The Return To 4-Track / Compressing Drums Help Please!

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CBA713
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The Return To 4-Track / Compressing Drums Help Please!

Post by CBA713 » Sat Oct 01, 2011 11:53 am

Hi there. Longtime TapeOp reader/subscriber and forum lurker, first post.

I'll try to make this detailed and quick. I got started with recording on a Tascam Porta 02 in my closet ("studio") in 1999. Moved onto a Boss BR-8 in 2005. Now using Logic Pro Studio 9 on my Macbook Pro. Long story short: Not having fun.

I was re-reading my TapeOp Book from about a decade ago and got super-inspired to record my fuzzpop power trio on a Tascam 4-track, preferably a 424 mkII or mkIII once I get a hold of one (PLEASE answer your Craigslist replies, jerks.).

Anyway, I was wondering about pretty basic drum recording techniques with a cassette 4-track. I want a 424 mkII or mkIII so I can record four tracks simultaneously using the Glyn Johns method (the method I use with Logic anyway). However, I'm super keen on not doing a whole lot of processing/producing of the tracks post-recording. Yes, I'm going to cheat and mixdown to Logic and perhaps do some VERY MINIMAL editing, but not a lot.

THUS: I'm wondering about recording 4-tracks of simultaneous drums to the 424 mkII/III and what you might recommend for like a preamp or compression... or whether I should just not bother with those for the most part, record direct, and then do a little bit of all that while mixing.

I have a Presonus Bluetube Preamp which can handle two signals, and can borrow an Art Tube Preamp from a friend. But what about compression? For my case, would that typically be done with a four-channel (or more) compressor? Or should I not ever really bother with that?

Drums and preamp/compression is pretty much the only thing I'm having trouble understanding, otherwise vocals, guitars, and bass aren't so complicated.

THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY ANALOG HEART.

C

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Post by drumsound » Sat Oct 01, 2011 12:28 pm

Compression is a huge can of worms. It might not even need compression. Hit the tape hard and see if you like that. Are you only recording drums to the 4-track? If not, how do you have your track counts planned?

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Post by CBA713 » Sat Oct 01, 2011 12:51 pm

Hello friend.

Welp, I'm going to try a whole bunch of different things regarding drum tracking.

What I have in mind to try first is to play live along with our drummer, record 4-tracks of drums using the Glyn Johns method, and totally take up all 4-tracks. Then I'm going to mix that down to Logic, either as two tracks or four, then probably bounce that back to the tape and go from there. It may take some of the "glory" out of 4-track recording, but I'm over that. This whole thing is supposed to be about simplicity and spontaneity.

Re: compression, I may just do exactly what you say. I don't understand it beyond the sound, just like with EQ. I'd like to keep it to little desktop units like my preamp or the JoeMeek ThreeQ that I used to have... and I don't think there are any "bigger" compressors that aren't rackmounted. Like I said, I don't really understand it.

I also wonder what would happen if I just used what I had, like if I have the two channel preamp, and use that for kick and snare, and then like one of the overheads with compression, and call it good.

I don't know! :)

Thanks!

C

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Post by Gregg Juke » Sun Oct 02, 2011 6:17 am

Experiment, but you might find that tape-compression (natural outgrowth of recording at a decent level) will be enough.

About "playing along" with the drummer-- How will you isolate your ____(guitar, I'm assuming?) from the drum tracks? You'll want to avoid bleed if you're going for isolated 4-track drums only.

GJ

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Post by farview » Sun Oct 02, 2011 9:55 am

Here is something else that I'm not sure you've thought of: Tape speed on those cassette 4 tracks isn't always constant.

If you record the drums, run them to the computer, and dump down a mix back onto the 4 track, what you perform to the mixed down drums will not necessarily line up in time with the separated drum tracks in Logic. Lining subsequent tracks up to the original drums is going to be a pain in the butt in the first place, but the timing will probably drift over the course of the song too.

I found this out the hard way a long time ago.

To answer your question about compressing the drums: In your situation, I would compress a stereo mixdown of the drums if compression was necessary at all. It's up to you if you when in the process you want to do that.

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Post by CBA713 » Sun Oct 02, 2011 11:01 am

Thanks for all the talkback, friends!

