How are you making EZ Drummer work in your mixes?

johnlewitt · Post by **johnlewitt** » Thu Apr 23, 2015 9:01 am

Hi,

I've been using EZ Drummer 2 since it came out and I've been trying to maximize the sound. I'm wondering what people do to get the liveliest, best sound out of this program. Here's what I do;

- I use the internal mixer and some times adjust the settings, strictly by feel.

- I put an EZ Mix Plugin right on the drum track, which one depends strictly on feel.

- I've started to send the drum track to a couple BUS' and put some distortion, reverb or filters on them, panning each hard left and right.

- And I just bought the Final Mix Parallel Drum Compression Plug In which I'm looking forward to trying out (hey, it's only $24!)

So what do you do to make your EZ drums pop and sound awesome? I want to figure out if I'm missing anything obvious or if anyone has some cool ideas they can share.

John

Kolstad · Post by **Kolstad** » Thu Apr 23, 2015 10:34 am

Very often I pull down the velocity quite a bit, and don't use any of the internal fx. I pan them center, and explode to individual audio tracks in studio One, and start mixing from there. Just like if I had a session of mono tracks recorded by a real drummer.

andygabrys · Post by **andygabrys** » Thu Apr 23, 2015 12:12 pm

hey John!

I agree!

all of this can help -

- I use the internal mixer and some times adjust the settings, strictly by feel.

- I put an EZ Mix Plugin right on the drum track, which one depends strictly on feel.

- I've started to send the drum track to a couple BUS' and put some distortion, reverb or filters on them, panning each hard left and right.

- And I just bought the Final Mix Parallel Drum Compression Plug In which I'm looking forward to trying out (hey, it's only $24!)

although I don't own any EZ mix plugins, and I typically use the Slate VCC first on the channel, and use a bunch of other plugins.

- I've started to send the drum track to a couple BUS' and put some distortion, reverb or filters on them, panning each hard left and right.

I do not pan the stuff unless I am looking for a specific effect. Are you talking about sending to two specific mono auxes and panning one Hard L and the other hard R? If the drums come out of the EZdrummer (or whatever VI you use) panned a certain way, the image gets retained when you put it through a stereo bus and insert a stereo plugin. Saves time and headache. Also keeps the hi-hat in the right place in the stereo image. If you send all the drums to two mono auxes and pan them hard L+R the image of the hi-hat, the toms and the various cymbals gets smeared and for me that isn't a sound I like.

one thing that I do it route drums to two auxes straight off:

Main drum bus - this is often "dry" or I might add a tape effect plugin, or possibly a compressor set on a longer attack to keep things punch like the SSL Buss comp on 30 ms attack.
Compressed Parallel bus - this might have a tape effect really slamming it, or a compressor set on stuff (like an 1176 all buttons mode) or one of those things and eq. This often sounds really out-of-control by it self, but by mixing it under the Main drum buss, you can get a feeling of power - if you want more agro sound, ride it up for a chorus or bridge, and for more clean mellow, drop it down for a verse or similar.

any of the drum tracks themselves (VI or recorded mono tracks) get sent to a variety of reverbs - one that I like for a snare, one that is a general "drums in a small room sound", any of the three reverbs I use for my main mix (generally office, longer plate, way longer hall or church), or center panned or ping pong delays depending on what I want to hear.

besides all this sauce, it helps to pick a kit that is close to what you want to hear at the end, and have a performance that works for the song.

2 cents from me.

JAMRecording · Post by **JAMRecording** » Thu Apr 23, 2015 1:49 pm

I mix it just as I would real drums. I usually have some compression/limiting on a master bus, maybe a tape saturation plug in. and maybe a bit of verb, depending on the sound I'm going for. Occasionally I'll bus the snare or kick to an bus if I'm adding an additional drum sample to blend in with the EZ drum. Lately I've been putting a CLA plugin on the overheads. It's works well for bigger drum sounds. I rarely use the provided grooves. We build drums in the midi editor and send the individual drums to seperate tracks.

PaulBergren · Post by **PaulBergren** » Mon May 04, 2015 8:09 pm

Nice topic John. The few tricks I use have already been mentioned.

Buzz, I am an S1 user and do things much like you do, but have never messed with the velocity. I will experiment with that.

Andy, I like the idea of adding a tape effect to the parallel compressed bus. I will try that too.

Thanks guys.

Fullertime · Post by **Fullertime** » Tue May 05, 2015 11:56 am

Hey John! Great question.

I have personally been wrestling this process to the ground over the last few years. I've bounced back and forth between BFD, EZ Drummer & Slate. Right now I'm very happy with EZ Drummer. And i feel like i have found a good process for me.

Here's what I have been doing that I am very happy with-

I actually set all of the individual drums to separate outputs in EZD (Channels 1/2,3/4,5/6 etc...) and then import them to real audio (separate tracks) in my DAW (Digital Performer).

From there I basically mix them as if they were a real kit that was multi-tracked. That way I can use my higher end Plug-ins, EQ's etc...

It's not the only way, but I do feel like it is the most natural for me and I can truly isolate kick, snare etc... in the final stage of mix down.

Here are two pop tracks that I have done that with and I am very pleased with the outcome:

https://soundcloud.com/fullertime/sets/ ... ompilation

Hope this helps!

Blessings,
Fuller

TheElement · Post by **TheElement** » Tue May 05, 2015 2:43 pm

I use EZdrummer1. I like the TR-808 from the Electronic expansion pack.

I'll either throw the Cubase stock compressor set to "Light Jazz Vocals" on it or The Sausage Fattener. Also usually remove internal mix reverb and other EZdrummer fx and then throw a little reverb on the 808 clap from the ValhallaRoom reverb.

Joseph · Post by **Joseph** » Wed May 06, 2015 10:47 am

Kolstad wrote:Very often I pull down the velocity quite a bit, and don't use any of the internal fx. I pan them center, and explode to individual audio tracks in studio One, and start mixing from there. Just like if I had a session of mono tracks recorded by a real drummer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvu4053I9rk

I don't know if this is helpful or just beating a dead horse, but it was a game changer for me. After that, I experiment with layering kicks and snares as well as parallel compression, EQ, changing velocity, etc. I'm no pro, but the first track I submitted after implementing the techniques I learned from this video and the forum got a forward so I'm sticking to it.

-Joseph

johnlewitt · Post by **johnlewitt** » Fri May 08, 2015 11:08 am

This is great feedback. I'm definitely going to try and start mixing all the drums separately, as if it were a real kit. I guess I was a little scared in the past to delve into it this way, but if you want to get better at something you've got to try!

John

How are you making EZ Drummer work in your mixes?

How are you making EZ Drummer work in your mixes?

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Re: How are you making EZ Drummer work in your mixes?

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Re: How are you making EZ Drummer work in your mixes?

Re: How are you making EZ Drummer work in your mixes?

Re: How are you making EZ Drummer work in your mixes?

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