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anonymous 5 March 2008

Secrets of the newbies,

Hey guys, my name is JoshUA Hamilton and I own and operate a recording studio in Middletown, Ohio called JoshUA Recording Studios. You can check out some demos of my work at http://myspace.com/joshuarecordingstudios .

I am writing this article to maybe help some of you out there with questions you may have about pro recording and how the crap they get such awesome sounds and why your stuff doesn’t sound as good.

Just a little about me, I didn’t go to school for engineering, but I did learn from some of the greats which I think may count for something a little more than a piece of paper. I have been in the recording industry for the past 11 years asking my self the same questions everyone else does when they begin recording bands and such.

This will be part 1 of a 6 part tutorial on how I approach recording.

1. CLICK TRACK
First things first, you need to record to a click track! If you do not record to a click then you are setting your self up for disaster down the road if not immediately. I usually start by having the guitar player play the song and use tap tempo to figure out the tempo of the song, input that in to your tempo track and have the band follow along with it to make sure it feels right to everyone, including the producer if he’s there. In some cases you may have a tempo change at one point in the song, you’ll need to edit that in the tempo track at the exact point in measure where the tempo change takes place, just because there is a tempo change doesn’t mean you don’t have to use a click.
2. GUITAR SCRATCH TRACKS
Once you have the tempo mapped out with correct tempo’s and tempo changes you’ll need to record guitar to the click track. I usually double the guitar scratch tracks to get extra volume in the head phones for the drummer and because it just sounds better, you’ll be hearing these scratch tracks for a while so you might as well make them sound decent! Usually you’ll come across something that isn’t right if you made tempo changes in your tempo track, fix that and then proceed with the guitar scratch tracks. Once you have the guitar scratch tracks recorded and double up panned left and right sounding pretty, you’ll want the band to take one more final listen to the entire song to make sure it sounds the way they intended. Here you are looking for a thumbs up from everyone EVERYONE in the group!
3. DRUM TRACKING
You need to have the drummer set up in a different room than where your main mix speakers are (the control room) so that you can hear what’s coming out of the speakers and not what’s coming from the drums. Once the drummer is set up and ready to go you can start placing your mics or triggers to begin tracking. If you are using microphones make sure and mic the drums in way that mostly only that drum will be heard when its hit and if you are using triggers just make sure you have at least one overhead set up so that you can hear all of the cymbals. NOTE: you need at least one overhead to hear the cymbals, you’ll see why in a bit. After you get the mics or triggers placed have the drummer play the kit and make sure nothing is in his way, for your sake and his, last thing you want is some guy you don’t even know to be banging up your microphones. Here you are looking for a thumbs up from him and once you get it, you need to do a level check. The level check is pretty important for your later editing. You need to have each drum wave look like a spike, but not clipping. This would look like a vertical line from top to bottom, it doesn’t have to be a really thin line but for the most part an up and down line. Once you have all of the levels have the drummer play the whole kit and then readjust all of your levels accordingly, because usually in level checking the drummer won't strike the drums as hard as when he’s actually playing, so you need to make sure and get proper levels no matter how hard he hits the drums and make sure that it never clips.

Now you need to play the click and guitar scratch tracks through the headphones for the drummer to make sure he’s got a good mix and that he can hear it while he plays. You are once again looking for a thumbs up; don’t move forward unless he can hear what he needs to. Also, you need to hear what is happening in the recording so make sure you can hear a decent mix of the drummer playing along to the scratch and click. A talk back mic is crucial because the drummer is going to need your suggestion or command on punch INS.

From here, you just need to have the drummer play for the most part to the click track. This can be achieved by punching in section by section. It’s not necessary for your drummer to play the song from beginning to end, most of them cant. An example would be to play only the intro of the song, listen to it back and make sure its close to the click and its what the drummer intended to play. Through and through you want to get a thumbs up from everyone in the band and mostly the drummer that the parts are recorded correctly. Proceed with the same steps until you have recorded the entire song. At this point you will need to cross fade your punch ins so you don’t get cuts in the sounds and so that the song plays like a song, not a section. Once you have that done, have the drummer listen back to the entire performance and make sure he’s happy with it. And whala drum tracking is done.

4. DRUM EDITING
This part of the process can be the most time consuming and the most important part of the recording. Have you ever asked the question, why is every song I hear on the radio flawless in timing? Surely not every single drummer in a signed band is perfect at timing, right? Well, the answer is no, they aren’t perfect at all. Granted most of them are great at timing, but none of them are perfect!