The issue of timedrift was more of a hypothetical thing in my mind, but I'm glad you pointed that out. At minimum I was going to have to sync like 10-12 tracks, and it would most likely end up being a maddening experience.

For "playing along" with the drummer, I was going to isolate the stuff as much as possible, but then I also read another thread here (something about "60s/70s sounds") where they just dealt with bleed from the live performances, and perhaps that's why a lot of those records sound the way they do. Mind you, I'm not really going for a 60s/70s sound with my fuzzpop trio... but not as lo-fi as early Guided By Voices, either. Actually, my specific example of what I'd like to do is on an old recording of "I Swear It's True" by Weezer, which I believe was done on a cassette 8-track in maybe '93. I'll see if I can link that:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVpIVCBx0Ow

I want my recording to sound pretty muche exactly like that! :D

For better or worse, I just bought (off straight impulse) a Tascam 488 mkII off eBay for $149. I hadn't even considered that, but I figured I'd pick it up as I've got time and a bit of scratch to experiment.

I may even just do two tracks of drums... MAYBE. We'll see. What with the timedrift issue, I'm sure I'll have to do some creative stuff, otherwise I might just try to squeeze it all onto 8 tracks!

P.S. I always thought the cassette 8-tracks were supposed to have lower-fidelity because it's cramming 8 tracks on to the tape instead of 4... so naturally I assumed that it was "splitting" the tape into 1/8ths on the 8-track instead of 1/4s on a 4-track. Apparently I'm totally wrong.

Thanks again!

C

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Post by Snarl 12/8 » Sun Oct 02, 2011 12:57 pm

CBA713 wrote: P.S. I always thought the cassette 8-tracks were supposed to have lower-fidelity because it's cramming 8 tracks on to the tape instead of 4... so naturally I assumed that it was "splitting" the tape into 1/8ths on the 8-track instead of 1/4s on a 4-track. Apparently I'm totally wrong.
No. You've got this right. 8-track 1/4" tape would be the same fidelity as 4-track cassette assuming same tape speed, tape formulation, quality of transport/heads/electronics, etc., etc. 8 tracks cassette production might be as good/better quality if it led to much less track bouncing though. When I first heard a 1/2" 8-track after years of using my 1/4 8-track I was pretty bummed at how much better the 1/2" sounded. It might have been running faster too, now that I think about it. It was just so much clearer and punchier.

Edit: BTW when I listen to that weezer track I can't help thinking that a little compression on the way in wouldn't hurt you. Taking a couple db off the kick and snare while you're tracking might make it easier to get that sound come mix time. The OH's sound pretty squashed too. I haven't recorded that much on 4-track, so I can't remember how much of that you can get via the tape. But that weezer stuff sounds pretty compressed and with a fast attack time too. (Not much transients. Pretty mushy.) But there's no faster compressor than tape, IMO.
Carl Keil

Almost forgot: Please steal my drum tracks. and more.

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Post by Gregg Juke » Sun Oct 02, 2011 7:18 pm

The reason I mention bleed issues is that if you're planning on over-dubbing guitar/keys/bass/whatever, it might be a problem if you don't play exactly what you did on the practice/guide takes.

Since you're not going for pristine, separate drum tracks, it may not be a big deal, but if you have guitar or bass in the snare or b.d. track, for instance, and it doesn't match the other parts (of the same instrument) that you're playing, it could be a problem. And once it's there, you can't "undo" it.

GJ

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Post by Mane1234 » Mon Oct 03, 2011 5:23 am

Do you have any way to borrow a mixer that you can submix your drums down to one channel and run that into the four track? That would help keep your drums in order and then you could either go back overdub to your drum track or just record everyone at the same time. Bleed from other tracks is not always a bad thing. I use a 424 MKIII to record stuff for my band and I've gotten by with just using an EV RE15 on the drum kit. It sounds pretty good for just one mic.
Of course I've had it in the ear before.....

