How To Simulate Overheads For Drums?

[vurt]

mic positioning comes from the recording.
kontakts internal mixers deals with it

but if you route those out to separate channels, pan hard left and right, eq low end out.
aside from a little crosstalk, the overheads are there for your cymbals/hats.
kick, snare and tom should be close miced.

But don't the overheads pick up everything?

they will, but that's why you eq those with quite a high pass

(from the pov of actually recording a live kit)

[wagtunes]

For those of you who are drummers or know drummers, what exactly is the purpose of the overhead mics? Is it to give the drums a bigger sound? More airy sound? Sense of depth? All the above?

Never understood why people put overhead mics on drums. Why not just mic each drum, which you do anyway, and be done with it?

[vurt]

For those of you who are drummers or know drummers, what exactly is the purpose of the overhead mics? Is it to give the drums a bigger sound? More airy sound? Sense of depth? All the above?

Never understood why people put overhead mics on drums. Why not just mic each drum, which you do anyway, and be done with it?

they didn't have as many channels to play with.
plus it adds stereo width.

[Gamma-UT]

Never understood why people put overhead mics on drums. Why not just mic each drum, which you do anyway, and be done with it?

One thing you'll often see in anyone talking about overheads treatment is engineers/producers compress the arse out of the overhead tracks, particularly in rock. The compression on a mix of low-level interacting sounds tends to bake in a rhythm.

There's also an advantage in having a mixture of sources with various amounts of room and interference from other instruments in there to make things sound a bit more alive. Individually miced drums can sound 'sampled' because they are too clean. Real rock mixes aren't like that.

[Unaspected]

For those of you who are drummers or know drummers, what exactly is the purpose of the overhead mics? Is it to give the drums a bigger sound? More airy sound? Sense of depth? All the above?

Never understood why people put overhead mics on drums. Why not just mic each drum, which you do anyway, and be done with it?

Cymbals.

And, indeed, a sense of width and completeness. Overheads give that top-end 'sparkle'. Whilst the room mic gives some body, the overheads help to 'lift' the sound. The overheads also act as a guide to how to pan your direct drums.

When recording anything, mic selection and position can be looked at as equal to EQ choices but the method for recording a full drum kit should give you some tonal control via the balance you apply through adjusting mix levels between direct, room and overhead mics.

[imrae]

For those of you who are drummers or know drummers, what exactly is the purpose of the overhead mics? Is it to give the drums a bigger sound? More airy sound? Sense of depth? All the above?

Never understood why people put overhead mics on drums. Why not just mic each drum, which you do anyway, and be done with it?

We don't always have the luxury! I've recorded drums a few times with 8 channels available so close-miking every cymbal isn't feasible.
Reconstructing a consistent correct stereo image is also a lot easier with a stereo pair than with a bunch of individual microphones and pan knobs.

Tom-toms sound pretty different in close-mic vs more distant. I like to build up a drum mix primarily from overheads and then use close mics to reinforce the drums.

The result sounds a lot more like a real drum kit and less like a bunch of samples.

[BertKoor]

Back in the days the whole band was recorded with one single mic and the musicians placed strategically around it.
There are very good recordings of the big band era (1950s) made with just one or maybe three mics.

Later when track counts increased (4-track wasn't very common until around ca 1965) and thus the mics around the drum kit increased. First a separate mic for the base, which had the most benefit of not getting room reflections, later separate mics for the snare, but overhead mics that picked up the whole kit remained very common.

[wagtunes]

Fascinating stuff. Could probably spend a lifetime just learning this one subject.

The reason I'm asking in the first place is I'm doing a 60s rock project (elsewhere in this sub forum) and want to make sure I get the drums just right. From what I heard, 60s drums used overhead mics. Or so I'm told. Certainly sounds that way on a lot of the recordings.

[Lotuzia]

Back in the days the whole band was recorded with one single mic and the musicians placed strategically around it.
There are very good recordings of the big band era (1950s) made with just one or maybe three mics.

Later when track counts increased (4-track wasn't very common until around ca 1965) and thus the mics around the drum kit increased. First a separate mic for the base, which had the most benefit of not getting room reflections, later separate mics for the snare, but overhead mics that picked up the whole kit remained very common.

Exactly this. When we run a jazz club, I mixed hundreds of jazz bands live, and the usual set up for the drums was : One mike for BD, one for the Snare , and a pair of overheads for everything else : Cymbals, toms etc. The interesting thing is that, you get the stereo,you get a coherent acoustic space, and you don't have 10 faders to move to control the whole drum kit. Then, it's up to you to make a coherent sound with all that. Placing mikes/knowing your mikes is very important too of course.

