratch tracks!

The kick is too upfront and theres not enough definition in the kick and hat-is it just OH mics and a kick in?

I'm not willing to make that judgement yet until I hear what the bass does. I normally like a lot of attack in my mixes (overall) but on a song like this I may want the more old school woofy type of sound.

Brandon

[BORNintoMUSIC]

First off. Bravo on the sound man. I love it.

The only thing my ears wants to hear more of is the kick really. Otherwise the sound fills in very nicely. Keep up the work and lemme know when your band comes to colorado =)