Metal, Hardcore, Death, Grind, Black, Doom, Elf-Metal...

[justhitthebutton]

Hey Ethan, have you started tracking yet? hows it going so far?


for anyone wanting to....check out http://www.myspace.com/thecolossuswillcrushyou
good friends of mine back home.

[Brett Siler]

KEEPIN THA SCENE AAALLLIIIVVEEE!!!!

[Ethan Holdtrue]

I havent started tracking These Are: yet just because there still writing but I did work on a track from Cross The Line, which should be available shortly at:

http://www.myspace.com/crosstheline

Look for 'Game Over' (or song no.3).

To day I started another project which includes an Iron Maiden cover (the trooper) which I'll post when it's done :]

[joel hamilton]

It seems like allot of the fokes on here are into (what I would call) oldschool rock, and allot of the recording techniques talked about in the messageboard seem to be geared more for that type of music. I was wondering if there are any fellow metal kids, or hardcore kids, or black, death and grind kids out there who would like to talk about how and what they do to attain those wonderfully brutal modern recordings that we all love and freak-out to in our respective little sub-scenes.

I?m going to begin pre-production on These Are: (Boston newschool Hardcore band) in a few days and I?d love to have a few new tricks to try out.

Any amp recommendations, plugins, gear, tricks?

I do a lot of heavy stuff. A well recorded record is a well recorded record regardless of genre. The rest is just aesthetic decision making during the mix that comes from knowing the genre. That just comes from listening...

[Ethan Holdtrue]

I do a lot of heavy stuff. A well recorded record is a well recorded record regardless of genre. The rest is just aesthetic decision making during the mix that comes from knowing the genre. That just comes from listening...

Different genres require different recording and mixing techniques, and the purpose of this thread is to discuss the ones that suit metal and hardcore. We all know that 'good is good', this is about making 'good' into 'fucking awesome!!'. :]

[Slider]

I do a lot of heavy stuff. A well recorded record is a well recorded record regardless of genre. The rest is just aesthetic decision making during the mix that comes from knowing the genre. That just comes from listening...

Different genres require different recording and mixing techniques, and the purpose of this thread is to discuss the ones that suit metal and hardcore. We all know that 'good is good', this is about making 'good' into 'fucking awesome!!'. :]

I think Andy Sneap has a forum on his site regarding "metal" recording techniques.
That might be of some help.

[justhitthebutton]

i see no reason why the collective minds of this board cant help Ethan out. just because its metal doesnt mean it doesnt fit at tapeop. sure Andys page is a great place for metal, but tapeop is great for everything. Lets not limit people.

[Brett Siler]

I offered somethings that have worked for me, but what Joel Hamilton said is true. Most of the stuff talked about on this forum is universal in the realm of recording. This site has helped me out immensely and I mostly record aggressive music. What I did is study on here, listen to records that I liked and studied them as well. Just listen to a record and write down things you like about the production and things you didn't and try to apply it to what you are doing.

I've checked out Andy Sneap forum and it has some good info but there is much much more on this one.

[justhitthebutton]

exactly!!! there is much much more info on this forum. and people are 99% of the time excited about helping someone out. the ultimate metal forum is mostly fans of metal, and not people who are actually recording that music.

[joel hamilton]

I have recorded a bunch of metal/noise/hardcore/stoner rock stuff, and I didnt really do anything insanely different than when i would record a straight up rock band. The sounds are different because of the tuning/song/approach/tones/etc...etc... In the mix things change of course, making stuff heavy as you possibly can requires a bunch of tricks but again, they are just different amounts of the same type of tricks I would use for a rock project....

I guess i just dont know specifically what is being asked?

[Skipwave]

Gang vocals, .

Love 'em. Can't wait to do em on my current project, Antinomy.

. .i.t will sound like there are about 20 angry meatheads about to kick your ass, which will make the band happy.

I prefer the enthusiastic youth crew sound, over the angry meathead sound, but its really a personal preference thing.

I recorded a punk/hardcore band called Donkey Punch a few years ago, and I really loused up the gang vocal sound. At the time, the only LDC I had was a RodeNT1A, so I threw that up in front of them. Now that I have a switchable pattern LDC, I realize how vital omni is to gang vocals.

[Skipwave]

I often wonder if the sounds we expect are a result of bands asking to sound like their favorite bands. Many of my favorite bands made horrible sounding recordings. I want to write music like they did, but not make recordings like those.

Are we working hard to emulate bad recordings? Is it possible to make a good recording and satisify the band's particular taste?

Anyway, a lot of people have gratiously offered advice here, and that should give ideas to tinker with. Go forth and make noise!

[Brett Siler]

Gang vocals, .

Love 'em. Can't wait to do em on my current project, Antinomy.

. .i.t will sound like there are about 20 angry meatheads about to kick your ass, which will make the band happy.

I prefer the enthusiastic youth crew sound, over the angry meathead sound, but its really a personal preference thing.

I just finished this local hardcore band's EP and they do a gang vocal at the end of the song were they all go "Hooaah!" I need to post it, I think it is hilarious but they love it, and it does work with they song well.