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Post by farview » Mon Oct 03, 2011 6:24 am

CBA713 wrote: but then I also read another thread here (something about "60s/70s sounds") where they just dealt with bleed from the live performances, and perhaps that's why a lot of those records sound the way they do.
The trick to that is recording everything at once. The bleed is actually the keeper track of that instrument. If there is bleed that doesn't match up to the 'real' performance, that can cause problems. Worst case, you made a mistake on the guitar while tracking the drums, even though you retracked the guitar, the mistake will still be in the drum mics.


CBA713 wrote:P.S. I always thought the cassette 8-tracks were supposed to have lower-fidelity because it's cramming 8 tracks on to the tape instead of 4... so naturally I assumed that it was "splitting" the tape into 1/8ths on the 8-track instead of 1/4s on a 4-track. Apparently I'm totally wrong.
You are not wrong. They are lower fidelity, but cassette is lower fidelity than just about anything else you can record on now. So it's a matter of degrees.

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Post by CBA713 » Mon Oct 03, 2011 11:22 am

Hello again friends. Let's see if I can answer everything that I'd like to and then add a few thoughts/questions of my own.

1. Re: Bleed. I think as far as "messing things up" while I'm tracking the drums, regarding like a flub on the guitar or bass and then having to overdub over the bleed with a "correct" part... the point of returning to a 4-track (or 8-track in my case if the Tascam 488 mkII works out) is to capture a performance. To return to being a good musician. Thus, while I would try to keep the live bleed from the guitars at a minimum while recording drums, the performance will have to be of the utmost quality regarding the whole band... that way, if there IS guitar/bass bleed over a great drum part, it won't matter too much because the performances will be record quality anyway. It might even help to fatten up the guitar sound in the end. Does this sound crazy? I do plan on doing overdubs for all of the guitars for the "true" take, but I plan on overdubbing over a complete drum performance with the guitar performances that bleed over being played properly.

2. Re: Tape width, fidelity, 8-track cassette v. 4-track cassette. I'm a little confused on this front... and let us not get into the inferiority of cassette tape to various mediums. I'm not trying to find the "best" medium, I'm trying to understand tape and how it works (sure, 20 years too late, but oh well). So, in general, you've got:

-cassette tape which has a width of 1/8"?
-reel-to-reel which can have a width of anywhere from 1/4" to 1/2" to misc?

My original query was on how a CASSETTE 4-track records vs. how a cassette 8-track records. I figured that the individual tracks on a 4-track (like the 424 mkII) cassette recording would have better fidelity because it is splitting the 1/8" of tape into fourths, i.e. four tracks. Whereas I figured the individual tracks on a cassette 8-track (like the 488 mkII) would have lower fidelity because it is splitting up the 1/8" of tape into EIGHTHS, giving each track less tape width and perhaps therefore lower fidelity?

^^^But apparently this is not so, and is also dependent on the heads, etc., which I have read are superior on the 488 as opposed to the 424.

Also: I read in the 488 profile on www.homerecording.com that a gent put his 424 4-track recording into his 488 and his four tracks were still separated, PLUS the additional extra four that the 488 now provided... yet still in the same fidelity. That I don't get.

3. Recording drums via a small mixer: I have thought about doing that with the drums, and then recording it all onto one track... or two if possible. However, I don't really want to use more than four mics, and wouldn't the standalone mixer be the same as the mixer on the 424 or 488? I could plug in the same four sources and record them all on to one track, couldn't I? Or two? I figured that this was the reason a mixer was included on those machines.

4. Re: The drums on the Weezer recording: So does it sound like that whole demo could have been done on a cassette 8-track? Seems to me like the drums aren't panned at all, straight down the middle, leading me to believe they were all recorded onto one track with a separate mixer or with two to four inputs on whatever recording device they were using, putting that onto two tracks and not panning them for the mixdown.

5. Re: Compressor: Can anyone recommend a true two-channel desktop compressor? It almost looks like the Really Nice Compressor can do that, but I don't think you can split the two stereo channels into two separate mono channels. I'd prefer something not rack-mounted, but I don't know if a two-channel compressor like that exists.


THANK YOU ALL!

