Help!! How to handle snare bleed on drum tracks??

[el biciclista]

I have a set of songs to mix for a CD. The tracking was not bad……………….except for a glaring exception: there is snare bleed on most of the drums tracks. I can’t imagine how the studio guys doing the tracking let this happen. I can mute the snare on most songs and the snare is still much, much too loud.

It seems to me I need to automate a trim plug-in on all drum tracks (overheads, toms, etc.) and drop the level at every snare hit, to get the snare level down overall.

I really don’t want to have to manually go thru each drum track and reduce the level at every snare hit. This will takes days of tedious work for each song, times 9 songs. I shudder to even think about it.

Man, if I could get my hands on the guy who did the tracking……………..what an amateurish job.

Are there any shortcuts for doing this?

The tracks were done by live musicians, so the snare hits aren’t perfectly timed. And of course, the timing changes slightly throughout the songs.

Any suggestions as to how best to do this?
Please, somebody have a easier way.

[PTLance]

Try using noise gates and see if that helps?

[1m1]

You can put a ducker or expander plug-in on the other mics that is triggered (keyed) by the snare close mic. This way, when the snare is hit, the level of the other mics is automatically reduced.

[el biciclista]

You can put a ducker or expander plug-in on the other mics that is triggered (keyed) by the snare close mic. This way, when the snare is hit, the level of the other mics is automatically reduced.

Sounds great...........but I've not done this before.

Is there a plug-in in the standard Pro Tools arsenal that does this well? Or will I need to purchase a specific plug-in for this?

[arche3]

you can put a gate on the tracks with bleed. the close mic'd drums should have louder attacks and levels than the snare bleed so you should have no problem getting rid of the snare bleed to taste.

My personal opinion.... If a tracking engineer tracked the kit without any snare bleed on the rest of the drum mics I would not be happy. As the ambience of the whole kit is what makes the drum sound to me. If I wanted less bleed I gate it like I described. For certain types of songs I will gate the Kick and toms to make the drums more punchy. the snare as well on occasion. If the tracking was done with gates on the way to tape (or hard disk these days) I would lose options when it is time to mix.

If the overall level of the snare is too loud compress the overheads to tame it. (since the snare drum is most of the time the loudest drum the OH mics will have the snare the loudest) the other mics should have the mic'd drum louder than the snare bleed so they will be less of a problem. or just mute the snare mics. keep messing with it till it works. Its not Rocket Surgery

[c-tone]

Is there a plug-in in the standard Pro Tools arsenal that does this well? Or will I need to purchase a specific plug-in for this?

Drawmer Dynamics works well for ducking. You would set up a key input using a buss. However, you should try the following first, since I think that ducking might not be the best way.

Mute or remove regions where some of tracks aren't playing, especially the toms. The main culprit is probably the overheads. You can get rid of a lot of the snare from the overheads by EQ'ing out a lot of the mids and lows. Keep the overheads' levels pretty low and then automate them up for the crashes; up fast for the attacks, and then a long ramp back down for the decays.

Mute any tracks you can get by without, such as room tracks and hi hat for example.

[el biciclista]

you can put a gate on the tracks with bleed. the close mic'd drums should have louder attacks and levels than the snare bleed so you should have no problem getting rid of the snare bleed to taste.

My personal opinion.... If a tracking engineer tracked the kit without any snare bleed on the rest of the drum mics I would not be happy. As the ambience of the whole kit is what makes the drum sound to me. If I wanted less bleed I gate it like I described. For certain types of songs I will gate the Kick and toms to make the drums more punchy. the snare as well on occasion. If the tracking was done with gates on the way to tape (or hard disk these days) I would lose options when it is time to mix.

If the overall level of the snare is too loud compress the overheads to tame it. (since the snare drum is most of the time the loudest drum the OH mics will have the snare the loudest) the other mics should have the mic'd drum louder than the snare bleed so they will be less of a problem. or just mute the snare mics. keep messing with it till it works. Its not Rocket Surgery

Yes, I agree. But the term "bleed" doesn't do this justice. The snare is the loudest instrument on many of the drum tracks. I really don't know how they accomplished this. On some songs I can mute the snare AND overhead tracks........and the snare is still way too loud. I can handle normal snare bleed w/o a problem................but this is way over the top.

Thanks for your help.

[crizdee]

Hi,

I would do as much as you can do with the use of a sharp EQ curve on all the other tracks to try and remove the main freq of the snare. by the sounds of it? with the spill being so loud, if you try to use gating of any kind you will be getting a sudden spash of everything thats playing every time the snare hits which would sound horrible!!

Maybe you don't need all the tracks playing? is there enough toms in the overheads or can you eq the toms up a bit on the overheads to enable you to lower the toms tracks etc. The Hi-hat would probably work by using a sharp hi-pass filter, quite extreme if the hat is supplying from the other bleeds etc.

Omnipressor from Eventide is a wicked compressor and expander for this kind of task!

Chris

[Steve MacMillan]

Hi el biciclista,

I notice that your bio doesn't include an email address (maybe it should). I have lots of experience fixing this kind of problem, and also enhancing drumkits with seamless samples. Email me if you need some help with your project.

STeve

[thin ice]

El Biciclista. I would start by cutting out the tom hits. Most likely this would give you enough reduction in the snare volume. If you're careful you can use strip silence to speed this up. Then fade dialogue with no fade in and 300-400 ms fade out if you don't want to do it manually. To see if it works just listen to the track with the toms muted before you do the edits.

Steve. How do you deal with bad sounding toms and adding samples? I have been placing samples alongside with tab to transient for accuracy, but even mixed with the original it can sound a bit mechanical.