How to Mix Drums Better

In this episode, I take you through my mixing process, showing the techniques and plug-in's I use to get my ideal drum sounds.

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[Charis-ulxh]

I would just like to add my voice to the chorus of fans asking for more content like this - the old videos you did like "How the Pros use EQ" and "How the Pros use Compression" remain saved go-to videos for me to the point where I often have them open in another window while I'm working on a mix. I think all your content is fantastic and understand completely that you need to take your market into account, but for the subset of your subscribers who are burgeoning engineers or producers this stuff is pure gold - thank you for making it and sharing your knowledge with us free of charge, I appreciate it.

[seanmichael]

Love all the content on both channels but THIS is what I have been missing!! Really miss all the videos you used to do with mixing, compression, EQ, etc.. The production stuff. I bought all the Beato material available and would love to see some production and mixing material offered up in the future. Keep Rockin!!!

[johnlarson]

Rick ....please more of this kind of content, your approach is so hype, walk through clearly & to the it !!!

[dougmcpherson]

Rick, your interviews have been really great, and I hope you keep doing them. But I also hope you can find time to keep sharing awesome production/engineering lessons like this. You're such a natural teacher, it's a pleasure to support your work.

[onomatopoeidia]

Mixbus is the first thing to try for self-recording drummers. You can select all your tracks and ‘optimize polarity’ which checks every combo of phase on all channels and gets you the ideal output. Total game changer! No guessing.

[justinreynolds]

Snare is awesome! The player. The room and the drum tuning are the biggest factors. People don't talk about the player enough Also why samples are used 95% of time. God forbid your drums sound different than the radio for once. Lol. Dude def knows how to record a kit. And it's not easy. Ssoooo many factors to worry about. Awesome advice!! Thank you!

[xwasssabix]

17:57 This. When people think of big drum sounds, especially bass drums, most people think of John Bonham, but my mind always jumps to Bike by Pink Floyd with the two massive reverby bass drum hits that lead into each verse. It reminds me of some sort of Vaudeville or circus act on acid, and just makes for an amazingly perfect way to lead back into those sections of the song that just would not work without the reverb. I just drove two and a half hours a few weeks back to get a '73 26 x 10 Ludwig marching bass drum that was converted into a kick, and it sounds just like that song when you whack the hell out of it!

[tortugulaproductions]

i feel like it should be noted that the drums are also well tuned and well performed. the playing is balanced. and the mic technique sounds good as well. I would argue these are more important than any plugins. So with these bases covered, it makes sense all you’d need is a lil compression, a sample, and a reverb if needed.

[lagpressure]

I think some of the best drum sounds came before a lot of the technology. Moving a mic away from the drum head will naturally compress the sound, and adding two condenser mics.... one near and another far across the room can do wonderful things in a stereo mix.
Joe Morello had some great drum sounds working with Brubeck for example. A good room is one thing... knowing how to utilize a good room is another. I'm on the side of "the more natural they sound the better". That being said, in the virtual age, everyone wants great sounds without great rooms or even great mics. That's understandable, but doing things the right way is still best.

Thanks for your great content as always Rick! It's wonderful!

[milanpolak]

Great video. The real takeaway and #1 lesson though is record your source sounds well.

[DEATHATSPACECAMP]

Completely blown away by the Master X HD plugin...I don't know if it was just a volume increase, but I was impressed.

[JordanLapping]

Please do more content like this! Love watching people who know their stuff do mixing in real time while explaining to us mere mortals what it is they’re doing. Great stuff!

[saintkevinofficial]

We need more of these types of videos. As much as we appreciate the interviews, this is equally invaluable.

[oldguysplaymetal]

This video shows how important it is to get the source sounding good as the first priority. Your instincts as to what to add is, of course, spot on, and in 10 minutes you had a super professional sound. Thanks !

[BlackCouchstudio]

I was actually really stoked on the natural recorded drum sound without all the plugins.

But simply masterful, simple tools and solutions here. I love it.

[Maggai]

Damn, those drums sound fantastic right off the bat!! Amazingly well recorded.

[atmos]

Great sounding drums without doing anything to them! Would be great if you could show how you tracked them and the gear you used to get them to sound so good! Thank you!

[powlobo.m.b.]

one thing I struggle is to have the snare mic without hi-hat bleeding. Your top snare track is very well recorded in that sense. I've tried so many techniques and plugins to get that right but nothing compares to a well recorded sound like this!

[rogerdat]

As soon as you added the reverb 15:55 I heard: Kick em when they're up, kick when they're down... "Dirty Laundry". Sing along. Sick drum mix Rick!

[michaelnilsson]

One thing that is nice to do with Superior is to trig kick, snare and toms, but only use the room micks in Superior. It give more resonance and tone of real drums then a room reverb 🙂