I think you'll need to provide a little more info. For example, is that sample just the one overhead or a mix of two or more tracks? What exactly do you mean you "isolated every other part of the drum on different tracks to sound good"?

It's just one overhead mic. I think I used a SM57 or similar. I recorded this band when I was 18 (16 years ago) & limited knowledge of anything. I had 4 tracks to work with on a Tascam Portastudio. tracks recorded were 1)bass 2)guitar 3)kick 4)overhead.

By isolated I mean that the kick track (#3 mic) is fine. I compressed/gated & did some noise removal, etc. to get a good kick track.

Now.. Everything else is more or less on the overhead (#4 mic). I compressed/gated, etc to extract a good seperate snare track. Then I was able to do the same to extract the toms onto another track (tons of manual editing too). All I have left to do is make a decent cymbals track to try & restore (out of the same #4 mic track). I just need to figure out how to correct the wacked out phasing cymbals. If I can at least correct those cymbals, then I can start restoration on the track to build & duplicate & whatever else to mix in cymbals. I just really want to salvage & make this recording alive again.

Well, if there was just the overhead and not too much bleed into the kick mic then there are no real phase interactions in the original tracks. If you copy the track and eq some copies differently than others then you are causing the phase problem. If you also apply dynamics or editing then the phase interactions will vary, making them more obvious.

If I were you I'd ditch all the copied overhead tracks and experiment with eq and multi-band compression on the original single track.

Try using phase inverse, before anything else. In Pro Tools, and Digital Performer, it's found on the 'trim' pluggin.

Can he stick all his channels with the same effects chains? I mean, put in dummy EQ's and such just to compensate for latency?

Couple of points here. First, I don't think you are using the term to mean the same thing I would. The usual definition of phasing isssues involves recording a single source with two different mics. Since the source is usually different distances from the mics, the sound arrives at different times. The slight delay causes some frequencies to cancel, some to be enhanced. This is called "comb filtering." So (at least the way I (and I think most other people) use the term) you can't have phasing issues with one mic. There could be a phasing problem with the kick, but not the cymbals. Second, the basic problem is that 16 years ago your drummer could not afford good cymbals. My guess is that they were recorded pretty accurately. You can try the suggestions above, but I doubt they will do much.

I used to own the 144 and 244 portastudio and the cymbals always phased. The bleed and tape speed inconsistency was bad in those. They were very cool in the day though:) I think this is what you are hearing and why it sounds so phased.

Thanks for the suggestions. I understand what happened & that is was the result of poor mic placement,etc & it's not truly a 'phasing' issue that I can match up with another mic track & phase correct, etc. It's just the phasing sound of the cymbals that I'm trying to counter-balance somehow & get a relatively listenable cymbal hit. I've been experimenting with a multi-band phaser plugin from Meldaproduction. It's getting me further then anything so far.. but not that great. I'm basically toying with the phasing parameters in the 700-3khz band to see if i can use a phasing effect to counter the phasing sound from the cymbals. At least that's my thinking now. I normally wouldn't put this much effort into something seeming impossible, but I'm the kind of person that'll spend months on this just to figure out how it can be down. Plus, I have about 9 songs from this band & I've been really wanting to revive it for years & they all have this same issue.

BobRogers, post: 373313 wrote: Couple of points here. First, I don't think you are using the term to mean the same thing I would. The usual definition of phasing isssues involves recording a single source with two different mics. Since the source is usually different distances from the mics, the sound arrives at different times. The slight delay causes some frequencies to cancel, some to be enhanced. This is called "comb filtering." So (at least the way I (and I think most other people) use the term) you can't have phasing issues with one mic. There could be a phasing problem with the kick, but not the cymbals. Second, the basic problem is that 16 years ago your drummer could not afford good cymbals. My guess is that they were recorded pretty accurately. You can try the suggestions above, but I doubt they will do much.

I think you may be right about what is really causing the phase-y sound, but you can have actual phase problems with one mic if you duplicate the track, apply different eq to them and then mix them back together. The filters will alter the phase response of the different tracks causing comb filtering over a limited frequency range.