Mutt's Drums - here's a challenge for ya!

[Hysteria]

Hi Folks

As I've gained more experience at this home recording lark, I have an idea as to how I might approach most things (even if they don't necessarily turn out exactly as I'd like) but if there's one thing...my nemesis in fact, that alludes me is how to get a massive, weighty snare sound that works on all systems and co-exists with other instruments in a big-sounding production without sounding boxy.

Which brings me onto my question for anyone who knows...

Just how do you get the Mutt Lange snare/kick sound?

Let me cite a couple of examples for you: Def Leppard's Animal (or anything on Hysteria...I didn't chose that name for nothing ) or Nickelback's Something in your mouth (or anything on Dark Horse)

Now, I know how to do the massive snare with lots of verb, gated or otherwise but if you listen carefully to these sounds you'll hear that this isn't what Mutt's done. Yes, there is some verb but the drums sound relatively dry compared with the methods I know.

Some observations / attributes about (principally) the snare sound:

-I has a 'springiness' to it like a tom hit
-It doesn't sound boxy
-it sounds huge even with everything around it being huge
-it works on everything from ipods, to car systems, to monitors, to hifi speakers - sounding great on each one (in fact the whole 'Mutt' sound, has these attributes, imo)
-there isn't much difference to the kick sound in some of the tracks such as animal

What I know:

-from interviews with Mike Shipley (Mutt's long-time engineer), I know the Hysteria drum sound was created on using multiple samples (using a Fairlight back then). It was created this way because they left the drums to the end and found that normal drums sounded boxy in context with the rest of the tracks.

Whilst Mike, like many of these pros, come across like a great guy, like others (and I can understand why), he stops short of telling you what you really want to know...which seems to be par for the course on many of the other boards.

So, does anyone have an idea what the (a) recipe might be to get close to these snare and kick sounds?

Many thanks

Simon

[Steverino]

When I was a younger lad, I was infatuated with Mutts drums on Pyromania... so I wrote him a letter. He was nice enough to answer.

The Pyromania snare was Simmons SDS5 modules triggered by Drawmer gates... SDS5 snare for the white noise, SDS5 tom for the bottom... then as Mutt explained, various harmonizing (for that detuned sound) and stereo-fying.

I'm a big fan of Steven Slate Drums samples... Shipley uses em... and out of the box they are punchy as hell... yer best bet it to check out the users MP3's on the Slate forum... there's some dynamite stuff getting created.

[Hysteria]

Hey Steverino, many, many thanks for that insight.

The fact you have a letter answered by Mutt is incredible! Everyone says he never talks but perhaps back in the day things were different or perhaps he's more receptive to the personal touch rather than interviews.

It doesn't surprise me that there is a tom hit in that sound, but trying to marry one to a snare has frustrated me in the past as the tom has a tendency to sound boxy.

I think those pyromania drums were perfected on Hysteria, although having heard Dark Horse, he's stepped it up a notch again, especially given the amount of chunky guitar in the tracks. In fact I would wind up some metal friends of mine by suggesting then when those Nickelback tracks are in full swing, they show the new new Metallica album a thing or two...they love that of course

Funny you should mention Steven Slate drums...around the time the last AC/DC album came out and I was raving about the snare in that...it's just a normal snare afaik, nothing clever but it's meaty and sits in the tracks...I thought maybe that's the closest I could ever get (i.e. I'd never achieve the Mutt sound) so I started seeing if I could find something similar on his website but I couldn't find anything low and meaty enough. Now, I know you can take the pitch down, but having read an interview with the producer, it seems that wasn't done which led me to believe that perhaps these guys tune their snares low (I'm no drummer)...so I tried to find something based on a deep or low-tuned snare but couldn't quite find it.

Currently my tool of choice is Addictive Drums but, while very good, it's hard to get the Black Ice snare, let alone a Mutt Snare. Maybe I need to check out Steven Slate again.

Cheers

Simon

[Steverino]

You just reminded me I have to go find that letter... got it framed in storage somewhere.. lol

I"m pretty sure that Slate's samples are on Dark Horse... the "Gotta Be Somebody" snare is so PRESENT in the mix... there's a whole thread on this in the Slate forum...


Steverino

[brandondrury]

Whilst Mike, like many of these pros, come across like a great guy, like others (and I can understand why), he stops short of telling you what you really want to know...which seems to be par for the course on many of the other boards.

Don't get the wrong idea about this one. It's not a big conspiracy to keep the cat in the bag. The actual execution of this audio engineering craft is much more complicated than merely talking about it. In practice,a great painter just slaps paint onto a canvas then it comes out like the Mona Lisa or whatever. When I slap paint onto a canvas, it looks like shit. This execution is not something that can be explained in a forum post or even 1,000 forum posts.

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When I was a younger lad, I was infatuated with Mutts drums on Pyromania... so I wrote him a letter. He was nice enough to answer.

No shit! That' is BAD ASS!

It doesn't surprise me that there is a tom hit in that sound, but trying to marry one to a snare has frustrated me in the past as the tom has a tendency to sound boxy.

Not all toms are created equal. If I was to try this, I'd definitely go with samples over a close mic'd tom.

I'm a big fan of Steven Slate Drums samples

Agreed!

Currently my tool of choice is Addictive Drums but, while very good, it's hard to get the Black Ice snare, let alone a Mutt Snare. Maybe I need to check out Steven Slate again.

You won't find it in a single package. Just sending MIDI data to Steven Slate won't get you that new Nickelback song either. It just won't happen. I find that I'm still using parallel compression with the Steven Slate stuff for maximum doom in my drum tracks especially for mixes that need to be ultra loud.

The typical home recording community looks to mimic these Mutt Lange style results with just mic placement or a nice preamp. Those aren't the tools for these kinds of drums. That's were you start, but you must take it a step further using creativity.