[Aloysius]

Put the loudspeakers on your big head

[Unaspected]

Fascinating stuff. Could probably spend a lifetime just learning this one subject.

The reason I'm asking in the first place is I'm doing a 60s rock project (elsewhere in this sub forum) and want to make sure I get the drums just right. From what I heard, 60s drums used overhead mics. Or so I'm told. Certainly sounds that way on a lot of the recordings.

Oh, if you're doing 60s rock, then the Abbey Road kit is perfect. Limiting your options/mic/mixer channels would be best to get an older style sound, as BertKoor suggests.

Much of the learning is practical. Better to get stuck in and learn through experience than reading about it. Of course, there might be some less obvious tricks that can be picked up by reading and some understanding of microphones is essential for recording.

I like to build up a drum mix primarily from overheads and then use close mics to reinforce the drums.

The result sounds a lot more like a real drum kit and less like a bunch of samples.

Exactly. Just follow the overheads for realistically panning the direct drums.

I only worry about top end tone/sparkle from the overheads though - As has already been discussed, I tend to high pass pretty high, post compression. This way the drums will impact on the motion of the cymbals, as Vurt suggested. Of course, you can always use a side-chain to impart movement if required - Automating this to highlight heavier sections can sound neat. Then you might high pass before compressing - using the side-chain from the signal before the HPF.

One trick that I really like is compressing the room signal to death - This can really help to glue drums together. Also, if you have the option, selecting a tube mic for your room is my preference.

EDIT: I should add that I would only compress the room mic heavily for a modern sound. For an older sound, much of the tone will come from the room mic.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

For those of you who are drummers or know drummers, what exactly is the purpose of the overhead mics? Is it to give the drums a bigger sound? More airy sound? Sense of depth? All the above?

Never understood why people put overhead mics on drums. Why not just mic each drum, which you do anyway, and be done with it?

Think of how we hear a drum kit? Do you hear each drum from a few inches away? Think of how close your snare drum mic is to the drum head and imagine listening to a snare with your ear there. Would it sound the same as it does from the dummer's position, or a few feet away in the room?

We hear the whole kit, in a room, at a certain distance. Overheads don't have to be used, but engineers discovered that they can provide a nice balanced sound of the kit, without having too much room sound. Gives you a bit of what the drummer might pick up too.

Direct mic'ing cymbals? I know every sample pack includes cymbal direct microphones but I've seldom seen this done in studios. Talking rock music anyway, and it's not like I lived in studios either, but had some experiences in smaller, NYC area studios. Traditionally, the cymbals and the kit are being picked up by overheads and room. You might ask the engineer to have a spot mic put on a ride or hat (usually with a small diaphragm consenser), but I've never actually been to a session where a crash or splash had a mic. In fact, just asking for a hat mic on one song elicited a confused response from an engineer who said he never mics them (this particular song had a bit of a Police vibe so I wanted the extra articulation on the hats). Then again, all the big BFD3 and Superior Drummer libraries do, so maybe it's more common in larger sessions with bigger budgets.

So yeah, different people will also mix kits differently, but it's not uncommon for the Overheads to be the primary source of the drum sounds, with the directs brought in to reinforce the overheads (not the other way around). You hear a lot of direct microphones with less overhead microphones in things like 70's punk recordings, which don't sound like natural drums in a room. Overheads microphones kind of act as a sweet spot between room microphones and direct microphones. In fact, some very classic, excellent sounding drum recordings might just be an overhead with a kick and a snare direct for some extra oomph with the overheads providing most of the sound.

Compressing the beejeezus out of overheads in rock recordings? I guess it could be done, but more commonly, it's the room microphones that get slammed. You might compress the overheads to level things out and smooth some fast transients, but they're still pretty damn close to the kit so you're probably not going to get that huge rock drum sound by compressing overheads. Hipassing overheads? I hear some people do it but I think most like to keep the sound of the kit in the ovreheads and maybe do some shelving to take out some bottom, and add some sparkle up top but not aggressive hipassing. Going to depend on the source, song, mix, etc. But usually, the top of your kick, snares, and toms (i.e. the air) will be coming from your overhead. Unless you're going for that dry 70's type sound.

Do you need to simulate overheads on a sampled kit? Probably not. They were probably already used in the sampling process in the first place (i.e. you're already hearing overheads in the samples). If you're not getting enough control and want to mix overheads and room microphones, use software that includes channels for the multiple microphones, otherwise, if your kit sounds good, don't worry about it.

