So this week I’m mixing an EP at Starbucks – on headphones!
I know, I’m a crazy person. Sometimes you gotta change it up and challenge yourself, just to keep the creative juices flowing.
This EP was written based around drum loops and I’m trying to make them pop in the mix, even though I can’t EQ or compress the individual elements like kick, snare, or toms.
In today’s video I show you an old school technique applied in a powerful way to get more out of your drum loops, all while retaining musicality and dynamics.
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My name is Graham Cochrane and I'm the founder of The Recording Revolution, one of the world's most loved audio recording and mixing blogs with over 200,000 readers each month. 
This was great, Graham. I did something similar to this about a year ago but instead of doing loops, we used just two overheads to mic the kit and duplicated the tracks to give it some thump and some sizzle. It was cool. Didn’t think of doing it with loops before, though.
Yeah, good idea! That would be a nice way to add some life to a pretty simple drum recording. Very nice!
This is so great! This is also really great advice/workflow for a single mic drum kit recording, which I will be doing very soon 🙂
Hey Graham,
What about phase cancellation?
If you’re getting phase cancellation issues, try using a “Linear Phase” EQ plugin. If my understanding is correct, it should solve your phase problems, although it sounds somewhat different from a “normal” EQ.
That said, I do parallel processing pretty often, and haven’t yet run into any phase issues. A regular ol’ EQ usually works for me 🙂
For this technique, phase shouldn’t be an issue, especially in mono, cuz you should be adding all the way. If you have that problem, it would likely be the result of latency–just a guess there, really. If you’re worried, you can always flip your invert switch and see what happens. 🙂
@Charlotte: Reason has no latency issues in parallel channels because they are from the same source and processed by the same channel strips (same amount of CPU and Buffer use on every channel) … you shouldn’t have any phase cancellation problems at all (as you can actually hear on this video)
@Graham: Man, it sounds really good… congratulations.
Nice track Graham, really reminds me of Steely Dan in some ways (which is not a bad thing), maybe the the tone of the Vocal that does it, anyway great vid as usual.
BTW wheres my coffee?
I used this sort of trick once to create a “room mic” track on an acoustic drum kit recording.
I actually recorded the drums myself, but for some reason the room mic recording got lost or corrupted. I didn’t find this out until much later, after all the other instruments were recorded and I was starting the mix. I didn’t want to re-record, but I did want a room track, so that I could compress it and give that energetic “roomy” feel to the drums.
So, I created a parallel track of the overheads. I set up a reverb and EQ to make it sound like a room mic recording. And then I squashed it to death with a compressor, as I usually do to a room mic track.
In the end, I wouldn’t say that this is a replacement for a legit room mic recording. But given the circumstances, it was a much easier solution than re-recording the drum kit.
Thanks for sharing this. Never thought about using loops in that way making copies of the drum loop track to eq it separately. You give me something to try out
Hey Graham – If you’re using headphones for mix references, or in this case, to mix, what’s your preference?
Hi Lennon,
Looks like he’s actually using Apple earbuds in this video, which is pretty cool.
I think the bottom line is, any headphones/earbuds will work, as long as the quality is decent, and you *learn* what good music sounds like on them. If you listen to a ton of good sounding mixes on your headphones, you will be able to create your own good sounding mixes by replicating their sound.
That said, I can tell you what I use if it’s helpful. When I mix on headphones, I use the Audio Technica ATH-M40fs. They are by no means the best headphones out there, but they do have a nice flat response which I like.
I’m thinking of getting a pair of AKG k702’s at some point. They are open back, so they should have better bass response. People also recommend the Sennheiser HD650’s, or HD800’s, but they’re a bit more expensive.
Just my 2 cents. Sorry to hijack your question, but hopefully this was helpful for you 🙂
@Lennon – I’m using KRK 8400s and my Apple EarPods. Listening back to mixes in the car, at home, and in the studio. Then going back and tweaking at Starbucks. Coming along nicely so far!
Most of us home studio midi_ots use drum loops. My drum loops are going to sound better. Thats A nice groove in your song..
Nice tip! I’ve done this before to a degree, but you take it a step further.
I like this track a lot, by the way! It has a good sound. The piano is a bit tame, though. If you’d like a fresher piano take, get in touch. I’d love to play on the track for you.
I really like this one. It gives a lot of control over room mic recordings.
I love what you’re doing. Keep it up.
Freakish stuff. Combine three channels of the same loop, whoa! Never would have thought. But then i see it’s all about adjusting the frequencies to maximize tone so that they don’t end-up clashing but actually synergizing for extra pump and body in a complementary way, nice stuff Graham!
I laughed when i saw you take a swig of the coffee, but you only did it once, alas, i wanted to see you swig-away during the whole video LOL.
But when seeing you maintain focus and coherency while in public doing this video says a lot about your character. God bless you brother!