So what we need here is perfect timing on the drums! There are several ways to achieve this, but I have been using different methods for years and I will reveal the method I use right now! Things you will need in order to do this, a recording program that has a drum editor used for midi notation. (I use cubase, but nuendo, Pro Tools, logic and others will work) You need a registered copy of drumagog 4.0 platinum preferably with some nice sounding gog files (I use the Andy Sneap gog files) and you will also need toon tracks ez drummer or superior drummer. Don’t worry at the end of this tutorial I will list links where you can purchase everything you need.

First things first, you need to open drumagog on all of your drum channels as a vst insert. The trick here is that you don’t want double triggers or false triggers to occur. You want the track to play back as intended, once you have that then move on to the next step.

Second you will need to turn on the midi out function on the drumagog, you can find this feature under the advanced tab. Set the midi notes to different notes, an examples would setting you kick to c3 and your snare to c3#. You want your drums to play different notes.

Third, you need to create a midi track for every drum track you have. Assign the the drumagog to each midi track so that you get the kick on midi track 1, the snare on midi track 2 and so on.

Fourth, record a segment of the song to the newly added midi tracks to make sure you are getting a midi note recorded for every drum hit on every midi track you created. Once you got that, record the entire song to the midi tracks.

After you have recorded all of your drum tracks to the midi tracks you can now delete the original audio drum tracks, or you can keep them if this scares you, but I trash them as soon as I have the midi on my new tracks.

At this point you will need to open ez drummer or superior drummer to hear the play back of your midi tracks as drums. Go to your midi tracks and select the output to go to ez drummer or superior drummer. You might need to create your own drum map to better suit your needs for drum placement and editing.

If you are lost at this point and you cant get it to work, go back through the steps until you get it right, a suggestion might be to create a copy of the entire project and use the copy to figure this out on, that way you don’t loose anything important.

Once you have your drums playing back on ez drummer, you’ll need to edit them to perfect timing. Note: your overhead mics should be turned off at this point! This part requires a little bit of timing theory, you must know what 4/4 is and 3/4 is, also 8th notes, 16th notes, 32nd notes and so on. Open the drum editor for the midi tracks that are playing your drums. Here you can see a grid to tell if the drum hits are on time and off time. You’ll need to quantize the drum hits accordingly to the timing quantize grid. An example would be if you have a kick snare back and fourth on a 4/4 beat at 120 beats per minute, you’d be able to use 8th notes quantizing to move the note to the grid where it should have been in the first place. If you are in doubt what so ever about where a drum should be on the grid, have the drummer help you, he probably knows a thing or to about timing and will be able to assist you.

Once you have all of the drums edited and they sound perfectly on time there are other functions that midi will allow you to do that audio tracks wont. Typically on a snare track you’d use compression,a noise gate, and a limiter to achieve optimal striking of the drum. In a midi track all you have to do is select the fixed velocity feature and bam your snare hits the exact same level every time. You may not want it to hit the exact same on a snare roll for example, so get out your pencil and draw in the velocity curve so that it plays back the way it was played or intended to be played.

Once you can set back and listen to the drums and not hear anything that sounds off or out of time or dynamically wrong like volume builds, you can move on to the cymbals.

At this point your overheads are so out of whack, it sounds like noise if you play back your perfectly edited drums along with the original overheads, right? So what you need to do is, bring up the overhead track by its self along with drum editor and start placing your cymbals in the midi editor. That’s right; you’re using sampling for cymbals also. This is the part where the drummer doesn’t mind at all to set there and tell you what they like and don’t like as far as hitting cymbals go. Once you have all your cymbals placed where they need to be, you don’t need your over head audio track anymore, so you can trash it or leave it, it’s up to you, but I would defiantly mute it, lol.

So, now you have perfectly timed drums that sound great and is exactly what the drummer wanted, if not go back and fix it. You should be able to set back and listen to the start of a great song at this point and not hear anything that is out of whack, your guitar scratch tracks might sound a little off at points, but remember those are getting scratched and the drums are there to stay.

Links:
Cubase 4
here

Drumagog
http://www.drumagog.com/

Ez Drummer
http://www.toontrack.com/ezdrummer.asp

Superior Drummer
http://www.toontrack.com/s20.asp
I hope you guys got some questions answered out of this tutorial. Please feel free to ask me any questions you may have along the way. You are now one step closer to recording like a PRO!

