Toms - where do ya like 'em?

[mjau]

Not asking for your universal, hard and fast rules on where toms go in your mix, but generally speaking, how you like to place them in the drum mix? Hard panned to draw them out of the stereo field? Mono to push them hard up the middle? Do you vary their width during tom fills? Anything wierd that helps them stand out?

[vvv]

I used to like to exaggerate tom fills, just as I used to like my crashes loud.

Lately, the toms are between 9:00 and 3:00 or 10:00 and 2:00, and I've gotten away from "cannons" and even spot-reverb; I kind of like them more organic, altho' with discernable right-to-left movement, that doesnt change the position of any given drum. I also tend to high-pass them, and try to keep them at about the snare level on loud fills.

[8th_note]

I'm pretty conservative on placement - I like the drums to sound realistically in the middle of the mix so I put the toms about 10:00 and 2:00. On the project I'm working on now, however, they want them panned very wide and I have to admit that it fits the music quite well (butt rocky southern). Not something I would have done on my own but I'm glad they wanted it that way.

[Recycled_Brains]

if it's a 3 tom (2 rack/fl) set-up i usually put the floor around 8 o'clock, the middle around 10 or 11, and the first rack around 2 or 3 (l-r from audience perspective). obviously that depends on the style of music, but that's where i generally start. i don't do (or haven't done) any panning automation for fills. usually that config. gives me the stereo spread i'm looking for.

i'll often try some gating if it's harder rock or metal stuff. i find that helps keep the kick and snare centered, and i'll often throw a low-pass filter on around 12-20k to filter out some of the cymbal bleed, and once in a while high-pass the rack toms at around 60hz to keep the low-end of the kick from getting too crazy.

once i get the kit blended well within itself, i throw on the headphones to see if the hits land where i want them to in the stereo field.

-ryan

[Brett Siler]

where they sound good

Very very genereally speaking hi tom about 45-50% to the left mid tom center and floor about 45-50% sometimes with metal they can go out further if don't want a more "natural" drum sound.

[barny15]

I kind of like them more organic, altho' with discernable right-to-left movement

this is exactly what i prefer for toms. hard panned "cannon" toms are a ton of fun, but what really excites me is having the drum kit sound like you're standing in the same room with the drummer rather than having the drum kit sound ridiculous.

[drumsound]

I pan them as if I'm sitting at the drums. I keep in mind how the drummer set up and try to make the toms make sense with the OH. On my personal drum-set, in my band the toms are a little wider because my small tom is under the hat and the mid tome is in the normal first tom spot and the floor tom in the normal spot.

[T-rex]

Drumsound, Is your small tom to the left of your HH, like you generally play it only with your left hand ala Gary Chester kind of stuff? Just curious.

Sometimes I pan mine like they sit with the kit. For me its rack tom left about 10:30 or 11:00 and the rack tom about 2:30 or 3:00. However, I recently recorded a song with my band using only OH's, BD, sn and one room mic, but there was a lot of tom work in the song (didn't know that going in, changed parts last minute - happy accident.) I panned the OH's hard L and R and it sounds great.

Here is one trick I learned at Joels workshop last year that I use all the time. Pan the toms hard left and right, but send them to a mono compressor, not stereo, for the thwack. So you get this sense of wide movement from left to right, but the mono comp track keeps the toms upfront and present down the middle so they don't seem too wide or unnatural. It works great and by adjusting the send or the comp's fader you can affect how wide or centered the toms sound. If youare feeling crazy you can ride that fader during fills and then all bets are off. . .

[palinilap]

For me its rack tom left about 10:30 or 11:00 and the rack tom about 2:30 or 3:00.

Same here. As a drummer I love for it to sound like I'm sitting behind the kit. So, floor tom is panned out farther than the ride tom.

[cgarges]

I generally pan them in the natural positions on the kit, unless the band wants otherwise. That makes them a little more phase-coherent in the overheads. Like, for me, in a standard four-piece kit, the rack tom often sits just slightly left of center, while the floor tom is farther right.

I used to go for the "wide-as-hell" toms, but I've gotten farther away from that in recent years.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

[objective]

rack: slightly left, maybe a touch further left with additional tom
floor: is to the right between 2:30 and 4:30 depending on style and total toms.

additional tom in between

and i usually do basic minimal EQ and let the drum buss comp. but i am really interested in working with T-Rex's mentioned/Joel's workshop. going to try it out. thank you

[drumsound]

Drumsound, Is your small tom to the left of your HH, like you generally play it only with your left hand ala Gary Chester kind of stuff? Just curious.

My 10" tome hangs off the the hat stand and is under the hats. I call it a 4 1/2 piece drum-set.

You can see it here. corry the size is big. I have no idea how to re-size things.

[T-rex]

Cool set up, thanks for the pic. I remember first seeing Dave Weckl play like that with like a 12 or 13 by the hh. I do that sometimes with a 13 rack or even 14 floor tom, it's nice to have an option over there.

[rydaken]

I guess I'm the odd man out. I like my toms LOUD & Proud. Bigger than life, and panned hard. The Transient Designer is great for 'em. Love it.....but I mostly work on pop records, so there you go.

Edit: Oh yeah, I almost always pan "Audience perspective".

[Skipwave]

I always pan the drums from the drummer's perspective. I can't stand it when they are panned from audience perspective. The toms are usually just their natural spread, sometimes with the floor close mic a little more to its side, but only if the room mic picked up a good amount of the low frequency energy from that drum.