# My Drum Settings 100% Revealed!



## Sliggy (Nov 18, 2009)

Hey guys. I've been posting songs here for a little while and a couple of people have requested my drum settings. I originally wrote this as a reply in the thread for one of my tunes, but it's a big post and there's not much information on drum sounds here so I thought I'd just make a separate post. Sorry if I'm flooding the boards!

Anyway, here's the track in question (for reference):

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<param name="menu" value="false" />
<param name="quality" value="high" />
<param name="wmode" value="transparent" />
<param name="flashvars" value="playType=single&songid=8363538&scid=8363538&q=hi&ext=1&autoplay=0" />
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Just keep in mind that I sidechain compress (run all tracks though to a bus with a compressor on it) my whole mix, and I have some EQs and a compressor on my master track also. Those settings are at the end of this guide.

NOTE: I just hit preview post and all my careful laying out has been shattered. It's a messy post but hopefully you guys still get the idea!

KIT: Drumkit From Hell
DAW: Nuendo 3

DFH LEVELS: DAW LEVELS:

Kick: -2.0 0.0
Snare T: -0.5 0.0
Snare B: -3.0 2.0
Hi-Hat: -3.0 0.0
Toms: -3.0 0.0
Overhead: -4.0 -1.0
Room: -3.0 -7.0
Comp Mix: -3.0 0.0

Snare: 14" Sonor 1
Kick: 22" Sonor Plastic Beater - Damped Extreme EQ
China: 15" AAXtreme Chinese

The rest is pretty much just default settings. I will point out that for the most part the velocity is always 127, unless I'm creating a snare roll / some hi-hat trickery / kick or snare sticks out too much in a certain part etc.

Now, for the fun stuff! All these plug-ins are the standard ones that come with Nuendo 3.

DAW PLUG-IN SETTINGS:

KICK COMPRESSOR: KICK EQ:
Threshold: -10.0dB 1: Gain/3.0dB - FREQ/65.0Hz - Q/6.0
Ratio: 4:1 2: Gain/-6.0dB - FREQ/500.0Hz - Q/7.0
Attack: 5.0ms 3: Gain/-24.0dB - FREQ/10.0kHz - Q/High S.
Release: 100ms
MU Gain: 7.0dB

Snare T COMPRESSOR: Snare T EQ:
Threshold: -26.0dB 1: Gain/3.0dB - FREQ/129.0Hz - Q/1.0
Ratio: 4:1 2: Gain/-24.0dB - FREQ/2.0kHz - Q/High S.
Attack: 10.0ms
Release 90ms
MU Gain: 7.5dB

Snare B COMPRESSOR: Snare B EQ:
Threshold: -26.0dB 1: Gain/3.0dB - FREQ/168.0Hz - Q/Low S.
Ratio: 4:1 2: Gain/-24.0dB - FREQ/5.0kHz - Q/High S.
Attack: 10.0ms
Release: 90ms
MU Gain: 10.0dB

OVERHEAD EQ:
1: Gain/5.5dB - FREQ/3,725Hz - Q/High S.

No other plug-in settings.

Now, for my sidechain settings:

Every drum channel has a send to this auxiliary track of -5.00dB.

SIDECHAIN CHANNEL COMPRESSOR SETTINGS:
Threshold: -26.5dB
Ratio: 3.5:1
Attack: 20.0ms
Release: 100ms
MU Gain: 2.0dB

LIMITER SETTINGS:
Threshold: -0.5 dB
Release: 10ms

And now for my master settings. I don't use the "main EQ" for the master, but rather use the plug-in under the "filter" setting calld "NuendoEQ2":

1. SUBTRACTIVE EQ: Gain/-2.0dB - FREQ/170Hz - Q/2.0
2. COMPRESSOR:
Threshold: -12.5dB
Ratio: 2.5:1
Attack: 5.0ms
Release: 145ms
MU Gain: 5.5dB
3. ADDITIVE EQ: Gain/3.0dB - FREQ/ 85Hz and 5.5kHz - Q/3.0

And that's my drum sound for the moment! Here is the MIDI file for this particular track's drums, along with an .mp3 of the drums on their own:
MEGAUPLOAD - The leading online storage and file delivery service

The tempo of the track is 155bpm until the EXACT moment the fast riff at 0:46 kicks in, where it changes to 190bpm. 

