Sharp Practise
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3/18/2008 10:28:07 AM
A palette of sounds - part one
I promised to talk more about what might be described as the palette of sounds from which we aim to compile the next record so it sounds like an album and not a collection of sounds.
I guess the first place to start is in space – or at least with reverb. One trick I picked up from working at New Rising was the concept of close and ambient miking the drums. So, in addition to separate mics for the snare, bass, hi-hats and a couple of overheads for the rest of the kit I’ll look at also using a couple of ambient mics to pick up the overall sound of the kit in the room. One of the reasons live recordings sound so different from the studio is of course that the onstage mics pick up reflected sound from the venue, hence you seem to get more depth to the sound. Logically, the same approach, using ambient mics, should help get a fuller drum sound in the studio.
Bass sounds traditionally have little artificial reverb added to them – I see the consistency here coming more from getting the EQ and compression right. I like to get as good a sound as I can at source and then any changes during mixing can be purely for creative purposes.
I also like to keep the rhythm section working together, so I try to tie in what the bass drum sounds like with what the bass guitar sounds like (and the left hand of any keyboard instrument too) to get that sonic cohesion I keep banging on about.
I’ll talk about the melody instruments and the overall mix next time.
Bye for now.
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