Trying to build a decent alt rock drum sound from MIDI

[denalihighway]

Hey guys,

As title suggests - I'm trying to get a decent MIDI drum sound - a thumping and driving alt-rock sound for this track, reasonably dry, a la QOTSA perhaps.

I've been experimenting with different ways of beefing up with parallel drum tracks.

The first Soundcloud track below is a basic track rendered from EZ Drummer. I took off the reverb and ambient mics completely and a little volume off the overheads just cuz that's what I felt was right for this particular track.. There is some light drum compression.

The second track is the drum bus, of 3 parallel tracks, rendered, and with the same little bit of drum bus compression again. (I've added reverb on 2 of these 3 parallel tracks, the third is heavily compressed)

(I've left off the mix bus compression and maximising for this for now)

The second Soundcloud track will obviously sound a bit louder etc, although I reduced it volume for the rendering to even the 2 tracks out a bit.

Am I getting somewhere with the drum sound though?

Any comments gratefully received.

Track 1 (basic)
https://soundcloud.com/stasissounds/bas ... th/s-sPpjy

Track 2 (drum bus with parallel tracks)
https://soundcloud.com/stasissounds/dru ... th/s-9jpuO

Thanks
Gar

[mojobone]

Hard to know, without hearing it in context, but yeah, the increased density seems to be helping. Something really odd going on in the second example, just before the sidestick section. Not sure if it's a digital rendering artifact or an effect, but it doesn't sound punkrock/intentional. If it's intentional, consider kicking a real spring reverb, instead of whatever that is.

[andygabrys]

nice. this would be tones more effective as a comparison if you pulled down the level of the second track to be by ear the same as the first before posting it.

It sounds impressive, but it could be just volume. I think its getting a little out of balance, the kick sounds like its louder than the entire rest of the kit which doesn't seem the same as the QOTSA classics.


also - for real world info on how QOTSA got those sounds:

https://www.gearslutz.com/board/q-eric- ... tails.html

this first link above has links to the isolated drums as well. Good and long thread. Eric Valentine posts for the first time at the bottom of the first page, and it carries on throughout.

http://www.musicradar.com/us/news/drums ... ows-590923

[denalihighway]

Hi gents, Thanks for replies

Here is the track to give some context - Andy I think, I've taken some heat off the kick. I'm gonna read that stuff you linked to as well. I'm not finished mixing this, its been a good learning curve.

Yeah Mojo - that flanger I added just for effect coming out of the 1st chorus, just something that I tried and thought was interesting.

https://soundcloud.com/stasissounds/rat ... th/s-TocMM

Regarding this mix - since I posted what you guys listened too, I've added some more twack in the mid range to snare and a bit more reverb to everything, as I thought it was sounding overly dry. I don't need it to sound exactly like the early QOTSA stuff per se, I was just a guide in my head as regards the attack and vibe.

This is an alt-rock instro I've been trying to nail, I almost tried to rush it through for listing on Friday, but I'm not sure I'll have the goods to complete it to the required standard myself - but I feel its close. There's a lyrical version to this tune too.

I'm not asking for mix comments but I won't say no to receiving any from you fine gents

(this is a rough mix of the lyrical version of the song if you're interested - with the older wimpier drums - https://soundcloud.com/stasissounds/rat ... -2/s-5lX9L )

Cheers
Gar