Sincerely,
JoshUA Hamilton
http://myspace.com/joshuarecordingstudios

Topic Tags

Comments

anonymous Fri, 03/07/2008 - 10:45

Actually

Where I work none of this happens. If we are going to use samples we use a VDrum kit. Why would you want to go to all of the trouble to mic a kit up. Why would you even make drum scratch tracks? If we mic a drum kit up, we have a studio set up for that (with a kit already mic'd up and ready to go) but if the client insists on using their own, then we get into the replacing sounds. We only do that if one of the drums sounds bad and cannot be fixed in a timely fashion.

But at hte studio we work at production is so constant that maybe we had to do it that way because of time.

But usually, if we set out to record the drums then we do a take and try to get it tracked nice and loud before any of that other stuff is even thought about. That just puzzles me why you would record a scratch track for drums when you could do the exact same with some software after the band is gone home.

But hey what do I know, I just run the duplication department...lol
I'm not trying to flame By the way, I am just...well wondering..
Jesse
8)

BrianaW Fri, 03/07/2008 - 10:52

tobacco_slammers wrote:
I feel it's my duty to let the cat out of the bag and share this info:

OMG! This is amazing!!!!!!! I watched them all and I NEED more!!! This is gold.

So let's see if I learned anything:

1. Use 58's for everything except vocals
2. Make sure you have at least 1 piece of Behringer gear in your setup (preferably converters).
3. Buy the most expensive headphones at Guitar Vendor... er, uh Center.
4. Buy two boom stands cause you never know when you may need more than one!
5. Buy a warehouse, get drunk, and record your CD that sounds like Manowar.

I'm just guessing on the Manowar thing... but it seems that there's gotta be at least a 50% chance right? :)

Thanks so much tobacco!!! You have definitely brightened my day! :)

anonymous Fri, 03/07/2008 - 11:27

BrianaW wrote: [quote=tobacco_slammers]
I feel it's my duty to let the cat out of the bag and share this info:

OMG! This is amazing!!!!!!! I watched them all and I NEED more!!! This is gold.

So let's see if I learned anything:

1. Use 58's for everything except vocals
2. Make sure you have at least 1 piece of Behringer gear in your setup (preferably converters).
3. Buy the most expensive headphones at Guitar Vendor... er, uh Center.
4. Buy two boom stands cause you never know when you may need more than one!
5. Buy a warehouse, get drunk, and record your CD that sounds like Manowar.

I'm just guessing on the Manowar thing... but it seems that there's gotta be at least a 50% chance right? :)

Thanks so much tobacco!!! You have definitely brightened my day! :)

The one that completely floored me was the one titled "Using Pro Tools Recording Sofware in a Home Recording Studio".

Now...

From the title you would assume that he is going to give you the low down on using Pro Tools? Wrong! He rips it to threads! :) lol

He goes on about Pro Tools LE "For a computer thing" which sounds "pretty digital sounding" having "no warmth" and here's the absolute belter, "flat as a plancake"! :cry: :lol: lol lol lol

Sorry if this is interupting the original post but I find these videos far better as a learning curve.

Maybe Joshua could invite Tad Donley over to his studio and they could collaborate and make the ultimate Pro Recording Manual. I would pay to see that.

Matt Damon comes to mind...

Davedog Fri, 03/07/2008 - 16:16

bent wrote: PSW's Thread:

http://recforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/mv/msg/22143/0/0/0/

Thanx for this Ben..........It seems that they didnt roast him too badly.

My guess is Joshua has ZERO idea what they usually do to unrepentant egoists on that site.

Son, you got off easy.

We have not been so nice here, but I wonder if the stark similarities of the opinions expressed here as compared to the opinions expressed there have any meaning to you at all?

I dont think you read whats being said.

Jeremy, lets leave this up for a few more hours.....it seems to have run its course....and NO ONE wants to hear parts 2 thru 6........

Then lets lock it. Its yer forum but I'll do if you cant get to it.

An apology for the name calling is at hand young Joshua. You have a little while to do so. After that I suggest that if you want to be a part of THIS community, you spend much time listening and learning. While we dont have the amount of upper-end engineers and producers here that reside at PSW, we still have very talented and knowledgeable folks willing to share what they know.

Its up to you.

anonymous Fri, 03/07/2008 - 19:43

Fun thread! Jeremy beat me to it, but I was also going to ask why not just use V-Drums? That's what I use! (Then again, I'm just a rinky-dink home recording guy.) What I like about them is that it's easy to get a sort of OK sound with very little fuss. What I don't like about them is pretty much everything else. I've been drumming for about 20 years, and I cringe every time I sit down at my kit.

