Lessons

Lesson Info

Tracking Drums

Tommy you still live out their ran were born you teo you still live out there I can't I can't hear you so you can hear me now I'm no I'm saying I've been out to hear anything you said I'm just sitting here with bones were almost ready which is dangerous yeah I think I think we're ready to try I'm not ready to track awesome I'm not sure people out there definitely raved no I think that's really good I think it's cool that use the actual built on pro tools q two because for a lot of people at home they they don't have a kind of extra money to buy it from bob bunch of plug ins yeah so so yeah yeah I mean to me like said I've tried them all I've tried the waves of fried you know you know massenburg I mean just all you know crazy stuff and just this clean it doesn't add a lot of character and you get really surgical withy the hewing and you know I just and just prefer you know um uh yeah but I guess tommy for ready we're going toe to toe try to track some still see what we got going on tone...

wise see if our tones are rocks down in rocket so uh yeah for you those of you at home this is kind of you know my process or whatever I just set it up good game structures tuneup the drones you to the best of my you know, my best educated guess as to what's going to get us close to the sounds and then we actually tracked some stuff and listen to it for this particular like said this is, you know, tommy's new song whatever we're only going to you like a minute and half of the song cash so we can move through things and you know, for this particular song whatever we've you know, I brought my session that we actually used to record this record and we have all his pre recorded tracks loaded already so that's what he will be listening to now normally like say, when I have a client come in, I would have ah uh, I would just have a you know, guitar players and the guys in the band jam with the drummers and so they can vibe off, you know, have you know, actually have the divide of the song and, you know, play properly dynamically and also or, you know, I have the drummer play with pre recorded scratch track, so we actually create scratch tracks a lot of it, you know? Ah, a lot of engineers they want to, you know, there's almost engineers I think in the industry, whatever they want to force the drummer to play with click track and in this case tommy can play the click track and he's going to play the creek quick tracking that's a pre recorded recording but there are a lot of rumors out there who or rehearsed practiced or you know it is difficult for them to play with a click track and you know actually you know you can actually quantify eyes you can record the drummer off a click and in quantities it to the clique later you know it's pretty industry standard nowadays tio have you know the tempo be consistent but it's not absolutely imperative you know some bands could track into a record not do it to click into sound fine sound great you know all the you know, records in the seventies and you know it depends on the player right? It depends on the desire production sound and what you're going to do like if you're up you know going tohave sequence material you're gonna want to kwan ties if you want you know for publishing uses its great quantities singing copy and uh copy and paste part to be a different song structure if you're in this case like what tommy's record we were producing on the fly s o I think it was really beneficial to be able to copy and paste parts and you know everything kwan ties in on time just so you can copy and paste and change make changes to the song without having retract everything but we like said for this instance we're tracking to a quick track tommy's you know he's you know he's well, you know, professional musicians that he's had a lot of practice we click tracks and then the normal play drums but you know, we just see play with this earlier today in proving that you could you could do it no problem on obviously the guy did the session work for this record will he's a master with a click track also so but I will try to get tommy to actually kind of play it not so perfect so we have some stuff to work when we go into the drum eddie hey, if it's too on obviously like with between the barrier to me blake tracks all his parts natural to click track and it's it's even though we we will kwan tai stuff when needed, whatever it's not necessary and he could play so tightly to the clique that it sounds great. You know, just naturally, you know spent extra time with him to try to get completely organic takes to get a perfect dynamics and the perfect timings and stuff like that a lot of people you know, it's like, you know, economically it's just better to just get some solid takes, you know, focus on the dynamics and energy and then and then you know, do the modern production of the quantities into the drums and impossible sample blending the even out dynamics and things like that uh you know it's pretty typical to have to do that's particularly in super progressive mental and very difficult style because you want the kids rooms consistent you want the math you know, precise you know it's a hallmark of the sound to have a kind of mechanical in nature and you know it's good that is desired quality so you know have any quantas obviously gives you that the ability to do that obviously for rock band like with tommy I would I would you know I would do a a quantity is a little lighter and stuff but we'll get into that I guess we'll go ahead and try tio you know, just go ahead let tommy jam on this song or whatever you know see what we'll see what our tones air sounded like and uh we'll talk about some of this other stuff after that tell me if you're ready I've got thea click track set up and as we had earlier just for those of you out there like say we jammed earlier whatever I think it's important to note that you know with the drummers of whatever like you they've got to be able to hear themselves