Thankyou all for putting in your time and thoughts - everyone picked something close to the mark and, as I said earlier, very impressive listening skills - I hope you all had some fun.
The 2 closest answers came from
Alistair and Chris H - very astute from just an mp3
- and it was really hard to pick.
The deciding word was
Vdrums - so congratulations to
Alistair!! If you'd like to PM me your address I'll put your T-Shirt in the post.
edited for ethical reasons - PM me if you're curious
Here is the answer (sorry it's a bit wordy):
Recording chain:Venue All percussion tracks recorded in my little studio
Mics Rode NT-1 (pair)
Drum Modules Roland TD-20x and SPD-20
Mixer Mackie 24.8 (recording) + 24E (tape returns)
ADAC Delta 1010 (x 3)
DAW PT8 on Vista PC
Mixdown chain:DAW PT8
ADAC Delta 1010 (x3)
Mixer Mackie 24.8 (8 bus) + 24E (tape returns)
FX TLA Fat1 Tube Compressor (toms and BDs only)
Fostex DE-1 for plate reverb (toms and BDs only)
No EQ
Methodology:Customer provided a stereo mp3 of guitar tracks that I upsampled to PT as a 44.1KHz / 24bit stereo track (customer's requirement)
Three (3) percussion takes end to end (no loops or quantizing)
Recorded wet (EQ via the Mackie's parametric / no other FX during recording)
Drums mixed down into Mackie with stereo sends to Fat1 Tube Compressor and DE-1 reverb
Returns recorded as 2 additional stereo tracks in PT
Levels set in PT (no automation or EQ in the DAW)
Bounced to stereo .wav and Dropboxed back to customer
Customer then remixed the guitars and set the drums/percussion levels as you heard on the mp3
Reasoning:The customer sent me this track and gave me free rein to put what I wanted on it.
It's a pretty song and is supposed to be a dream so I didn't want a regular beat or anything regular for the listener to lock into thus no snare or HH.
The chimes / bells were planned to create a swirling effect for a bit of disorientation, the cymbals to create the general flow and accents, the toms to lead the listener away and back into the guitar parts.
Take 1: Indian Brass BellsRode NT1 pair
XY orientation
Height 1.5m
Distance .2m
Reflective screen .5m behind mics
Shaken, not stirred
Take 2: Bar chimes (2 chime racks)1 set chimes mid/low pitch solid brass (pitch descending L->R)
1 set chimes high/mid pitch hollow aluminium (pitch ascending L->R)
Played like a harp doing overlaying “scale” runs up and down to create the swirl effect
Same mics / screens as Indian bells in Take 1
Take 3: Electronic drums and cymbals2 x BDs
4 x toms
5 x cymbals
No snare drum or HHats
Roland TD-20x kit (my config – modelled off Gene Krupa's sound)
Roland SPD-20 padset for one octave of china cymbals (my config.)
Track plan:1/ BD (double bass drums on 1 track)
2/ Sn
3/ HH
4/ Ride
5/ Cymbals Left
6/ Cymbals Right
7/ Toms Left
8/ Toms Right
9/ China cymbals Left
10/ China cymbals Right
11/ Indian Bells (stereo)
12/ Bar chimes (stereo)