Bass clicking

[shiebcte]

As a drummer in a metal band i preffer the clicking sound on bass drums like vinnie paul, or chris adler. Any ideas how they get that sound? right now i have a click pad on my superkick II and my beaters or turned around so the plastic is hitting the bass. I like the way it sounds but its not perfect. Any suggestions?

 

[stump]

The wonder of studio engineering or a massive live sound board are what you are hearing. Live sound can be played with if you have a good sound guy. He can put effects on the drums to give them the sound that you want. Have one of the guys in the band play the drums for the sound check while you are out front with the sound guy and have the drums tweaked how you want them sound. If you are playing without mics or a sound system....forget it! Peace on ya!

 

[drummert2k]

many many drummers use triggers to get this sound. the click pad will give you lots of click but nothing can replicate triggering your kick with a tight gated effect

 

[stump]

many many drummers use triggers to get this sound. the click pad will give you lots of click but nothing can replicate triggering your kick with a tight gated effect

Agreed. Sound guys can work wonders!

 

[shiebcte]

yea that make sense. I figured id see if it wasnt an effect but ill just stick with what ive got for now.

 

[Spydr2000]

the problem is your soundman, try getting that mic right on the beater. Mine was placed 1" from the impact of the beater on a slight angle. But one of the tricks I used was a quarter on the drum head but it's hell on the head. Use plastic beater also.

 

[Howepirate]

many many drummers use triggers to get this sound. the click pad will give you lots of click but nothing can replicate triggering your kick with a tight gated effect

Agreed. Sound guys can work wonders!

Actually dude most of the time triggers are up to you for how their mixed because any more mixing from a module would obviously be overkill. They just worry bout the volume

 

[blackreign]

tell whomever is recording to put a mic inside the bass drum, point it towards the bass kick beaters, and put a 2nd mic facing the beaters on the other side of the kit (where you actually hit the drum with the beater) that way you get some of the attack,
also adjust on your mixing board the high and low EQ turn the high up and the low down a few decibels...

Im not an expert on sound, and I go for the opposite sound (lots of bass and not very much attack)

tell the guy to try what I told you to, its something I read up on , but I dunno if it works, mabye I can recreate it for you and let you know what to do... or what your sound guy could do

hope that helped...

 

[Anonymous]

Kick triggers ....both use Ddrum triggers.....the module and rack effects no idea...but anyways...yeah triggers or you can get a wood beater with a metal kickpad(not a fan but sounds ok).........like all the other dudes said too.....SOUND GUY and how your kick is tuned..........also on albums the tracks are so layered and f***ed with(compression and misc effects) its damn near impossible to replicate without the proper sound samples from the original studio recording..........idk just my 2 cents

 

[TheYardstick]

A trick that was popular back in the 70s-80s was to tape a quarter to your bass beaters to get that click sound. It's an inexpensive alternative to triggers, but triggers will sound much better.

 

[shiebcte]

tell whomever is recording to put a mic inside the bass drum, point it towards the bass kick beaters, and put a 2nd mic facing the beaters on the other side of the kit (where you actually hit the drum with the beater) that way you get some of the attack,
also adjust on your mixing board the high and low EQ turn the high up and the low down a few decibels...

Im not an expert on sound, and I go for the opposite sound (lots of bass and not very much attack)

tell the guy to try what I told you to, its something I read up on , but I dunno if it works, mabye I can recreate it for you and let you know what to do... or what your sound guy could do

hope that helped...

Thanks man, ill definitely try that. Im recording in about 2 weeks so ill let you know how it sounds.

 

[brownpaiste]

i got your solution.

although i dont like it my guitarist does.

you just have to by an oversized falam slam and put a quarter in it (make sure the sticky side faces out) and tape usually does the trick.

the thing about vinnie paul is that he is endorsed so he would buy 2 stick them together and put it on. but hey, when you're endorsed its whatever.

 

[iatemygoat]

i got your solution.

although i dont like it my guitarist does.

you just have to by an oversized falam slam and put a quarter in it (make sure the sticky side faces out) and tape usually does the trick.

the thing about vinnie paul is that he is endorsed so he would buy 2 stick them together and put it on. but hey, when you're endorsed its whatever.

whats a falam slam?

also i tried to quarter thing on the beaters a while ago and it wore through the tape within minutes. then i put them on my head. same thing. anything else i could use so hitting wont wear through the tape?

 

[drum man]

sorry no ideas. thats pretty much what i do. i dont know if it would help but you could get wooden beaters. im not sure you might want to get some more oppinions on that one.

 

[Justiceislost17]

Dude its drum triggers. Gringcore bands use them a lot so they dont have to bounce there knees, they can just use there ankles to go a lot faster and still make a good sound. The triggeres go straight into the PA so the sound is even and ajustable. they have triggers for each drum too to get really fast blasts and fills.

 

[Apollo]

When I record a band that wants that sound, I simply set my software to make 2 copies of the bass drum track. Then I EQ the 2nd one as follows- Cut everything below 1K reduce 1K by 3-5 dB and then boost 2k-8k by 2-3 dB each. Then I take the 2nd track and EQ it as follows-cut 250hz (to leave room for the bass) boost 125 hz by 1-2.5 dB and cut the high frequences from 500 hz to 16k by about 4dB. I then mix the 2 of them until I have that well defined click but I still have a big deep kick drum sound. I however do prefer that low kick sound myself so I mic the resonant head and favor the 1st track when I mix and just leave enough of the "clicky" sound to define the attack, and also so it cuts through the mix on a cheaper set of speakers.

 

[Brazilian Drummer]

i got your solution.

although i dont like it my guitarist does.

you just have to by an oversized falam slam and put a quarter in it (make sure the sticky side faces out) and tape usually does the trick.

the thing about vinnie paul is that he is endorsed so he would buy 2 stick them together and put it on. but hey, when you're endorsed its whatever.

whats a falam slam?

also i tried to quarter thing on the beaters a while ago and it wore through the tape within minutes. then i put them on my head. same thing. anything else i could use so hitting wont wear through the tape?

a flam slam is a bass pad that remo makes to give more punch to your drum, its also cool cause it makes your head last longer if you use the plastic side of the beater

 

[Kaos]

while a lot of people are right about the triggers Ill tell you from experiance you probably don't want to spend the money time or agrivation of triggers. If you could spend about 3000 just on triggers and modules you might get close to the big guys sounds but its not really worth it. All you need is wood beaters and a promark click pad. Place the mic half way in your drum aimed at the click pad and you should be able to acheive that sound your lokking for. also you may need to slightly adjust bass drum tunning.

Vinnie Paul uses triggers and I believe Chris addler does not use triggers although he may now that they have more money.

 

[LawNinja]

You dont really need a huge sound system and crap to make the clicking, I've actually seen some bands from before they got big that had no sound system support for the drums but had the click anyways.

 

[guilty_verdict]

there's an old trick some sound engineers use when recording to get the click sound out of a bass drum. You put a piece off gaff tape on the skin of your bass drum (to protect it), then on top of that you place a large coin (in australia they use 50 cent pieces) and then another piece of tape over that. On the beater you do the same thing. Then when you hit the bass and the coins connect it produces the clicking sound