Why use them then? Live playing. Yep, I like 'em for that -- Easy to set up and tear down, and a decent-ish sound. As I get older, I also appreciate the band not having to be so loud to compensate for the volume of the drums at smaller venues.

Oh, did I mention that I play in an 80's cover band? (Don't laugh!) Yeah, electronic drums kinda work there, too.

Good gosh, please don't let mine be the last post. :lol: [Scurries off to practice recording ... AND PLAYING! ... real drums.]

bent Fri, 03/07/2008 - 20:07

Vander, excellent point.

I was hoping one of you cats would post something like this, keeps me from having to do so.

I mixed a country / pop cover band for a few years, their drummer had a VDrum kit (one of those with the mesh heads); Of course the samples sound like samples, but the ease of use on stage can't be beat - especially when everyone's wearing in-ears.

Were he to record in my studio, however, he would be playing on the in-house kit.

Thanks!

8-)

MadMax Fri, 03/07/2008 - 21:59

I'll chime in with one last thought...

I think much of the commenting about Joshua was far milder here and at PSW than it would have been even a couple of years ago.

I cannot imagine the field day had the old Shit Brigade been around, or if this post had shown up in the old Rec Pit, R.A.P. or even in The Womb.

Joshua... consider yourself one lucky young man...

If you care to engage in the discussion of recording and techniques... chime in, please. Just be cognizant that there will be differing opinions.

anonymous Fri, 03/07/2008 - 22:41

So, is it possible for Joshua Recording Studios to redeem its self after this post?

I know quantizing has been around for years, but toontracks has not! Never until superior 2.0 was release was you able to trigger drums (acoustic drums) and have them sound realistic. The only difference in sound is that it’s on time, which is the whole reason I use this method. I am perfectly capable of recording a drum set with only microphones and getting great drum sounds, the problem is a drummer that can play perfectly in time. Granted, you could do take after take for 10 hours straight on 1 song, but its much easier and time efficient to quantize, in the end everyone is happy. Mike portnoy wasn't happen with the sound of his drums on images and words, not the timing! The only problem Mike Portnoy had with sampling is that he didn't like the samples that particular producer was using. I do suppose, quantizing drum hits isn't for every style of music, jazz for instance probably wouldn't be the best time to start moving things around, besides, jazz drummers are phenomenal most of the time and they play on time better than a click track could, lol!

Also, when I started this method of tracking drums, I wasn't the best at quantizing and making the drums sound good with the samples that I had. I can see why you might be turned off by this method in the beginning but you if you keep persistent at it you will get better at it just like anything else.

If you are against drum replacement and you claim to be a 100% realist in the aspects of recording, then I am assuming you mix down your masters to tape as well. Because got forbid everything gets quantized in to 1's and 0's, hahaha!

Anyways, take it or leave it, how many more times do you guys want me to say it?

This method isn't for everyone, so if you want, you can use it, if not that’s fine to!

NO MORE NEGATIVE RESPONSES PLEASE, BY LEAVING A NEGATIVE RESPONSE YOUR ARE JUST SHOWING HOW GOOD YOU CAN MAKE A BIG DEAL OUT OF NOTHING!

Oh yeah, I suppose you guys don’t like Simon Cowell? Give me your thoughts on that one! He is a pro at giving his opinion and pissing people off, but he’s right most of the time I would have to say! He spits the truth, I like that! But don’t mistake truth for opinion.

Late

anonymous Sat, 03/08/2008 - 06:05

Davedog wrote: Thanx for this Ben..........It seems that they didnt roast him too badly.

It would appear they did:

http://recforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/t/22149/0/

Joshua: Why post the Toontrack link?

This has nothing to do with your original post. You said you replaced and edited acoustic drums after recording them, this does away with them! Maybe you should have watched the video prior to setting up your studio. Could have saved you some cash.

Anyone who has heard of Simon Cowell will know he knows his stuff, doesn't matter if they like him or not.

Are you seriously referring yourself to him? lol, good one!

I think it's time you took it like a man and admit you went the wrong way about things when you joined here. Maybe then you will salvage what's left of your rapidly decreasing popularity.

I don't care if you want to go on and on about how we are all wrong. It won't do anything to my business rep as I don't have one! You however should consider the fact that you do and you should have nipped this in the bud LONG ago!

Although, I'm easily amused and could do with more of a laugh if you wish to continue...

Cucco Sat, 03/08/2008 - 07:01

joshuarecordingstudios wrote: So, is it possible for Joshua Recording Studios to redeem its self after this post?

Yes.

