Recording To A Click - Never Loud Enough

[ScumBum]

I have a hard time recording to a click because I can never hear it in the headphones . Is there any tricks to get a nice mix in the headphones where the click and the music can be heard without killing yourself from the insane volume of CLICK CLICK CLICK CLICK !!!!!!!!

[Pawel]

Hi, you can try some high isolation phones like the EX-29 or the Ultraphones, so you cut out more the acoustic sound of the drums and you can use lower volumes inside tha cans.

Direct Sound Extreme Isolation Headphones
hearing protection stereo headphones, video drum lessons, drum methods, at GK-Music.com

Or you can try a vibrating metronome like the Peterson BodyBeat Sync, which can also be connected to a pc and sync via midi to your recording software.
That way you just have to Feel it and not hear it.

Peterson Strobe Tuners - BBS-1 Wireless Pulsating Metronome

[trevoire520]

Try a different click sound. In PT the stock click is a annoying beep that gets lost really easily. Using the Trillium Lane click set on woodblock is much easier to hear imo.

[ScumBum]

Originally Posted by Pawel

Hi, you can try some high isolation phones like the EX-29 or the Ultraphones, so you cut out more the acoustic sound of the drums and you can use lower volumes inside tha cans.

Direct Sound Extreme Isolation Headphones
hearing protection stereo headphones, video drum lessons, drum methods, at GK-Music.com

Or you can try a vibrating metronome like the Peterson BodyBeat Sync, which can also be connected to a pc and sync via midi to your recording software.
That way you just have to Feel it and not hear it.

Peterson Strobe Tuners - BBS-1 Wireless Pulsating Metronome

That BBS-1 Wireless Pulsating Metronome is perfect ! Thanks a million , I'm getting one .

[biggator6]

Isolation headphones.

[joeq]

That metronome looks very cool. I want one, too.

I must say however, that in my experience, the 'never enough click' syndrome is rarely cured by purely physical means. Louder clicks, different click sounds and isolation phones are all useful methods when you are recording NOW and need to scramble for a solution.

Long term, the issue is with the drummer, not the click.

I think pounding clicks are mostly needed because the drummer is fighting the click. The more he works with the click, and relaxes into it, and gets comfortable playing to a click, and gets comfortable playing with headphones on, the softer that click can be.

Some guys get it down to a whisper - and those guys are the ones who really lock in, so go figure.

[ScumBum]

Originally Posted by joeq

That metronome looks very cool. I want one, too.

I must say however, that in my experience, the 'never enough click' syndrome is rarely cured by purely physical means. Louder clicks, different click sounds and isolation phones are all useful methods when you are recording NOW and need to scramble for a solution.

Long term, the issue is with the drummer, not the click.

I think pounding clicks are mostly needed because the drummer is fighting the click. The more he works with the click, and relaxes into it, and gets comfortable playing to a click, and gets comfortable playing with headphones on, the softer that click can be.

Some guys get it down to a whisper - and those guys are the ones who really lock in, so go figure.

Thanks for the feedback , maybe I just need more practice if the guys that are really good at playing to a click can have it turned down so low .

[Pawel]

A very very useful exercise to internalize the click is to start at a given tempo on quarter notes, say 96, then keep the same playing speed and progressively divide the click amount in two, so 48, 24, 12, 6, 3. This way you have to produce time, instead of following and constantly adjusting to the click; the very sparse beats just check your time-producing skills. If you practice this way, then when you go back to quarter notes it's easier to keep it steady and relaxed. The trick is to play "over" the click, you don't have to hear it, but keep it at a volume where you cover it with your hits; then when you hear it, it means that you're not perfectly in sync. This way it doesn't distract you, so you can focus on the music.

[KRStudio]

^ what he said! You should only need to hear the click because you are off time, not all the time.

[Kiwi]

"Click track" is wide open to interpretation - find something that works for you. Personally, I never use a metronome "click".

I usually start off a gridded project with a basic drum beat - so I normally use the high hats as my first track, drawn in with a mouse for perfect 8th notes usually.

I normally play in the kick and snare and then hard quantise: this is just to get the project started, not the end result. Consider it a fancy click track.

I then usually put in a keyboard pad (maybe piano, organ) with simple block chords, hard quantised. This gives a tuning reference (so make sure the vitrual instrument is pitch perfect - many aren't). I normally add a simple keyboard bass, quantised.

I find this really helps to layout the project - I use a lot of cut and paste. The start of each verse & chorus is usually defined by a midi Crash note, and I might even name this V1, V2, C1 etc.

This is following in the tradition of a lot of great 80's music that was usually started with a drum machine and synths - even bands that were dominated by guitars and real drums.

Once the arrangement, tuning and timing is defined by this midi "backbone", you can layer as many real instruments and none of this has to appear in the final mix. Although it's surprising what might stay, perhaps at a low level.

For a drummer, having a click that is right on the notes they are supposed to play doesn't help. Perhaps throw in some percussion (cowbell, shaker, claves etc) doing syncopated rhythms that aren't on the notes, so they can play around them.

I like to have a guide vocal in place by the time real drums are being tracked - so the drummer doesn't play fills over the vocal etc.

All this stuff acts as one big, complex "click track".

[jpgerard]

Try a lower pitch click or a snare sound instead of a click, and use isolation headphones. The Direct Sound / Extreme Isolation EX-29 mentionned above, I mean the current version, post-2008, certainly do the trick. Other closed cans will but will most likely cost more than the 29's. One more trick: if your metronome has a LED's showing beats, keep it in sight. This trick's saved a couple of tracking sessions at my studio int he past...

[Eutoxita]

Originally Posted by Kiwi

For a drummer, having a click that is right on the notes they are supposed to play doesn't help. Perhaps throw in some percussion (cowbell, shaker, claves etc) doing syncopated rhythms that aren't on the notes, so they can play around them.

+1 on Kiwi's whole post, but especially the syncopated part. When I'm cutting drums myself, I avoid the straight click like the plague. A simple machine pattern with syncopated elements usually does the trick.

Another alternative that gives less than perfect results--which, to me, is often the goal--is to have a really solid rhythm guitar part laid down against the click and then have the drummer follow that. It keeps the song on track (har, har...) but lets the drummer breathe more.

[pan60]

Peterson: BodyBeat Sync Metronome!
now that looks like another item that will be on my shopping list.
very interesting little device.

[jsox2409]

Try something musical. I use Xpand in pro tools and built a midi track with a shaker.

Or try something like Stylus. That's what I use now.

Use a loop and let it play 8th notes and then if you want add the MPC click in pro tools to the down beats. turn the MPC up just enough to hear it mixed in with the loop

[soundsundergroun]

The solution to this is easy and is 2 part.


1. Use a musical click. The stock PT click is not musical. See sample attached to this for an example of a musical click.

2. Use good isolating headphones or even better in-ears with ear muff type hearing protection. IN EARS PROVIDE AROUND 20DB OF ISOLATION + 28ish DB ISOLATION FROM MUFFS. THAT'S NEARLY 50 DB OF ISOLATION WHEN USED TOGETHER.

[thismercifulfate]

The stock PT click track does have different sounds, it just seems like no one seems to know how to change it.

As mentioned, getting a decent set of closed-back tracking headphones will solve the problem for the most part. Sometimes it helps to pan the click hard to one side, so it's only coming out of one side of your headphones.