1) This tom theory thing has be interested. You may be on to something. Maybe a tom is layered with the snare.

2) The kick drum is obviously a sample as it's tone doesn't appear to change from one hit to another.

3) I'm guessing there is a SPL Transient Designer increasing the sustain tremendously on both the kick and the snare and maybe the toms too.

4) Who knows what compression was utlized on this thing.

5) It's a fun exercise to attempt these sounds. However, my personal views are I don't give a damn about winning engineer of the year awards. In other words, grab 12 great rock records from now, 40 years ago, or everywhere in between. On many of them the drum sounds will be good, but nothing to quit your job and run off to India for. Because my goal is to record great music I tend to focus on that side. The sonics tend to take care of themselves when the music is great.

Brandon

[Hysteria]

Hey Brandon

Many thanks for your help and advise and let me take the opportunity to say thanks for doing all of this for us amateurs.

Perhaps my comment about the engineers not revealing all was a bit of a blanket statement. However, I have found, especially with the Mutt stuff, that say, Mike Shipley will say a lot but never quite go to that final stage even accepting that the detail might take pages. For example, I always thought there was a Tom sample in those sounds but I have read quite a few threads about it on other boards and Mike is very helpful but he's never said the sound was made from samples of an x, a y and z. I wouldn't expect the precise recipe but perhaps to confirm the ingredients list

There was another similar question I was trying to get answered and got the same kind of wall. On Leppard's Animal and coincidentally Nickelback's Photograph there is a vocal treatment in the verses that makes the lead vox sound, for want of a better word, raspy. Mike S said it was automated eq but when I pressed to get some feel of what sort of frequencies (etc) might be in play he declined to answer. No, I wasn't expecting it to work verbatim for me, but it would have been instructive and a starting point for me the amateur. Interestingly another posted sent me a private mail saying he had been trying to get this info for ages but always came up blank.

Still, perhaps a letter to Mutt would have been better

Re, your point 5, I'm not trying to recreate these sounds as an exercise. And I know from Shipley interviews that he gets lots of stick from other engineers for these 'unnatural' sounds, so perhaps he hasn't won engineer of the year either But to me these productions deliver sonic ecstasy to my ears (is that a bit over the top? )


For the stuff I (try to) do (80s influenced rock), I long for a drum sound that fits like these sounds, something that you can always hear, has body and balls but doesn't conflict with the other elements of a big track. I know Mutt believes strongly that all elements of a mix should 'have their place' and that guitars should stay out of the way of the bass, etc and you can hear it in his productions.

I've been listening to these sounds for years and they always seem a million miles away but I will persist

Thanks again

[great_saputra]

how to get amazing sound drum make me crazy........

[Steverino]

Thats exactly what Mutt said... he used the Simmons SDS5 "snare" for the white noise, and the SDS5 tom for the "boom" (bottom end) of the snare... combined the 2, and detuned the tom with a harmonizer so it would go from a higher pitch to a lower pitch, giving the snare bottom end that "falling" sound...

If I can find the letter I'll put a more concise response.

[Hysteria]

What do you mean, 'if I can find the letter'? It's there on your wall with a light above it

I wonder where one can find those samples these days...hmm, will have to investigate.

btw - did you know Pyromania is due to be remastered this year and released as a Deluxe Edition, rather like Hysteria a couple of years back?

I always thought the drums were rather overpowering in Pyromania and even did my own little remaster a while back (just using some multiband compression to even it out) and while it was no Bob Ludwig, it tamed the drums and brought the rest up. It was amazing the detail in some of those tracks (little sounds, layers, use of fx) that became more obvious.

Still, I'd much rather have the pro-remaster and unlike Hysteria which was superb already, I'm hoping it will be the Pyromania as I'd imagined it.

Actually, according to Mike Shipley, when they first sent it out for mastering back in 84 (or whenever) the first guy called Mutt and said it was 'unmasterable'. They'd just spent god knows how long on it and were burnt out and I think they'd worked over Christmas or something so to be told this did not make them happy bunnies to say the least! Fortunately, the next guy (Ludwig I think) did the business and all was well!

[brandondrury]

Actually, according to Mike Shipley, when they first sent it out for mastering back in 84 (or whenever) the first guy called Mutt and said it was 'unmasterable'. They'd just spent god knows how long on it and were burnt out and I think they'd worked over Christmas or something so to be told this did not make them happy bunnies to say the least! Fortunately, the next guy (Ludwig I think) did the business and all was well!

This sums up this whole engineering thing so well. The songs that define entire generations and still get heavy airplay on radios and in bars today were once considered "unmasterable".

That's the problem with this engineering shit. 99% of the guys are already done and have nothing new to contribute. When someone truly innovates, his work is considered "unmasterable". There is no way I want to be one of those 1%.

Thats exactly what Mutt said... he used the Simmons SDS5 "snare" for the white noise, and the SDS5 tom for the "boom" (bottom end) of the snare... combined the 2, and detuned the tom with a harmonizer so it would go from a higher pitch to a lower pitch, giving the snare bottom end that "falling" sound...

Well, I've never tried this one. I guess I'm gonna have to try this one today.

I wonder where one can find those samples these days...hmm, will have to investigate.

Maybe the specific samples are important. Maybe they aren't. While possible, I'd be surprised if the same samples were being used on Pyromania and the last Nickelback record. I think the iimportant part is the concept. If you really are in the emulating business that's one thing. However, as you probably already know, there are a zillion billion factors that come into play on every recording. Just doing 3...or even 300 things just like Mutt did ain't gonna get you even close. However, utilizing the concepts they employ can enhance the energy in your tunes in a similar way.

Brandon