[evilaudio]

I have recorded a bunch of metal/noise/hardcore/stoner rock stuff, and I didnt really do anything insanely different than when i would record a straight up rock band. The sounds are different because of the tuning/song/approach/tones/etc...etc... In the mix things change of course, making stuff heavy as you possibly can requires a bunch of tricks but again, they are just different amounts of the same type of tricks I would use for a rock project....

I agree with this, completely! I used to think there would be this majick box that would make everything sound more "metal", until I really learned, used, and understood the electronics involved. In my opinion from doing this for some time now, It's really all in the band's "sound" to begin with. Sure, you can add some "colouration" with different mics/pres/etc..., but it is mostly the band's instruments and delivery that have the biggest determining factor in the end-result, no matter what style. There are a lot of "power violence" and "black metal" albums that really would not be nearly as great without the slightly low-fi sound that they got, thus enhancing the overall scathingness of it all. These bands would NOT sound good with a nice pretty clear production. A band like Dimmu Borgir would not benefit from a low-fi sound, and a band like Infest or Darkthrone would not benefit from a hi-fi sound, to put it bluntly. Each band, as long as they are somewhat unique and good, will have a "sound" in their individual instruments, voices, attitudes, and emotions, all you have to do is carefully capture and enhance or mask certain elements and you're 1/2 way there! Of course, there's always "good shitty" and "bad shitty" sound, too! heh heh!!!! I really don't care what the album "sounds" like, as long as it's a well-written honest piece of history, no matter how popular, or whatever (I'm into a lot of really underground "noisey" stuff, FYI)....

Anyways, Joel... any chance you could elaborate or share some of these "tricks" you use?? I'm always looking for new ways to make stuff as heavy as I possibly can. I love the compression tricks you've described before, and I've learned a lot from your posts here. My mixes have improved ten-fold. I still have trouble with guitars, sometimes... Having very little outboard as far as comps go, I am pretty limited right now, but do have the "digital" ones, which are decent...

[joel hamilton]

I have recorded a bunch of metal/noise/hardcore/stoner rock stuff, and I didnt really do anything insanely different than when i would record a straight up rock band. The sounds are different because of the tuning/song/approach/tones/etc...etc... In the mix things change of course, making stuff heavy as you possibly can requires a bunch of tricks but again, they are just different amounts of the same type of tricks I would use for a rock project....

I agree with this, completely! I used to think there would be this majick box that would make everything sound more "metal", until I really learned, used, and understood the electronics involved. In my opinion from doing this for some time now, It's really all in the band's "sound" to begin with. Sure, you can add some "colouration" with different mics/pres/etc..., but it is mostly the band's instruments and delivery that have the biggest determining factor in the end-result, no matter what style. There are a lot of "power violence" and "black metal" albums that really would not be nearly as great without the slightly low-fi sound that they got, thus enhancing the overall scathingness of it all. These bands would NOT sound good with a nice pretty clear production. A band like Dimmu Borgir would not benefit from a low-fi sound, and a band like Infest or Darkthrone would not benefit from a hi-fi sound, to put it bluntly. Each band, as long as they are somewhat unique and good, will have a "sound" in their individual instruments, voices, attitudes, and emotions, all you have to do is carefully capture and enhance or mask certain elements and you're 1/2 way there! Of course, there's always "good shitty" and "bad shitty" sound, too! heh heh!!!! I really don't care what the album "sounds" like, as long as it's a well-written honest piece of history, no matter how popular, or whatever (I'm into a lot of really underground "noisey" stuff, FYI)....

Anyways, Joel... any chance you could elaborate or share some of these "tricks" you use?? I'm always looking for new ways to make stuff as heavy as I possibly can. I love the compression tricks you've described before, and I've learned a lot from your posts here. My mixes have improved ten-fold. I still have trouble with guitars, sometimes... Having very little outboard as far as comps go, I am pretty limited right now, but do have the "digital" ones, which are decent...

For guitars I use pretty unlikely amps and usually about three performances. Maybe two performances. Each performance wwill be anywhere from 2 to 5 tracks though. Just to get a bunch of tones during each performance, to keep things tight. Then i wind up panning a few of the amps L-R and one or two C. You wind up with a HUGE sound when you double that setup and flip the panning arrangement. I will almost always run a DI up the middle and either use amp farm or a reamp for the specific song and delivery during the mix. Sometimes the amp farm track has just the right amount of "forward" sounding attack when mixed in along side of a few great amp tracks. It depends on many things... as always...
I also like having a few guitars and amps around that i KNOW will fill in some of the tougher low mids and midrange to really make everything snarl just right. Like a 74 les paul custom through a gibson goldtone all the way up, or through a movieola "squak box" just to fill in the ROAR when the guitar is not playing muted crunchy stuff, like more sustained stuff. I pretty much pick amps and tracks that do something for each part of the song or riff, like something crunchy that has a nice heavy chug, but then something that really opens up on the open chordal stuff...