Stereo Recording Assignment

Local Natives - Ceilings (Paddy Henchman Remix)


Drum Recording & Mix - Written Commentary

Recording Process

In order to achieve the best starting point for our drum recording, we carefully considered several aspects of the recording process. These included the acoustic space we would record in, the drum kit that would be used, the microphone choice and perhaps most importantly, the performer. One of the members of our group knew a proficient drummer with his own kit and acoustically treated live room so we decided to make use of this.

The acoustic of the space in which we were recording was our first consideration. We decided as a group that we wanted a dry sound for the initial recording to help eliminate unwanted spill and to leave room for creative editing in the mixing process. In addition, the drum part that we were recording was in a jazz/ soul style so we wanted the sound to be close and warm rather than masked with reverb. We also considered the placement of the kit and found that it sounded best when positioned around one-third into the room from each wall.

The kit itself was tuned correctly and we made sure that each drum sounded as good as it could before recording. Any items in the room that were causing unwanted noise were removed.

We tried several different microphone setups in order to find the best sound. In our initial recordings, we were using a spaced pair as overhead microphones and a room microphone to capture an overall image of the kit. However, upon listening we found that due to the dry acoustic of the room, the ambient microphone was adding little to the recording. Our final recording included eight microphones set up as follows:

Overheads: We used a coincident pair of Rode NT5 Small diaphragm condenser microphones. This gave the best stereo image of the kit and helped to eliminate phasing issues (Stereo Microphone Techniques, 2014).

Bass Drum: For this recording we found that the best sound for the bass drum was achieved through using two AKG D112 microphones. One was inside the drum, close to the beater, to capture the initial transient. The other was outside the drum next to the sound hole in the bass drum skin - this captured the low frequency resonance.

Snare: We used two microphones on the snare, a Shure SM57 on the top skin and an AKG C414 on the bottom to capture high frequency detail in the metal snares. We used a gain plugin to invert the phase of the C414.

Toms: For the toms we used two SM57 microphones, this time placed on the top skin of each Tom. We tried different placements until we found one that captured both the initial transient and the resonance.





Mixing Process

Once we had captured a quality performance, we approached the mixing of the recording individually. I decided that due to the style of the performance, a natural sounding mix was important. I began by setting up auxiliary channels – a group fader for the snare microphones, another for the bass drum microphones and a reverb send. 

I then used noise gate plugins to help better isolate several of the drums. I set the attack on these all to 1ms in order to preserve the transients of each of the drums and to give them definition (Mixing Multitracked Drums, 2001). I set the release times so that the drums were still being allowed to ring and the thresholds so only the intended hits would be allowed through the gate. However, I found that a lot of the bass drum was still spilling through the snare drum gate. I found that by using an EQ plugin and cutting some low-end frequencies of the bottom snare microphone helped to eliminate some of this spill. 

Next I used EQ plugins on each of the tracks to increase separation between each of the parts of the kit. I boosted some of the low-end frequencies of the bass drum to increase its power slightly. I also boosted the snare drum around 4650Hz to help increase the clarity of the side stick hits. I found that the overhead microphones had picked up a lot of resonance from the drums, which I found to be muddying the mix – I remedied this by rolling off the low end.

I set up compressors on the bass drum and snare channels to keep them at a more even level. I then applied and adjusted a gentle compressor to the whole kit to create a slight pushing and pulling sound and to even the dynamics slightly.

In the last mixing stages, I sent small amounts of the snare and overhead signals to the reverb send to give the mix an added ambience. I then used automation to further accent the side stick hits and to create fades. I finished by placing a limiter on the master fader to control the louder sections and to bring up the overall output level.

(818 Words)

References

Stereo Microphone Techniques (2014). Available at: http://www.shure.co.uk/support_download/educational_content/microphones-basics/stereo_microphone_techniques (Accessed: 6th May 2014) 

White, P. (2001) Mixing Multitracked Drums. Available at: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/feb01/articles/drummix.asp (Accessed: 6th May 2014)


Patrick Henchman