P.S: You probably noticed that the drums on the MIDI file cut out a little early before the clean part of the song. This is because the "fade out" section I burned to an audio file and the re-imported as audio. I did this because I had planned to drop the tempo again where the clean part begins, but in the end it sounded weird so it was a pointless exercise. This not only explains why the MIDI drops straight out before the drums start fading, but also why synths appear out of nowhere on the .mp3 file.

Happy programming y'all!

Oh, forgot to mention. My sidechain auxiliary track is set to -2.00dB and my master channel is just set to 0.0dB.


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## leandroab (Nov 18, 2009)

I love you!


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## TreWatson (Nov 18, 2009)

haha, DFH, love it. 

lemme go try and see if i can fix the snare in superior though... that's gonna be fun. D:


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## eklundh (Nov 19, 2009)

sounds massive  but what's the use of the sidechain compressor (I yet have to try it myself)??? does it help the kicks etc. to stand out more from the mix???


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## Sliggy (Nov 19, 2009)

the sidechain mix itself is very obviously / extremely compressed, but when you mix it with the normal mix you don't lose the feel / sustain of your normal mix, but what you do get is extra punch / attack. it's a very subtle effect but it helps to give your mixes that punchy sound.


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## K-Roll (Nov 19, 2009)

I may sound like a complete noob, but.. do you have everything in a separate track when working in nuendo? I mean if you have the kick in a separate track, tom in a separate, hi hat in a separate.. Because whot I do is that i write my percussions in guitarpro, export it into a midi and then import this into the DAW, which, unfortunately is always a 1-track thing with everything mixed together. so i cannot really EQ the kick separately and work single things out in details, which i would love to change.. any suggestions? ( i know this might be pretty basic for you guys)


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## Sliggy (Nov 19, 2009)

The MIDI file / data is just a single track. The audio output channels should be separate. If you open Drumkit From Hell in Nuendo it will automatically open 8 audio channels for it. In other software (and nuendo as well actually) you must open drumkit from hell, right click on the orange text that says "track1" underneath one of your faders and hit "multichannel." It automatically sets it up for you.


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## leandroab (Nov 19, 2009)

This is awesome.. But I still have do decipher all this, because it's looks like it's all in Hebraic or some random Egyptian Hieroglyphs for me hahaha!


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## adhirajsingh (Nov 20, 2009)

Dude firstly thanks for sharing drum settings..it really helps!

You sure dont use any other plugins? Cause the mix clips like hell and the compressor on the master makes the volume go up and down like a wave! I used the compressor found in 'Dynamics' and the standard EQ except for the master as you've mentioned. And the Add EQ comes after the compressor on the master.

Think I followed everything else how you mentioned it without any tweaking to see what kinda sound I get.

Maybe Im still doing something wrong?


P.S : N00b alert .


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## Sliggy (Nov 20, 2009)

Hmmm... well my mix "clips" as well. Not audibly mind you, just on the meter. "Technically" my settings are probably horrible, but I've just mentioned everything that I do. If it doesn't sound the same as the .mp3 then I'm not really sure what to say, I've included everything I do and it sounds like you're doing it right.


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## adhirajsingh (Nov 21, 2009)

Uh no man its always good to get an insight on what other are doing so I much appreciate you sharing your settings and thats a pretty good sound outta dfh!

Yeh the mix goes over by a good 6-10db man! You dont limit it or anything?


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## Sliggy (Nov 21, 2009)

haha if i can't hear it clipping then it doesn't really bother me. i use my ears over what meters tell me. is yours audibly clipping?


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## adhirajsingh (Nov 21, 2009)

Nah not that i can make out..in my experience, it only starts to show up at loud volumes. I loved the guitar sound too btw..what have you used? Also, do you sidechain the bass with the kick as well?


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## Sliggy (Nov 21, 2009)

i sidechain all my tracks to the same channel.

for guitars i like to quad track. i basically do a track on the left and the right, and then set the "mic" on my pod to condenser (the original being 57 off axis) and do it again. the condensers are considerably quieter than the 57s and mainly just to give the mix air, but quad tracking gives me a lot of options creatively. sometimes in the more ambient parts for example i'll have the 57s playing something totally different than the condensers.

57 tracks are panned hard left / right, and the condensers are panned 80% L and R.

My signal chain is:

guitar -> podxt -> presonus firepod -> emu 1212m soundcard -> nuendo.

For bass it's the same chain, and i only do one track straight down the middle.

All other effects / synths etc. i don't really have any presets for. i just fuck around until i find what i need, apply it, and forget it.


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## adhirajsingh (Nov 21, 2009)

Ah okay..sounds big man, loved it!