Joshua wrote:
I know quantizing has been around for years, but toontracks has not! Never until superior 2.0 was release was you able to trigger drums (acoustic drums) and have them sound realistic.

See, now it appears as though you're happy about your software. This isn't a bad thing. Just realize that not everyone will share your enthusiasm - engineers, drummers, and (maybe some) producers may actually prefer the organic nature of real drums. And yes, even Superior 2.0 sounds like fake drums.

Joshua wrote:
The only difference in sound is that it’s on time, which is the whole reason I use this method.

You seem hell-bent on this "on-time" stuff. First, what drummers are you recording that can't get close enough to the click that they NEED to be quantized?

Second, replacing a drummer because he can't stay on time is exactly like replacing Ron Jeremy because he gets soft early. Ron wouldn't be happy about that, neither should your drummer. (Maybe we should all consider wearing WWRD bracelets from now on?)

Joshua wrote:
I am perfectly capable of recording a drum set with only microphones and getting great drum sounds, the problem is a drummer that can play perfectly in time. Granted, you could do take after take for 10 hours straight on 1 song, but its much easier and time efficient to quantize, in the end everyone is happy.

Who the hell is mangling your drum kit that it takes you 10 hours to fix the timing?


(I edited this because I made an unfair attack against an entire group of people - besides, even mentally handicapped individuals could play drums correctly enough to not need editing for 10 hours...)

Joshua wrote:
Mike portnoy wasn't happen with the sound of his drums on images and words, not the timing! The only problem Mike Portnoy had with sampling is that he didn't like the samples that particular producer was using.

Just think, if they had just recorded the drums that Mike was playing, he would have liked the sound in the first place.

Joshua wrote:
Also, when I started this method of tracking drums, I wasn't the best at quantizing and making the drums sound good with the samples that I had. I can see why you might be turned off by this method in the beginning but you if you keep persistent at it you will get better at it just like anything else.

Dude, I've been playing with MIDI and quantization for 23 years now. Drums are easy to quantize.

Joshua wrote:
If you are against drum replacement and you claim to be a 100% realist in the aspects of recording, then I am assuming you mix down your masters to tape as well. Because got forbid everything gets quantized in to 1's and 0's, hahaha!

Nope, I stay digital here. Also, bear in mind, quantization to 1's and 0's in the digital realm have nothing to do with quantization of sounds within the X time domain. It has to do with quantization of amplitude in the Y envelope. 24 bits represented by 1's and 0's represented every sample.

Joshua wrote:
Anyways, take it or leave it, how many more times do you guys want me to say it?

We don't want you to say it anymore.

Joshua wrote:
This method isn't for everyone, so if you want, you can use it, if not that’s fine to!

Fine.

Where this would have been appropriate then, would have been on someone's post on this forum about how to record drums using samples. There's at least 200.

Joshua wrote:
NO MORE NEGATIVE RESPONSES PLEASE, BY LEAVING A NEGATIVE RESPONSE YOUR ARE JUST SHOWING HOW GOOD YOU CAN MAKE A BIG DEAL OUT OF NOTHING!

Oh, heck yeah. I can make a HUGE deal out of nothing.

Joshua wrote:
Oh yeah, I suppose you guys don’t like Simon Cowell? Give me your thoughts on that one! He is a pro at giving his opinion and pissing people off, but he’s right most of the time I would have to say! He spits the truth, I like that! But don’t mistake truth for opinion.

First - are you equating yourself to Simon Cowell?

Second - Simon is a Blow hard. His whole purpose on the show is to bring the conflict to the show that Fox requires. What he spews may be true in many cases, it's venomous. In other cases, he completely glosses over piss-poor performances with horrible intonation issues. He has a role to play and he does it well.

How about looking at it from this standpoint -
You're the contestent here on RO and Dave, Bent and Me are Simon. (I'd say Remy too, but she's got more of an angry black man trapped inside of her than a cheeky brit. Perhaps she's a rabid Randy...certainly not a Paula.)[/img]

MadMax Sat, 03/08/2008 - 07:31

joshuarecordingstudios wrote: So, is it possible for Joshua Recording Studios to redeem its self after this post?

Let me consult the "magic 8 ball"... "The answer is unclear. Try again later."

I know quantizing has been around for years, but toontracks has not! [blah, blah, blah, blah, blah]

Anyways, take it or leave it, how many more times do you guys want me to say it?

That's not the point kid. The point is that "WE" don't really want you to say anything other than "I guess I should have not posted this in the way I did." and leave it at that. But your following statement kinda' proves that you just don't seem to get it that you are fanning your own flames in typical toll-esque style.