If you wanted to know how to do it: find some impulse responses of a drum microphone setup with Overheads, Room Microphones, and the like, and add those impulses to your track. The orginal BFD library came with Impulse Responses from the El Dorado recording sessions for example.

[Unaspected]

Compressing the beejeezus out of overheads in rock recordings? I guess it could be done, but more commonly, it's the room microphones that get slammed. You might compress the overheads to level things out and smooth some fast transients, but they're still pretty damn close to the kit so you're probably not going to get that huge rock drum sound by compressing overheads.

Indeed, overly compressing overheads will push them back in the mix - turning them into a pad - and won't sound as natural. Though I've heard this done and it can sound great - it just doesn't work for me. I like enough compression to place them with the kit, rather than behind it.

Room mics are begging for abuse.

[JoeCat]

Yeah - Abbey Road 60's kit is perfect. And as donkey mentioned - you can mix the overheads individually per drum, if you want to get to that level of detail.

We rely a lot on the overheads in the studio 'cause we like a lively sound, but we do close mic all except the ride / crash. One advantage of using closed mics on each piece of kit is to trigger layered samples to beef up the kit, and to gently nudge (lol - completely move) those hits when your drummer, who never plays to a click track until the day they record, decides to march to their own, um, drummer (me? yup). Not sure how our producer jives this with the overheads though!

I don't particularly care for too modern a drum sound. As a matter of opinion, I think it sounds more "amateur" (also known as "indie - lmao). now. Here's why: A lot of bands I know, in an effort to sound MORE pro, seem to rely on a much cleaner sound (I originally wrote drier - but that's not the same entirely - lots of reverb yes, but the sounds are perfect, with no bleed, etc.). All room sounds are removed, amp noises, yelps etc., and the drum sounds are "perfect". That's where production went in the 80s (really earlier, after Aja, or maybe even Dark Side). But if you are playing rock, listen to the Stones, etc. - all those noises add to a live feel in the mix, especially in the gaps when they hit the compressor. 60s / 70s recordings had some nice filth to them - even the dryer ones sounded more alive (rice-paper snare, anyone?).

The bands doing the cheapest / homegrown recordings have a live / filthy sound ('cause they are often mic'ing in an unprepared room, maybe stereo pair and kick mic, etc.), playing live, etc. But the next leg up are the bands paying for studio work and getting that ultra-clean sound that (I guess) looks good on their producer's resume, and is great for pop. To me though, they all sound the same. I'm always telling our producing to leave noises in unless they really stand out and negatively affect the mix.

Anyway, I'd use Abbey Road 60's out-of-the-box, and throw in a track of ambient noises and mix that into the drum buss at very low volume for a really authentic sound.

[wagtunes]

Yeah - Abbey Road 60's kit is perfect. And as donkey mentioned - you can mix the overheads individually per drum, if you want to get to that level of detail.

We rely a lot on the overheads in the studio 'cause we like a lively sound, but we do close mic all except the ride / crash. One advantage of using closed mics on each piece of kit is to trigger layered samples to beef up the kit, and to gently nudge (lol - completely move) those hits when your drummer, who never plays to a click track until the day they record, decides to march to their own, um, drummer (me? yup). Not sure how our producer jives this with the overheads though!

I don't particularly care for too modern a drum sound. As a matter of opinion, I think it sounds more "amateur" (also known as "indie - lmao). now. Here's why: A lot of bands I know, in an effort to sound MORE pro, seem to rely on a much cleaner sound (I originally wrote drier - but that's not the same entirely - lots of reverb yes, but the sounds are perfect, with no bleed, etc.). All room sounds are removed, amp noises, yelps etc., and the drum sounds are "perfect". That's where production went in the 80s (really earlier, after Aja, or maybe even Dark Side). But if you are playing rock, listen to the Stones, etc. - all those noises add to a live feel in the mix, especially in the gaps when they hit the compressor. 60s / 70s recordings had some nice filth to them - even the dryer ones sounded more alive (rice-paper snare, anyone?).

The bands doing the cheapest / homegrown recordings have a live / filthy sound ('cause they are often mic'ing in an unprepared room, maybe stereo pair and kick mic, etc.), playing live, etc. But the next leg up are the bands paying for studio work and getting that ultra-clean sound that (I guess) looks good on their producer's resume, and is great for pop. To me though, they all sound the same. I'm always telling our producing to leave noises in unless they really stand out and negatively affect the mix.

Anyway, I'd use Abbey Road 60's out-of-the-box, and throw in a track of ambient noises and mix that into the drum buss at very low volume for a really authentic sound.

Great stuff! Ambient noises? Like what? Never heard of this trick before.