pan your drums out of the center

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nicholasdover
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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by nicholasdover » Thu May 14, 2020 6:12 am

I listened to Son Of A Preacher on headphones a couple of weeks ago and it's very LCR - only thing in the middle is Dusty, bass and drums all right except drum verb in left, guitars all left I think I remember correctly. Then listened to the Aretha version and it had same layout! So I've given it a go on a song that has kind of 60's sounds and really enjoying it, but it's taken surprisingly long to acclimatise to that arrangement, given that I don't really bat an eyelid at Preacher! My drums were mono OH anyway so that's no loss. I've yet to lay down vocal, just trying to set the scene in LCR.

Also, separately, I did a trio album a few months back where despite the drummer being a kind of techy Mark Giuliana type guy, the music was actually pretty open and feely, and the leader was super sensitive to subtlety like panning, compression, reverb, levels, and he loved hearing the drums about 15% one side, bass centre, him 15% other way just because it totally made sense to his sonic memory from having his amp to one side of him - my studio is one open space so no headphones, guess that means proper listeners like him will get a very real sense of it, and drums centred is not part of that memory unless you sit directly facing them!

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by drumsound » Fri May 15, 2020 6:54 pm

frans_13 wrote:
Thu May 14, 2020 4:30 am
I had the topic audience vs. drummer perspective come up not even half a dozend times in 35 years. For mixing live i think the question isn't too hard, right? I had considerable more lefthanded drummers live.

For recording, if the drummer says so and the band is okay: fine. I usually never place the snare in the center of the mix, because it rarely IS in the center of the drumset. Having my overheads not at 90° to the kickdrum but rather 90° to an imaginary line kickdrum-snare, which usually puts them a good deal clockwise, seen from above. To get the whole drumset evenly positioned in the stereo picture in the overheads, then the spot mics are panned to match the overheads. The floor tom doesn't end up far out and the snare does end up at maybe 12:30 or 13:00. I make up for this with the main guitar on the opposite side, so the distribution of level isn't lopsided.

Next time i'll ask the band if i should record the whole thing from "keyboarders perspective". Not.
I started doing the line through the SD and BD placement for overheads several years ago. For me as a player I think of the snare as both the physical and sonic center of the drums, and I want that to come through in the recordings. And BD off center it too distracting for me to deal with in rock/pop/soul/funk, anything with a backbeat. I'm always trying to have that solid center.

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by vernier » Sat May 16, 2020 1:23 pm

joninc wrote:
Thu May 07, 2020 4:48 pm
i dare you. :P
There's no center in my rig, lol ...just mono left, mono right, and not linked.

Drums hard panned right during verses . . https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODt90AwrZpc

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by digitaldrummer » Mon May 18, 2020 6:50 am

I thought of this thread from years ago. Too bad the file attachment is not available because it was a great example of where non-centered panning really worked for the drums. A bad-ass tune as well. But maybe Red Rockets Glare is still around somewhere? Brian Whelan can be found, but nothing listed from back in 2006. :lol:

viewtopic.php?f=21&t=31728&p=289510&hil ... ss#p289510
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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by crow » Tue May 19, 2020 9:13 pm

I love the Zach Barocas story.

One more vote for drummer's perspective because in order to hear individual drums "panned" in real life, you have to be reeeeeally close to the kit. If you're out in the crowd at a show, you're not going to hear the hi hat off to your right and the ride way of to your left. So then the choice is to hear the kit from the perspective of a person standing right in front of the kit or of the drummer. Air-drumming brings such joy to so many; I like to support that.
Full disclosure: I did recently listen to an old favorite record (I've already forgotten which) on headphones, and noticed for the first time that it was panned audience perspective.

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by nicholasdover » Fri May 22, 2020 3:31 am

crow wrote:
Tue May 19, 2020 9:13 pm
...in order to hear individual drums "panned" in real life, you have to be reeeeeally close to the kit.
A drummer friend did a recording at my place and asked for hats and toms more spread out - when I said, "Dude, you know you're the only person in either band or audience who hears your drums like that? From more than a couple of steps back your whole kit just comes from one place" he really laughed, had never considered it! It was a live recording in one big room so the kit had loads of dimension, it was funny he specifically wanted separate drums in different spots in what was otherwise a big natural sound.

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by vvv » Fri May 22, 2020 9:40 am

Hmmm ...

Pretty sure I've been at shows where the toms were panned when they were a featured part.

"In the Air Tonight"-type stuff, but also floor tom Bo Diddley-type and Goth-type stuff.

But of course, that's not the usual.
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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by T-rex » Thu Jul 30, 2020 8:08 am

Several years ago I went through an LCR phase. Lately I’ve been compacting the drums so they resemble their actual physical space on stage more and getting away from hyper wide stereo stuff. Depends on the song, but definitely less panning of drums than I used to do. I’m an atheist, so I go back and forth on drummer’s perspective. :D

I did do a remix of one of my old bands songs with drums mono left (iirc) and it was awesome. Just don’t get the opportunity to really make that work that often.

On the jazz stuff I totally agree with the exception of the early Marsalis trio records. I think Jeff Tain is mono left on a few of those and I found it distracting. Rudy took his secrets to the grave apparently!
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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by apropos of nothing » Thu Jul 30, 2020 2:05 pm

I'm gonna do a jam where I pan the kick and snare hard left and right just to upset everyone. All toms and cymbals straight up the middle. or maybe 15% left.

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by drumsound » Thu Jul 30, 2020 11:41 pm

apropos of nothing wrote:
Thu Jul 30, 2020 2:05 pm
I'm gonna do a jam where I pan the kick and snare hard left and right just to upset everyone. All toms and cymbals straight up the middle. or maybe 15% left.
BWAHAHHAHAHA.

I will totally HATE that, but go for it anyway. If the music is cool, I'll get over it.

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by vernier » Wed Aug 12, 2020 1:05 pm

Over all, I like mono recordings best.

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Re: pan your drums out of the center

Post by markjazzbassist » Wed Aug 12, 2020 1:10 pm

vernier wrote:
Wed Aug 12, 2020 1:05 pm
Over all, I like mono recordings best.
Even when listening with headphones? i don't.

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