NO MORE NEGATIVE RESPONSES PLEASE, BY LEAVING A NEGATIVE RESPONSE YOUR ARE JUST SHOWING HOW GOOD YOU CAN MAKE A BIG DEAL OUT OF NOTHING!

WRONG! By you failing to actually listen to the community which is telling you to politely shut up and listen, you keep bringing more and more negativity upon yourself. It's not the other way around.

For those of us who do not subscribe to your methodology, it IS a big deal when you fail to recognize that we too are entitled to our own opinions. Oh, you say you recognize that we're entitled, then you attempt to excoriate us for disagreeing with you and are obvious in your failure to actually listen to reason.

Late

As in too late?? Probably

BobRogers Sat, 03/08/2008 - 07:48

joshuarecordingstudios wrote: So, is it possible for Joshua Recording Studios to redeem its self after this post?....

Oh yeah, I suppose you guys don’t like Simon Cowell? Give me your thoughts on that one! He is a pro at giving his opinion and pissing people off, but he’s right most of the time I would have to say! He spits the truth, I like that! But don’t mistake truth for opinion....

The answer to the first question is "No" if you continue to make delusional, self aggrandizing statements like the second statement. I'm afraid that you are the one who needs to learn the difference between the truth and an opinion. You also need to learn the difference between an opinion that is grounded in extensive experience and the opinion of a novice. You need to learn the difference humility and arrogance. You need to learn the difference between honest salesmanship and unsubstantiated hyperbole.

Just to repeat what has been said before but you can't seem to get through your head: Many of the people here have a substantive disagreement with you on the subject of quantization and sound substitution. But that's a good thing. We like substantive exchanges. The reasons people are getting on your case so strongly are:
1. You started out giving a very unsubtle sales pitch for your business.
2. You represented yourself as having secrets and inside information - and far more experience than you actually possess.
3. You implied that your methods were superior to others (the truth rather than opinion).
4. You insulted the character and motives of those who disagreed with you.

Go back and read your posts. You just can't seem to resist bragging and taunting. You still have not been able to gauge your audience. Until you have fixed these problems, I'd give up any thought of trying to write articles. You just aren't any good at it. (An opinion from a professional author.)

anonymous Sat, 03/08/2008 - 08:50

If you haven't at least tried
my method with ALL of the software that I USE, then you have no right to say I dont know what I am talking about! Not only do you need to try before saying I'm clueless, you need to get good at not only quantizing ( which yes is easy) you need to get good at making your drums sound realistic. They sound like fake drums, well I guess you didn't watch the link, they are in fact real drums recorded with multisamples meaning every sound you need is in the software, you just have to find it.

I will continue to defend my method because I use it, you dont have to use it if you dont want.

As a matter of fact, I am heading to the studio right now to record a band that comes to me for this reason.

late

bent Sat, 03/08/2008 - 09:08

You're the contestent here on RO and Dave, Bent and Me are Simon.

This Simon sez: No golden ticket for you!

Time for me to repeat myself, from page two I think:
The main problem I have with your original post is that a majority of us have been there and done that, it's no big deal, no secret.
Most people here know what drum replacement is, and quantization. Hell - alot of us know what dither is and use it purposely, not just because it seems like it's the right thing to do. How did you word it on the Mastering thread? Let's see...
A-ha, about dither you said:

This is so you dont loose your sound quality from 24 bit or something like that, haha, I just use it cause I know your supposed to.

I've been shakin' my head at this one for hours now. :roll:

You appear to have a fairly lucrative business going on; A number of bands seem to trust you and your abilities... Kudos to you.

However, if you keep it up on these and PSW's pages, you're going to find your fan base begin to dwindle - then in short notice we'll all be on Ebay making comments about how much you're tryin' to auction that POS Bluetube preamp for.

Cucco Sat, 03/08/2008 - 11:44

joshuarecordingstudios wrote: they are in fact real drums recorded with multisamples meaning every sound you need is in the software, you just have to find it.

No...I watched the link. And besides the talking head doing a LOT of name dropping and the drum set with a snare that sounded like ass, all I heard was more talk about samples.

Samples, by their very nature, are samples of REAL live instruments.

This doesn't make them quality at all.

There are SO MANY VARIABLES to real instruments that samples simply cannot achieve. One of the biggest problems is true decay of cymbals. When hit properly and left to decay, a thin crash or large ride can ring for a very long time. The samples in these librarys have quite finite cut offs making them almost instantly identifiable.