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## ShreddyESP (Nov 21, 2009)

Awesome. I've always been a fan of that drumsound.


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## MF_Kitten (Nov 21, 2009)

this sounds awesome, man! it´s surprisingly thick and focused, and the drums don´t sound like the gross DFH stock sounds. i thought it was S2.0 at first! 

awesome playing and composition as well, this stuff fucking slays! if you could give it an extra edge, and make it sound more open (try adding some high end presence here and there maybe), it could be ready to go on a pro recording


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## tr0n (Nov 21, 2009)

I love the sound of the mix, the drums have space to breath which is what I've been struggling a lot with in my mixes. I'll have to try altering how I pan and EQ the guitars so they're not too overpowering.

I notice at the start of the song it's pumping a little when the guitars are chugging out that tight rhythm up to 0:46. I think your mix bus compressor ratio is a bit too high which will be causing that. I'd probably go no higher than 2:1.

I haven't heard of side-chain compression, do you mean parallel compression? Side-chaining is where you feed an external signal into a unit's side-chain as opposed to the input source. I tried the parallel compression for the first time a couple of days ago and I like it a lot.

Out of interest, do you use many HPFs when you EQ?


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## Sliggy (Nov 21, 2009)

Thanks for the kind words everybody!

Ah yes, parallel is what i meant. And the guitars are actually not compressed at all, I've just gone in an edited them that way with very miniscule (like 1/32nd) fades. It's a sound I personally like, but many people confuse it for gating. I guess a gate would do the same thing but I'm looking for exact measures so I just edit the actual take haha. Still, I'll mess around with the ratio and see what happens.

I don't think I use any HPFs when I EQ. Maybe on lead tracks / if something is booming, otherwise I usually leave it alone. As I said, I usually tend to just listen to a mix and apply something when it's needed, and I don't think I usually need a HPF (to my ears).

MF_Kitten thanks a lot bro! That means a lot coming from you. Really love your shit / have been a fan of your mixes for a while


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## FMG (Nov 22, 2009)

Jesus this is ridiculously helpful!! thanks so much for this dude


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## MF_Kitten (Nov 22, 2009)

dude your mix sounds more metal than mine 

granted, you have most of the drum mixing done for you, since you have DFH, but if you can get that sound with DFH, then you could probably get it with Superior as well. you just have to do more stuff before you get there.

i haven´t liked any of my own mixes in a while, i gotta step back and look at the bigger picture. i´m getting closer every time i try, but i have problems abandoning pre-conseived notions in my head of how things are "supposed" to be, and how i want things to be.


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## Sliggy (Nov 23, 2009)

FMG said:


> Jesus this is ridiculously helpful!! thanks so much for this dude



No probs. Hopefully it's a good lil template for you to find your own sound! 



MF_Kitten said:


> dude your mix sounds more metal than mine
> 
> granted, you have most of the drum mixing done for you, since you have DFH, but if you can get that sound with DFH, then you could probably get it with Superior as well. you just have to do more stuff before you get there.
> 
> i haven´t liked any of my own mixes in a while, i gotta step back and look at the bigger picture. i´m getting closer every time i try, but i have problems abandoning pre-conseived notions in my head of how things are "supposed" to be, and how i want things to be.



Hmmm... your standards might be higher than mine haha. I literally write and record at the same time so I go in with no pre-concieved ideas (besides maybe a riff) and just churn somethin' out. Works out better when my production and my songwriting can kinda work together.


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## DrewsifStalin (Nov 23, 2009)

I'm honestly so impressed with the fact you got the Crack of the DFH snare to be a nice solid hit, Great job!


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## Sliggy (Nov 23, 2009)

Haha thank you my man! Like MF_Kitten you're one of the guys here that I really respect and check out frequently so that makes me warm n whatnot hearin' that from you. Appreciated


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## _detox (Nov 24, 2009)

I love you for this dude! That sidechain mixed with the regular mix is a golden idea, I finally have that fat snare that I envy so much from you guys on this forum. 

Edit: I should add that I don't write djenty music in the slightest, so it's interesting picking and choosing things I like about djent mixes!


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## 7 Strings of Hate (Nov 26, 2009)

when i open drumkit from hell/superior 2, and set it to multichannel, i'm not getting multitracks in the DAW. its still just showing the 1 track like i didnt set it to multichannel


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## Sliggy (Nov 26, 2009)

That's pretty odd. What DAW are you using?


