Audio Recording

I received an inquiry from a reader:

From: Wes
Subject: Rock Mix, space for big drums

Message Body:
Hi, I was wondering if could help me. I am currently working on a mix of a heavy rock band. One of the things I am looking for is how to make that space between the big drums and big guitars and bass. Pig by Seether is a perfect example of this. It sounds like the drums have all this white space around them but the guitars is still huge. This band plays with tons of low end in their sound, esp around the 125. Any suggestions, and thanks for your time and help.

My reply:

Since you provide a sample track: “Pig” by Seether: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2uKBQ2-554 , this is possibly how the producer arrives at getting big sound, space for drums as well as other musical instruments like the guitar and bass. I list them by techniques so that you will know each of them individually and specifically.

First technique: Properly Recorded Drums with Ambience- The “Room”

Before any mixing starts, the drums are properly recorded. The space and ambience sound of the recorded drum parts is a function of the room acoustic properties. For example if the drums are recorded in a small room with concrete/cement surfaces is ideal for getting “in your face” sound of the drums which is typical for rock music.

Of course if you recorded it in a big/wider room with wooden floors it will sound warm/moderate with some naturally captured reverb which is good for pop/country/jazz music. Other factors of getting that sound you like are the microphones and miking technique used for the drums. For example if the microphones are closer to the drum skin, of course it sound bigger and louder.

The drummer personal style can also be a factor (how hard the drummer hits the drum skin whether it is of moderation or very aggressive/strong).

Personally, I would track each drum parts (meaning the kick, snare, and toom) in mono then recording at 96 KHz, 24 bit to recording software.

Second technique: Panning

Panning is used to place recorded mono tracks in the stereo field. This is one of the most important ways you can separate instruments in stereo and “getting that space” you need. For example, kick should be placed in the dead center (0), the snare slightly off center, while the tooms are both on the left and right.

You can read my tutorial on how to pan drum instruments, to get an idea about separating each that drum parts in stereo. Of course you can tweak further for best results.

The tricky part is the guitar. For rock music to be certainly loud which means that all guitars and drums should be dominant; I will not panned guitars too much on hard left or hard right This will simulate a small room environment, and in reality if you are inside a small jamming studio with rock band playing, it is certainly very loud.

Third technique: No artificial reverb on drums

When I mix rock music, I will not add any reverb on drums. This is to get a tighter “in your face” sound of drums.

Fourth technique: No artificial reverb on almost everything

Not only drums, but guitars and bass too. Natural reverb is recommended for rock recording and mixing. This means that reverb comes naturally from the room where it was recorded (either using microphones on guitar amplifiers, bigger room means wider sound, small room will get tighter loud sound). Although for bass, best results can be achieved using direct line recording.

Fifth technique: Compression

Compression can make some parts of the drum loud. You can read my audio compression tips on this blog.

As to how the band arrives with tons of low end, the mixer emphasizes the bass guitar sound in 40 – 70Hz but around 125Hz is where the kick is possibly boosted for dominance. So the deep bass is actually the bass guitar.

You can read tips here on how to mix bass guitar for rock.