Basically, what's lost is the key ingredient to a good drum kit - the wholistic presentation of a single instrument made up as a sum of many different components. Instead, you get a "great sounding" tom or two, some interesting flavors of snare, a killer kick and some acceptable quality cymbals. Put it all together though, and you're still dealing with all of the parts, not the sum thereof.

No sample library ever can recreate this and it is for THIS reason alone that these kits are useless in my opinion.

bent Sat, 03/08/2008 - 12:51

(Edit - Oh, now it's a monkey with a gun? OK!)

JP,eh?
Let's compare and contrast a few of these nuggets of wisdom, shall we?

NO MORE NEGATIVE RESPONSES PLEASE, BY LEAVING A NEGATIVE RESPONSE YOUR ARE JUST SHOWING HOW GOOD YOU CAN MAKE A BIG DEAL OUT OF NOTHING!

I CREATED THIS TOPIC YOUR IN RIGHT NOW AND ITS THE ONLY ONE I POST IN. NOW GET THE HELL OUT OF *MY* TOPIC.

THIS IS MY TOPIC! So get out unless you have something to contribute!

I will continue to defend my method because I use it, you dont have to use it if you dont want.

I've said all along my compression/limiting method produces a decent result for me but they're trying to convince me its wrong! I've tried it 'their way' and it completely SUCKS.

My drum micing skills are the same as yours I'm sure that is if you’re doing it right.

I could easily give back any minimal dynamics lost compressing with a bit more eq on my mixer (if that were a problem).

I promise, you dont have to replace your drums, you can just settle for less than perfect, I mean heart felt, lol. What a joke, this guy!

Your petty insults are of no consequence. They only show your inability to reason with others properly. You need to learn how to cooperate, loser.

I don't own a VDrum kit Haha!

I'll leave it to the rest of you'se guys to figure out who wrote what...

Davedog Sat, 03/08/2008 - 13:31

I like the gun monkey J.

Okay. So as a service, I thought I'd give the benefit of doubt and go listen to samples of J****Rec**^%%*S**#@@@os. No, I will NOT link you here.

Dude. You have a serious monitoring problem......At least thats what it sounds like to me. Yes, I AM listening on the COMPUTER MONITORS....YES they are ALTEC LANSINGS......YES....they suck in one of the best ways ever. Its like a pair of horror-tones with some highs....If it sounds good here, then when I take it down to the studio and the GENELECS it probably will kick ass...

ALL of the samples have a veil over them. Theres something not quite right in the EQ. Its LOUD. I suppose after listening to your mastering drivel and your penchant for replacing anything real and organic, that this is the end result. Nice, if you like to put out lifeless, sterile, completely holloweyed dunnage that seems to be all the rage.

Theres folks on this site with bedroom set-ups that smoke your crap. Seriously.

Now. Its time you heard the reality of posting here.

The ONE MAJOR THING we all strive for is accuracy in our posts. The REASON is there are a LOT of beginners that come here to learn. If there is a bunch of heresay, or information that isnt exactly truthful or portrys a methodology that is less than desireable, then its up to the Mods to protect the unwashed and curious to this harmful information. I have been recording odd bits of noise for 30 years.(more but whos counting).. While I have sat in on a number of mastering sessions and know what the gear does and why, I would NEVER pretend to be a mastering engineer. Ever.

Eliminating pops and clicks, drawing the fade-outs, setting the 'ceiling' for the levels....knowing how to do these things does NOT make you a Mastering Engineer.

Most of the folks on here can prep a project for mastering. I do it well enough that the M.E.s actually LIKE me as they dont have a lot of 'fixing' to do. Most can do this.

And you dont hear ANYBODY puffing out their chests and bleating loudly about how their skills are such that they deserve to be lauded for a job that is basic in its concept and REQUIRED to be a viable commercial entity.

Its the MAJOR reason that those amoungst us have reacted so vehemently towards you........that, and the fact you act like a tool everytime someone refutes your "Secrets".

Read this carefully. There WILL be a test.

RemyRAD Sat, 03/08/2008 - 21:28

I'm with Bob. I think we've all replaced something in some manner shape or form, with or without computers. I mean, I used to fly vocals & instruments into jingle tracks after laying back to a 2 or 4 track machine because the 1 inch 8 track just wasn't enough. So it wasn't unusual to find that you had 24 composited tracks into 8 before the final mix.