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## tr0n (Nov 26, 2009)

7 Strings of Hate said:


> when i open drumkit from hell/superior 2, and set it to multichannel, i'm not getting multitracks in the DAW. its still just showing the 1 track like i didnt set it to multichannel



If you're using Logic you'll need to click the small + icon at the bottom of the channel strip and it'll add as many auxillaries as you need.


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## 7 Strings of Hate (Nov 26, 2009)

^oh, sorry, its in nuendo i'm having the problem. I was using cubase and had no problem splitting the tracks, but it wont in nuendo. It even says in the mixer screen of the DKFH below the sliders for the drums that each channel is separate , but it just doesnt show but 1 track in the daw.

I even tryed to split the tracks in cubase, then opened that file in nuendo (since they are compatable with eachother) and when i do it says that there was a problem with the ports.
It says ports 1 and 2 for the ASIO multimedia drivers are unmapped. When i do import it, it shows all the individual tracks in the daw, but i get no sound. I'm assuming theres a problem with the assigning of the tracks?


Edit:
also, when i try to play a drum peice when i dont import a peice from cubase and just set it up in nuendo(because i get NO sound from the import) and i set it to multi channel, all i get is kick drum. then when i set the other drums it will play them only when they are set to channel 1. 
its like it wont let me set up tracks 2-8.


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## Winspear (Nov 26, 2009)

Thank you for this post  I don't have my computer at the moment to try this out, but it looks very promising. I wasn't aware that Drumkit From Hell standard could satisfy me until now


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## 7 Strings of Hate (Nov 26, 2009)

and whats with the side chain deal. how does that work?


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## tr0n (Nov 27, 2009)

Side chains are basically an external input source. For instance, if you put a Noise Gate on track A, then it will use track A as the input to gate track A. With the side chain however, you could use track B as the input to gate track A. For drums this is great because you can use trigger tracks to make sure gates open early and don't cut off part of the signal you're wanting to control. Additionally, you can filter and process the side chain however you want to emphasise the actual trigger. The trigger doesn't necessarily have to be audible so you can go nuts with it.

If using programmed drums you'd have to bounce them down first and anyway I don't think DKFH has much bleed on it. Compressors also have side chains but I haven't experimented much with them.


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## Sliggy (Nov 27, 2009)

lol yeah that's sidechain. unfortunately for my purposes I meant "parallel compression" lol. basically just combining the drum sound with a compressed version of itself.


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## neoclassical85 (Apr 18, 2012)

Thank you for sharing your settings man! My kickdrum is sounding a LOT better as is the rest of the kit. I am getting a crazy amount of clipping on my snare though, the output meter is showing like 35db lol. Im having some trouble using your EQ settings with the Sony EQ vst plugin for Acid pro, its just a 4 band EQ and Im not 100% sure if Im matching your settings correctly with it. Can anyone recommend an EQ I can download as a VST where I can easily punch in those settings? Im getting closer to having a drum sound I actually like, but its always the snare that bothers me, I cant seem to get rid of that PING and I want a fat sounding punchy snare like you hear in metal. I also have my kit seperated in my daw, each piece of the kit is a different soft synth with a different chain of effects applied to it, and then I have a master bus that they are all linked to for another effects chain and compression etc. Thanks again for sharing man, if anyone can help me Id really appreciate it!!


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## neoclassical85 (Apr 18, 2012)

btw - DKFH - since when was "POINNGGGG" a metal snare sample? Thats what the 14'' sonar sounds like and every other option is progressively worse all the way down the list lol.. Frusterated and wishing I had spent the extra money for Superior or got Addictive instead.. but I have no more $$ left, so Im doing everything I can to process the sound in my daw.


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## ghostred7 (Apr 18, 2012)

I couldn't pull up the linked track in the OP....are these the same settings used on all the AA stuff?


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## Kurkkuviipale (Apr 18, 2012)

Dude... this thread is three years old, I don't think Sliggy's checking this site frequently anymore; last time he visited was four days ago.


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## neoclassical85 (Apr 18, 2012)

lol worth a shot at least? Im still playing around with the snare but havent come up with anything solid enough yet.


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## niffnoff (Apr 18, 2012)

neoclassical85 said:


> lol worth a shot at least? Im still playing around with the snare but havent come up with anything solid enough yet.



... Dude you coulda made a thread for this. 

DKFH snares are the WORST SAMPLES....

There's plenty of tutorials out there search up MojoJojo378 on youtube he has some sick tutorials for mixing in general... but man way to Necro....


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## neoclassical85 (Apr 18, 2012)

Yarr matey, I be bringin up ye old threads.


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