My Sound Clinic

Most drum programs are self explanatory, enabling easy use and creative freedom. But getting them to sound right, or real, is whole other story. Below are a couple of settings that work brilliantly. They work equally as well for real drum setups when recording a live acoustic kit too. Note that these settings are pretty universal for metal and hard-rock sounds, but you may want to adjust to your preference.

Provided you have access to the EQ management try something that looks a little like this for your kick drum.

Notice the deep ‘V’ shape. This is not too dissimilar to the way most metallers have their guitar tone in the sense that the mids are heavily scooped out. On a guitar this helps accent the percussiveness of the playing, forming an aggressive chug. On a kick drum however it reduces the “boxiness” from the mix, taking away the sound which, to me, sounds like a huge balloon being burst in a concert hall!

Scoop out quite a lot from 125-500hz, but leave in a few more DB’s of the 125hz end, which helps deliver the punch of the bass frequencies.

Around the 50hz mark are your bass frequencies, which, seeing as it’s the bass drum you’re modelling, should be slightly boosted. If you raise them too much however they can boom a bit more than required, so just play with it until you find a nice balance.

Taking your 1k back just a tiny bit, the rest of the EQ should raise in an upwards slope, peaking at 4k to get the attack. These are your highs and provided you’re trying to get the thrash metal “click” then these must be boosted. Depending on how much attack you want of course, it’s all to taste, but if, like me, you’re a huge metal-head then the more click you’ve got the better! Listen to drummers such as Jason Bittner of Shadows Fall or Chris Adler from Lamb of God and you’ll hear an abundance of click in their kick pedal EQ, which aides greatly when cutting through the mix of thunderous guitars, and helps develop the overall aggressive sound.

As I mentioned, it’s not for everyone, and if you’re more partial to a typical rock sound then just roll back the highs and dial in a touch more of the mid frequencies.

Now, for the snare I’ve noticed there are no real rules. As with the kick it very much depends what the sample is like. I’m only basing mine on the fact that my samples are real drum hits recorded with a mic, or at least “real sounding”. Snares tend to be a bit trickier and what works with one snare might not work with another where as kicks tend to be a bit more universal.

These are the EQ settings I use for the snare that I have and it gives a nice heavy rock style crack, with plenty of oomph to cut through the mix of the heavy bass pedals. Now, it does take some playing around, but if you use this model as a blueprint for your snare then just adjust to taste depending on what sounds best for your sample. It’s good to find a snare that you like the sound of by listening to the bands that you like, then listen along to a song and try to emulate it. I’ve based mine on the very sort after Abe Cunningham (Deftones) sound.

Reverb is a great way to make a snare sing out and sound great. Over-use it though and it will sound out of place in context to the rest of the mix. Dial it in until it sounds reasonable, and then roll it back a touch (you always over-use to begin with).

Happy programming!

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In my endless search for that perfect tone I came across another avenue of possibilities. There are so many factors to take into account when approaching tone, depending on how meticulous you are of course, right down to the size of your speakers and the grain of the wood that they are mounted in.

String tension is my newest venture and it’s one of great impact. The gauge of string that you use can vary your sound massively. Because the actual mechanical movement of the string varies with its width you can therefore control the range of tones coming from it. Generally it’s quite self explanatory, the thicker the gauge the bassier and rounder the sound.

I chase a tone that’s chuggy, percussive, responsive, yet clear with a slightly scooped mid. I tend to use very light strings at the treble end and thicker strings at the bass end (9 – 46 with a 50 for the B string on my 7 strings). I like the way they feel, you can bend with ease and if you have a lot of control then you can command a massive range of sounds through them. A lot of people don’t like light strings because of the slack tension which is another factor – tone vs playability. It’s all about finding the optimum medium. For example; fast alternate picking can become clumsy on lighter strings because the string doesn’t return to centre very quickly, which is why mine thicken up as the pitch gets lower to provide a much more even tension.

Lighter strings can be combated of course with a lighter attack with your pick, but a lot of people can’t find the control. At speed your picking tends to become more aggressive as the muscles in your arm contract, so people up the gauge. Opt for a gauge that’s really thick though and you lose all clarity all together. For some people this is the desired consequence (I know people who have a .52 for an E string, and a .65 for B!!) but it’s not for me.

Heavier strings, therefore, do not mean heavier sound. The key is to experiment and find your perfect match taking into account all the factors. I manage to get a massively chuggy and heavy sound out of my strings because of the way they vibrate in context to my picking attack. Try it out for yourself.

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Here’s a quick lesson I found interesting from the messiah himself, Mr Joe Satriani. Enjoy.

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I’m not going to lie, Floyd Rose trems are utter bastards to begin with. The first time I changed the strings on a Floyd I was completely baffled, it was just a nightmare. I’d never had one before, never been shown or read how to do it, so I had to take it to the music store and get a tech to show me. When you’ve done it once or twice though it’s easy.

Here’s a quick and easy step by step set up so you don’t get as perplexed as I did, ready to chuck your axe out the nearest window!

Checklist:

• Pliers
• Alan Keys
• Screwdriver (Philips)

Firstly, snip the ball off the end of your strings.

You don’t put your strings through anything on a Floyd, you simply place the snipped tip into the saddle block

and tighten with the Alan key bolt until it’s secure.

You then take the other end of the string and place it through the machine head as normal and bring the string to pitch.

I tend to alternate the order of pitch of string I put on, i.e. rather than go up (E, A, D, G, B, E), I go low E, high E, A, B, D, G as to balance the tension evenly.

As you bring each string to pitch you may realise that the other strings become flat in pitch. This is because all the strings are sharing the tension of the springs that hold the bridge in place. So as one string tightens it releases tension off of other strings so they will begin to detune. Do not worry, once the strings are settled they will become balanced. I recommend tightening each string a little at a time. As you tune each string give them a stretch.

The string will detune, but re-tune it to pitch and repeat the process until you can stretch it without having to re-tune.

At some point the bridge will probably begin to rise,

and this is particularly noticeable if you’re using a heavier gauge of string to the previous set. If you open up the back plate of your guitar you will notice the two or three springs held onto a toothed plate that is screwed into your guitar.

You need to tighten this until the plate of the bridge is level with your guitar’s body. Similarly, if the bridge has dropped too low then you need to loosen the screws so the string tension lets it rise again until it’s level. Remember: this will change the pitch of your guitar, so you will have to re-tune, then re-balance, and repeat until you find the perfect medium.

Finally, clamp the locking nuts down and fine tune with the microtuners on the bridge. Now you can dive-bomb until your heart’s content without losing pitch!! Happy shredding.

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