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The deftone's "WHite Pony" album has awesome drum recording. Does anyone know how and what kind of mics they used? thanks for the help guys.

angel

Comments

anonymous Wed, 07/28/2004 - 20:30

Terry Date does such an amazing job on drum tracking... Here's his usual setup, but I'm on 80% sure that this is what he used.
snare top - Either sm57 or md421
snare bottom - sm57
toms - md421
overheads - akg C12's
hat - either sm57 or beyer m88
room - u67's
Kick - atm25

He works off of a really cool ssl 4000G console that has a very unique sound... and he obviously re-enforces his drum sounds with samples.

anonymous Sat, 07/31/2004 - 09:28

As this is one of my fav's I tried to learn as much as I could about the recording process.

I have heard..... but can't be positive, that the cymbals were overdubbed on this record.

There is some obvious drum replacement going on as well.

I have tried the cymbal overdubb thing alot in the last year or two and can say.

1. You better have a GREAT and very open minded drummer to work with. Getting the same "feel" recording this way is hard to do.

2. It take some practice for you and the drummer. You need to decide what you will use to replace the cymbals while trakking the drums. The drummer will need some sort of "silent cymbals" to play/hit.

I have found that while trakking the cymbals they mostly "play" thier knees.... so I take away the drum's and get a pad/pillow for the kick foot and the knee if they play on it.

3. It is alot of work and it takes time and practice.... but it can be done and when it all works it does give you that amazing "White Pony" separation and clarity.

If you got the time you should try it,

next time
jfg
http://www.jacklord.us

anonymous Sat, 07/31/2004 - 22:28

A lot of producers are doing this now. Recording snare, kick, toms first, then cymbals in a second take. I was talking to my pal Marc from High Holy Days and it seems that is how their producer is doing everything.

They can fix timing issues easier during mix down. If a kick or snare is off they can just adjust it without affecting the overheads. Decent idea.

I used it on one track I did for my album. Turned out alright. Easier editing timing issues let me tell you. Pro tools would be easier, but I don't use it, nor will I.

Randyman... Sun, 08/01/2004 - 14:11

Just a question - Are the engineers still recording the Overheads on the "Drums minus cymbals" pass for "room sound", or is all you hear the tight mics in this case? (with appropriate artificial ambience). I recall seeing pictures of Mick Fleetwood doing his stuff like this ages ago (one drum per pass).

For cymbals, would they just use the acoustic cymbals, or use samples (I don't see why they would use a Cymbal sample - yuck!). I guess the cymbals would then be recorded with the OH's and room mics on a seperate pass (overdub)?

I have been strying away from a tight gated/synthetic sound, but maybe I need to revisit these options.

One more quick one - how do you keep the snare ghost notes audible with a tight gate? I know the OH's will pick it up, but in minute proportions to the gated tight mic (which will also have extra processing the OH's won't have). Ghost notes are VERY important to my style, but I still rock a steady groove on top and in between...

Later :cool:

anonymous Sun, 08/01/2004 - 15:41

yep I use sort of a modified recorderman/glynn johns thing. I'll set up and mic the whole kit then just take the cymbals of the stands for the drum recording.

I normally use....

D-6 in kick
57 top snare
414 side snare... hardly ever use it though
2x U195 in recorderman setup for OH on drums and cymbals about a foot lower for drums than cymbals
Royer SF-24 up high and out front and center for room/cymbals

While I can see that editing is easier this way I really never do much of that.... thank god. For me the best thing is that it is sooo much easier to compress the drum tracks without the cymbals getting funky. I can really smash em if I feel like it :twisted:

next time
jfg
http://www.jacklord.us

KurtFoster Tue, 08/03/2004 - 21:20

Anyone with a sig line that says; hmmmmm...compressors and coffee... , is ok in my book. 8-)

Overdubbing cymbals is an old Nashville method of recording drums. I saw this being done at Grady O'Neil's Tiki Studio's in San Jose in the late 80's (where The Syndicate of Sound recorded "Hey Little Girl" in the 60's). I think it totally destroys the feel.

I draw out the cymbals from the toms between hits (size the tracks) and usually supplement the snare with a triggered tone from a drum module. That way I can compress them if I want and there is very little spill. I like to add a lot of top end to toms to get a strong attack and if I don't do this, I get a lot of nasties from the cymbals.

anonymous Tue, 08/03/2004 - 21:29

Rag wrote: I am just recording a band that gave me some deftones CDs as refrence for the vocals. Does anyone know how Chino gets his voice sounding like that? what effects processing does he use?

Thanks,
Rag

I don't know, he sounds like sh!t live!

But really though, it's probably just compressor, delay, reverb, and auto tune. Just like everyone else.

anonymous Mon, 08/09/2004 - 15:19

Overdubbed Cymbals

I was suprised to see this as a new trick -

When working on the remixes for Megadeth's So Far, So Good, So What? I found the drums were recorded this way - my thought was, "Man am I glad this didn't catch on!"

It did make editing easier, since you don't need to deal with ring-through on the drum tracks, but it messes with the feel big time, and with the ambient sound too. I would do it only if I had to - but it mght be a differant matter if precision was WAY more important than feel - but that's what drum machines are for.

Some other answers to questions I saw:

The room mike was on the kit - the cymbals were on 2 tracks only - not in the room mike at all.

The hat was recorded with the kit.

When I was in the studio with Chino he used a hand-held SM57 that was being squashed to bits with an 1178 - The FX preset was from a DSP-4000 - a Taj Mahal type of long-decay verb.

anonymous Tue, 08/10/2004 - 15:06

Grace notes through the gate

Oh yeah -

To get grace notes on the snare to open the gate you need to put a trigger on the snare drum and use that to trigger the gate - if you are recording, record the trigger signal and use it to trigger gate during mixdown.

Too bad all this nifty info is on the second page - bet no one ever even gets to read this.

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