C

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Post by Gregg Juke » Mon Oct 03, 2011 11:41 am

Hi again,

That's a lot of questions/statements, and I shall defer to my fellow Oppers for some of the responses, but I did want to say, regarding this:

>>>>I do plan on doing overdubs for all of the guitars for the "true" take, but I plan on overdubbing over a complete drum performance with the guitar performances that bleed over being played properly.<<<<

The curse/blessing is, you're not a machine, and you will never play it _exactly_ the same again. As long as they're pretty close, and you don't mind a little bleedy ambience in the tracks, go for it. But there will be subtle differences, hence the standard(s) that most people have learned to abide by-- 1) record it all at once and take it as it is, as a one-time performance, _or_ 2) build the piece track-by-track, recording each instrument with as much isolation as possible.

PLUS, you are putting a lot more pressure on both/all of you, because now not only does the drummer have to "nail" the perfect take, but so does everybody else, or the whole shebang is out the window and you're back to square-one.

But what the hey, give it a shot. You may be the one guy that can pull it off, or, you'll learn like everybody else that that may not be the best approach.

GJ

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Post by farview » Tue Oct 04, 2011 6:44 am

CBA713 wrote: 2. Re: Tape width, fidelity, 8-track cassette v. 4-track cassette. I'm a little confused on this front... and let us not get into the inferiority of cassette tape to various mediums. I'm not trying to find the "best" medium, I'm trying to understand tape and how it works (sure, 20 years too late, but oh well). So, in general, you've got:

-cassette tape which has a width of 1/8"?
-reel-to-reel which can have a width of anywhere from 1/4" to 1/2" to misc?

My original query was on how a CASSETTE 4-track records vs. how a cassette 8-track records. I figured that the individual tracks on a 4-track (like the 424 mkII) cassette recording would have better fidelity because it is splitting the 1/8" of tape into fourths, i.e. four tracks. Whereas I figured the individual tracks on a cassette 8-track (like the 488 mkII) would have lower fidelity because it is splitting up the 1/8" of tape into EIGHTHS, giving each track less tape width and perhaps therefore lower fidelity?
This is correct.
CBA713 wrote:Also: I read in the 488 profile on www.homerecording.com that a gent put his 424 4-track recording into his 488 and his four tracks were still separated, PLUS the additional extra four that the 488 now provided... yet still in the same fidelity. That I don't get.
This didn't happen. You need to stay out of the SAS (substance abuse forum) when you are trying to find facts.


CBA713 wrote:3. Recording drums via a small mixer: I have thought about doing that with the drums, and then recording it all onto one track... or two if possible. However, I don't really want to use more than four mics, and wouldn't the standalone mixer be the same as the mixer on the 424 or 488? I could plug in the same four sources and record them all on to one track, couldn't I? Or two? I figured that this was the reason a mixer was included on those machines.
IF you record the drums to two tracks, you will have two open for the guitar, bass or what ever is playing with the drums. If you use an external mixer, you will have two open inputs for those instruments.

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Post by nick_a » Tue Oct 04, 2011 9:54 pm

dude, I think the only way you'll know about any of this is just by trying some shit out and seeing what you think. The whole reason cassette multitrack machines were made, in my opinion, was to remove a lot of the variables that have been considered in the above posts from consideration. They're supposed to be accessible and easy. They're supposed to reduce the amount of time spent for set-up and increase the amount of time spent playing and recording. Try bouncing drums within the 8 track, and using the remaining now available tracks to finish out overdubs. Try doing the thingy where you dump drums into logic and bounce them back out. Try it all. It's gonna sound cool any way you slice it.

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Post by CBA713 » Thu Oct 06, 2011 10:59 am

nick_a wrote:dude, I think the only way you'll know about any of this is just by trying some shit out and seeing what you think. The whole reason cassette multitrack machines were made, in my opinion, was to remove a lot of the variables that have been considered in the above posts from consideration. They're supposed to be accessible and easy. They're supposed to reduce the amount of time spent for set-up and increase the amount of time spent playing and recording. Try bouncing drums within the 8 track, and using the remaining now available tracks to finish out overdubs. Try doing the thingy where you dump drums into logic and bounce them back out. Try it all. It's gonna sound cool any way you slice it.

Solid advice. I keep forgetting to keep it at the level you are suggesting... need to stay there.

I bought an ART VLA-II 2-channel compressor for fun. We'll see how that goes.

THANK YOU ALL!

C

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