you know so you've got to have good you know monitoring system going click track nice and solid in the mix like said my system at home I'm able to dial up separate mixes you know, for the drummer and for the guitar player whoever is playing so they could hear what they need to hear how they need to hear it and uh um you know and what we've already done that work so or everybody was going over that but but it's very personal issues however they want to set it up but I think tommy's got it set up for any tommy yell let's roll it from the top whatever you get your four county and whatever and just if you mess up whatever just you can just stop we could back it up and take it again or we can punch it in you just go and jim this is we're only doing a minute and a half to go ahead janet and whatever happens try not to play perfect I mean, you know, I know you're you know, not a drummer but I know you don't want to look ridiculous on you know, but we need to be able to show the editing so if it's two on time not that bad don't you don't play that poorly, but but I just try to you know you can just rock out you know don't be too mechanical, you know it's kind of a lot of you know that that you're all of you let's give it a shot here awesome that's out a great let's do it again just get comfortable yeah we'll let you do it again yeah yeah iraqi me to not be a drummer minutes crazy but, um you know one thing to note like I said, when you're tracking drummers whatever obviously for right now we're just kind of let him jam to get warmed up always encouraged people to get one bill up like a lot of times you know, like a lot of studios you know, when I was a kid you know they're charging by the hour they're like come in let's go you know and you know, it's important for drama to be comfortable in his head falls down and right get is you get warmed up and ready to rock you know and uh you know, always tried to be positive and um you know and you try to encourage the drummer you know have had experiences and heard of bands have been any experiences where they're just like the engineers just constantly like pointing out all the negative you know as opposed to, you know, dispose of building the player up you know, like even, you know do a lot of younger younger bands and they're in the developmental stages and you know, it's you know, obviously there they're doing things that are ideal, you know, and you know they've got issues whatever in terms of their where they're at you know performance wise and things but I think it's important to ah teo to build him up to help you know kind of you know you know the psychology behind it try to nicely put how how to you know improve their performance like what tommy's performance I would have no you know no harsh recommendations you know he's playing the drums usually I lecture drummers and like look the most important thing is that to group put the energy and the recording of this post iraq make it rock this place to be chilled make it chill um you know things that uh uh like a you know try to play consistently for some reason a lot of drummers nowadays it seems like they don't think hey I need to hit the snare drum the same every time or uh things of that nature so you know if I see a drummer is having issues like you know he's not playing consistently a lot you know hey man, it sounds awesome but you know see if we get this snare drums a little more consistent on you know, just for recording purposes just try to find a lot you know, light way to put it just to get to get what you need out of them without no terry number yeah self conscious exactly how many people miss that that when we're working with the clinic is really the goals needed them to do sorry, yeah um basically, uh it's so important to work with them and be encouraging to them and so many people missed that yeah, you have to get because you're you know, as a producer as an engineer and producer whatever you have to to get the best take a can of the drummer you know, obviously you know and I try to do it as efficiently as possible also like things like, you know, punching in the drums say, you know, he's got the first half of the song and it's it's like spot on whatever really solid than a hairless punch in, you know, with technology today you can do it and you can make it sound pretty seamlessly pro tools you can drive back and I'm sure you know those you home who have ah, you know, work with the digital audio, you know, how you can drag back the region and things of that nature if you don't know, like, I guess we could somebody could just you asked the question or whatever when you get in how to do that, but but yeah, like said, I mean, just I try to, you know, make it just comfortable hey jizz rock captured, you know, I'm listening, I don't stop the drummer feel like accidentally hits the rim shot um something that nature I don't stop the german make him redo the song like we're going to take samples here in the moon before we actually record record but like said if we got good tones I'll go ahead and grab the drum samples and then you know, I'll just if he hits one I was replaced that one goes there system redoing the whole song right or you know are hey let's just punch it in before that spot you know, important to note on the drums like obviously for puncheon's drummer has to be playing the same symbols for the symbol bleed is there things of that nature whatever but I saw kind of comments that you're here if you put you in it right on a b you'll hear it sounds chopped you could tell the symbols or chopped and things like that but yeah, the uh you know, just to get through it and get through it you know, with you know it doesn't have to be a grueling experience I think you know, people people do music because they enjoy it you know? They start in the music because it's pleasurable won't have fun you know you need a professional like, you know ah great product with today you want to have a great experience to and I think it's, you