mixing EZdrummer drum sounds

prophet · 12th January 2010

I got EZdrummer to use for demo songs/small budget productions. I'm quite a novice regarding mixing drums, so I'd be happy to get some advice here: how should I mix EZdrummer sounds (especially talking about the Nashville extension)? the kits sound pretty produced already to me; would you still send the kit to a stereo bus for compression? any EQing at all? thanks

2pulse · 12th January 2010

There's no reason not to try every tool at your disposal in an attempt to tailor them to your song. EZ drummer has some beautiful sounding kits, but don't get caught up in the mentality that they should be left alone. You have access to EQ and compress and reverberize and subgroup every element of the kit however you'd like to in your DAW, so give it a try and if it ends up sounding better without any processing, at least you took the time to explore the range of options.

enroper · 12th January 2010

Something I'm going to experiment with, though have no idea if it will sound good, is re-amping them. Play out the monitor and re-record them. Letting a little bit of the room sound may help them seem more natural.

also another thing to try is turn down the room mic and apply your own room reverb to the kit and your other tracks. It may not fool a real mix engineer but it may be passable for demos and such.

5aculu5 · 15th January 2010

I'd still multi-channel EZDrummer. The Snares T & B should be bussed and you can split the toms for rack and floor for separate processing. It also makes setting up a snare verb easier this way as well. Then bus the entire thing with some parallel compression and you have almost all the options of a multitracked drum set. I'd then make a template of your processed drum tracks so it can be pulled up for easy recall in other projects. Superior 2.0 has a ridiculous amount of mixer options and I still multi channel it for having more control.

Joe Gilder · 19th January 2010

I agree, EZ Drummer has great kits, but even if you recorded the most amazing drum kit with the best engineers and equipment, you'll probably still need to do a fair share of EQ, compression, reverb, etc. to make it sound right for the mix.

And I agree with 5aculu5, you should definitely use the multi-output feature of EZDrummer. <--video link on how to do this.

12th January 2010	#1
prophet Gear maniac Joined: May 2009 Posts: 219 Thread Starter	mixing EZdrummer drum sounds I got EZdrummer to use for demo songs/small budget productions. I'm quite a novice regarding mixing drums, so I'd be happy to get some advice here: how should I mix EZdrummer sounds (especially talking about the Nashville extension)? the kits sound pretty produced already to me; would you still send the kit to a stereo bus for compression? any EQing at all? thanks

12th January 2010	#3
enroper Lives for gear Joined: Dec 2007 Location: Philly Suburbs, Pennsylvania Posts: 621	Something I'm going to experiment with, though have no idea if it will sound good, is re-amping them. Play out the monitor and re-record them. Letting a little bit of the room sound may help them seem more natural. also another thing to try is turn down the room mic and apply your own room reverb to the kit and your other tracks. It may not fool a real mix engineer but it may be passable for demos and such. __________________ graphic & web designer / musician / geek :: design: www.edroper.com music: http://facebook.com/pointatob "Don't ask me to speak f'in english again. I'm in Canada, I speak canadian man..."

19th January 2010	#5
Joe Gilder Gear maniac Joined: Apr 2009 Posts: 154	I agree, EZ Drummer has great kits, but even if you recorded the most amazing drum kit with the best engineers and equipment, you'll probably still need to do a fair share of EQ, compression, reverb, etc. to make it sound right for the mix. And I agree with 5aculu5, you should definitely use the multi-output feature of EZDrummer. <--video link on how to do this. __________________ Joe Gilder HomeStudioCorner.com

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12th January 2010	#2
2pulse Lives for gear Joined: May 2004 Location: Denver, CO Posts: 618	There's no reason not to try every tool at your disposal in an attempt to tailor them to your song. EZ drummer has some beautiful sounding kits, but don't get caught up in the mentality that they should be left alone. You have access to EQ and compress and reverberize and subgroup every element of the kit however you'd like to in your DAW, so give it a try and if it ends up sounding better without any processing, at least you took the time to explore the range of options.

15th January 2010	#4
5aculu5 Gear interested Joined: Mar 2008 Location: Newark, DE Posts: 7	I'd still multi-channel EZDrummer. The Snares T & B should be bussed and you can split the toms for rack and floor for separate processing. It also makes setting up a snare verb easier this way as well. Then bus the entire thing with some parallel compression and you have almost all the options of a multitracked drum set. I'd then make a template of your processed drum tracks so it can be pulled up for easy recall in other projects. Superior 2.0 has a ridiculous amount of mixer options and I still multi channel it for having more control.