Anyway, fabulastic, really. We have our own personal tutor, and he always explains what’s what, and what he’s doing at every stage of the process, like when telling us what copy of what track was what, and that this is another parallel copy of the original and not a copy of the first copy etc. That’s how you do it; here we have a man with the foresight to give quick explanatory comments to make sure we don’t get confused. Thankyou Graham! You actually have no idea how thankful i am to you. Nonetheless, i’ll be purchasing some of your tutorial series in the future when i’m cashed-up. Cheers bro.
PS: Can’t wait to see your “Recording revolution” App on Android (hopefully), i never have had an iPhone and never will.
Thanks Forde!
This is the exact same technique I used on a track from my latest EP! I was using a couple of prettypretty basic mono drum loops from a loop pedal.
There are so many possibilities with this parallel processing technique. I ended up with something like
Track 1: high hats and sizzle
Track 2: very high freq/ air with mid/side processing
Track 3: snare pop
Track 4: snare with big saturation
Track 5: Deep deep kick
Track 6: Room Mic imitation using reverb and compression
Then for the chorus I added two extra snares with parallel precessing
I found that when using a mono loop, if you’re careful enough you can even isolate certain frequencies for panning
Tim Luxter
Great song Graham – and very useful turorial! I think it’s important to realize that a great sounding album / EP / song can be made with whatever gear you have if you know how to use it.
This is cool information! I’m so glad I subscribed to this blog. I can actually do this in my “DAW.”
I discovered and executed something like this on my own, though the results I was aiming for were a bit more far-out than these. I heard some overtones in a, er, um, “deliberately noisy reverb track” (let’s just call it that for now, or we’ll be here all night), adding notes to my chords, and I hunted them down and brought them out using a parallel track.
I turned a riff-heavy A minor into an extended Am6/9 in this manner, but you’d have to be paying attention to notice it. }:)
Nice tip Graham, Thanks!
Sounds like you are evolving, I like it.
Nice tip, so what was the Drum Chorus track for, what processing and result did you get?
Ended up not using it. It’s empty. Need to delete it 🙂
As always, great video! I’ve used some of logics drummer stuff but the bite is missing at times. Can’t wait to experiment! Also could you share the name of the artist for this song. I’d love to support them on this or any past releases. I love their sound! Thanks for all you do!
The artist is… me 🙂
Glad to see you’ve gotten back to the EP.
Yep! Life got in the way for a few months.
Thank you so much, Graham. We couldn’t have produced our own record without you.
Great video! I love it and will be using this method in the future. Where can I buy your music? I love that song.
Will be available early 2015. Current EP is here: http://www.nimbitmusic.com/grahamcochrane
Awesome! Going to try that. What a BRILLIANT track, I love the feel of it.
Mate you need realise that there are a lot of recording/mix engineers that want to see more quality videos,
Cheers
Thanks, haven’t thought of doing this to drum loops.
Dude, this is amazing stuff. Totally inspired me to demo out Reason – the console mixer is one of the coolest ideas in audio software right now. If you could use plugins, I would be completely sold (but even then, the lack of plugins kind of forces you to mix properly). I wish more DAWs would implement features like this!
Hi Graham –
At first I was expecting you to talk about multi-band compression – and I was surprised and happy to find out the subject was a lot more straightforward. 😉 But what would the difference be between the two solutions? I assume parallel processing allowing more fine-grained tuning of what elements you want to bring out (by using hi/lo pass filters, gates, etc, which you could not do with a compressor unless you multi-tracked it as well).
G
This is an awesome song Graham! How did you write it? Was it the original method with the acoustic guitar, or did you change it up for this EP?
Check out the Creativity Switch video I referenced above – it’ll explain how I wrote this song.
Graham,
This track sounds reaaally cool! I like the vocal, it fits in very well.
Very catchy, very fresh. Can’t wait hear the whole EP.
Regards,
This is a wonderful tip. The possibilities are endless. Thanks.
Cy
This is a sick mix. I love how unique it is and that guitar solo in the verse sounds perrrrfect. You nailed this one. Thanks for helping so many people with recording while praising the Lord with your music!
Hey Graham, Will you send me an Email, notifying when this song becomes available.
I’m pretty sure this track will catch the public’s Ear!
ROGER GERVAIS,Owner
Gervais Service
P.O. Box 873
Hermitage Tn 37076
(615) 773-2044
[email protected]
You got it.
Thanks for another great video, Graham! Really great lateral thinking on applying parallel compression!
Have to add my vote to the “Awesome Song” category. It hooked me right away! Loved this video too. Very good demonstration of parallel processing.
Long time viewer, first time caller. 🙂 excellent stuff here, Graham. I am a devout practitioner of parallel processing and this is a very clear, concise approach. Nice to see Reason being used. I think some people still think you can’t get good sounding mixes out of it. It’s the carpenter, not the tools. Thanks so much for sharing and I am now off to Dueling Mixes to join up. See you there.
Thanks Michael. Honored to have you join Dueling Mixes!
Nice song, bro. Will look it up
Dude this helps so muchh!!! I mean especially for Hip Hop producers who are constantly working with loops and samples. Bless you!