know, you know, producer's job to kind of help make both of those things happen you know also nowadays like said the budgets aren't great or whatever there's not a lot of money being generated in album sales and things of that nature so you know, I try to help the bands get in and out as quickly as possible you know without you know I don't want to shortcut anything but uh get into drummer to track you know, get his tracks down pretty quick or whatever make him feel good and uh I don't you know little timing things I know there's going to be fixed by default in the quantities and I just let it slide cool you know so but I think let me listen back to what we've got going on here don't tell tom he's going to tell me I'm gonna listen to these track decision see what we got some cool tones okay, we need to make any adjustments and uh and at some point I need some help moving this kick it's having the kid yeah it's kind of gotten is that angle now yeah got you it's hard to play when we give you hand just yeah just uh if you don't mind it would be great yeah, I usually don't have help so this is also you tell me I'm gonna listen to these journals and see ifit's overtones or happened you let me know what you think can you hear these drums when I plan back I don't know planting let me I'll play him back you should do to hear them. Yeah, it is it's kind of yeah awesome. What do you think of the drum tones? I think it sounds pretty good. Yeah yeah the uh like said one thing it's important what I just did you know it was isolating he's trying to make sure we had a good clean signal for one you know makes there's no pops and clicks with digital stuff as you guys know that you get like like st artifact yeah or the likes route you know, cables brattle in our banking or something like that so you want to check him individually? Whatever is to make sure you got some good clean signal but I think it's important to hear and stuff in the context of a mix like said we isolate you hear some snare ring and things like that and it's like by itself it sounds kind of annoying maybe some people but when you're in the mix like you can't, you know you don't even hear it or whatever it is actually kind of a cool character thing. So you know, I think it's important to have some scratch guitars in the mix or something like that so you can hear and get an idea how the drone is going to sound in the final product like that again where I do my own you know compression in the q seven's and ballpark it's like you know you kind of get an idea how things are going to shape up in the final obviously like said it wants to get into mix and I'll get into more surgical accusing of snare but like so I want to make sure we're all tones or or solid whatever and like said it's my opinion but also try to bring the the client in and you know I try to explain the client hey these are all these aren't process I don't have the tom's gated and things of that nature trees have been sound one hundred percent but I think it's in the ballpark what do you think and then they convert voice like well hey you know the kick drum isn't exactly what I had in mind and could be like well what do you want different about it let's ah is there another record that you kind of giving me ideas or you might have to do some further production like you know further e q further compression is that something that teo really sell the clientele hey is the final product is going to be the way you want okay uh you know and uh you know a lot of times like said I don't I don't try to personally as a producer I don't impart my tones and my sound and preference on stuff on I might make a suggestion but today whoever is paying is the ball's in my mind you know, in my opinions how I approach my business too so yeah so basically said I mean tom, you feel like they're pretty rock and obviously you know we've got time yeah restrictions in the normally like it's been hours yeah doing the half a day just dialing up drum sounds and totally trying different stuff like hey let's try it the solar snare see what that sounds like and see what rocks harder you know normally have a case but you know, I think that's obviously an incredible kid and you know, the mikes and creates you know, all premium stuff happened so it all comes together pretty quick and one thing to note like said with the you know, home likes it a lot of people are using you have like a bear injure like a channel preempt and you know, uh you know this you know, really inexpensive cad mike's or something like that there's a sound nice and clean I mean, they'll do grateful for demos and things, but like a lot of people here, my mixes and you're like, they think I'm doing all this crazy acu and doing all the stuff that I'm not doing actually they're just hearing the better quality equipment it's one of those things you can't you can't skimp on like in terms of ah you know, for tracking drums and, you know, I try to recommend, like, through the people home, like, if you don't have the premium that d a conversion eighty conversion, the premium of, you know, preempts the correct mikes and stuff just go to a studio there's tons of studios everywhere around the country around the world who have this stuff already and just track. What does that mean? Usually I mean, if you got your stuff, britain were rehearsed, you contract the drums in a day or two often times, so it's just, you know, just do the drums, everything else honestly, for rock and middle almost can be donut hole, you know, in a bedroom or whatever. So but, you know, the drums was things you just you won't really, you know, real drums that they're sidestepping myth is a lot of people use at home where they just kind of record symbols or uses programming drones with superior germer easy drummer things like that, and you use samples that were created in studios like this with the premium conversion in the pre empts and so you can get a big, you know, presents sound that way, all budget, yeah, exactly.