We've all cheated with our computers on a regular basis. It's just how badly and/or how much you like to cheat at things? I mean if that's what makes you feel good & alive & a genius, you should do it. It's not really hurting anybody. But the music business and the business of making music. But hey, all of the good melodies have already been copyrighted and there aren't any more that are not already a copyright violation of somebody's. I'm lousy with math but I know math is like music. So think about this. When you used to call your friend on the phone two blocks away from you how many numbers did you used to dial? Right, seven. How many you have to dial now to get the same friend? Exactly, 10. If copyright law is based on a finite number of sequential Notes and that number happens to be under 20, at some point everything will or already has repeated. So I think the copyright office is another failed fraudulent federal racketeering associated bunch of folks, designed to make the rich guys richer and the poor guys poorer. Especially since the average songwriter can't afford the same kind of high-priced attorneys as the bigwig greed mongers can.

So samples will obviously proliferate because nobody is allowed to write any decent music anymore. Nor need to have decent musicians or instruments since everything can be replaced, including real recording engineers. Obviously, anybody with a Sound Blaster card knows what they're doing.

DON'T STOP DON'T STOP DON'T STOP (just a sample of what's to cum)
Ms. Remy Ann David

Oh to be young again
Ms. Remy Ann David

Cucco Sat, 03/08/2008 - 22:20

Alright Remy...it's not fair to comment on the topic when the non-mods can't...so we'll open it back up for a bit.

Remy wrote:
If copyright law is based on a finite number of sequential Notes and that number happens to be under 20, at some point everything will or already has repeated.

Okay, BobRogers, correct me if I'm wrong here -

The chances of this occuring would be 1 over 12 to the 12th power or 1 over 8.91610045 × 10(12th power). Then, if you factor into the equation the various chords and/or inversions and octaves, the number increases far greater than exponentially.

Herr Professor - I defer to you on this one as this kind of math is most definitely NOT my forte.

Based on my numbers though, I'd say there are a fair bit of melodies out there that Mozart and Haydn didn't even touch on, much less that have been copyrighted since 1922.

BobRogers Sun, 03/09/2008 - 05:00

Well, I tried to post this at 3:43 AM when the dog woke me up, but some thing was wrong with the RO system or my system or something. Anyway, don't depend on anything I say. But the number of sequences of 20 tones in the standard scale is 12 to the 20th power or 3,833,759,992,447,475,122,176. The odds of two people choosing the same sequence at random are even slimmer than the odds that someone will enjoy the academic classical music based exactly those random choices. Now its time for Zantac for me and a milkbone for the dog.

anonymous Sun, 03/09/2008 - 08:43

I have waisted to much time reading this drama that I could have been learning. Damn me, I'm so easily distracted.

Watching everyone try to tell a brick wall the same thing over and over again, then the brick wall fights back with another seemingly pointless remark.

I wonder if I could turn this into a sitcom some how.

Bahh!

hueseph Sun, 03/09/2008 - 10:49

Seriously though, what school do you go to? You should have one of your teachers come here to back you up. Really though. Are you brave enough to do that? Or, why don't you post a link to this thread on your myspace site? Let your clients come and back you up. Bet that would be good for business.

I wonder if your teachers would find it beneficial to have your school linked to this thread?

Davedog Sun, 03/09/2008 - 11:53

joshuarecordingstudios wrote: watch the video, I dont want to hear it!

First of all, none of you are Simon Cowell! More like Paula cause you guys sound drunk!

LOL

Its TOO late chippy. You are what you are and you havent even tried to understand what we've all been saying about being a part of THIS community.

Methodology or not, you still refuse to integrate yourself here as most peole have....those that did enjoy the place....you still seem to want to force-feed your flawed attempts at recording and expect us to swallow it whole. Aint gonna happen buckwheat.

You are ,as Max put so eloquently, one of the reasons the music industry is in such a shambles these days. Its the heartless, lifeless recordings that continue to pile load after load of crap onto the steaming heap of mindless musical pap that keeps things the way they are.

Nevermind artistic relavancy, "lets just get it prefect".....

Yeah it blows.

And you are going to hear it. Day after day after day until you leave this site never to return.

You're an ungracious mindless drone and as far as I can tell you have no viable information to share with this community.

Get out before I toss you out.

Codemonkey Sun, 03/09/2008 - 14:55

The thread had no value in it anyway, all we've acheieved in a week (?) or so is to decide that joshuarecordingstudios wastes time on his drum tracks, reinforced the idea that samples suck and thanks to Davedog, generated more profits for Zantac.

Oh and along with PSW, provided a hell of a lot of laughter to a hell of a lot of people.

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