Hybrid Studios Drum Setup - Warren Huart: Produce Like A Pro 

Hi Warren, I've watched this twice today already. I have to say your best episode to date, the amount of detail you share with us is fantastic! Sadly the only gear I have that is the same as yours is the flip flops.

This video is unbelievable! It's almost like being your understudy! Nice!

I greatly appreciate you taking the time to walk us through the minutia of your drum tracking process. It is constantly and forever showing me new ideas and approaches to tracking drums.

referring back to this video again as we are recording drums in a rehearsal space soon. Pure Gold!

BIG thanks that was really nice to walk with you thru this live recording setup ... almost as if I was there !

So much value in these videos!!! Thank you!

I really appreciate all your videos and your willingness to pass on your knowledge. I have learned so much from you. Thanks a million!!!

thanks for the amazing tour I really appreciate your effort warren

Another awesome tour. Thanks for breaking the process and passing along all the great knowledge. Keep it up!

WOW! I'm at Uni doing an Audio Production Degree right now and I swear, this is better than any in-studio tutorial we've had in over a year of study. I'm not a newby to this myself but even for me this was a great tutorial.

Cor blimey mate. I just can't believe how great and helpful your videos are! thanks for taking the time.

Awesome tour. Great break down on getting a full drum sound. Keep up the great work.

Many thanks on another great info packed video, Warren! As a bass player I find the drum sound paramount of the mix.

Ahh Warren, This is by far my favourite channel on youtube. Thank you for yet another great lesson in production ;)

Fantastic stuff! I absolutely love the room miking!! Those N8s are impressive! Thanks Warren!

Every video you make is just candy for the brain, and ears. Thank you so much for the usable info. Seriously

Good evening Warren! i know this videos are A LOT of work, real hard word, so i just wanted to thank you so much for making them, i cant express how grateful i am for them, for you to make them, so thank you (: keep it up and have a marvelous time recording, like i do myself every time you wish it at the end of the videos

Hey Warren As always your videos are so inspiring and helpful; They could be 3 hours long but they felt like 15 minutes with how well you explain things...! cheers..!

Excellent vid. Really informative with something for new and experienced engineers and producers alike. Very impressed. Great sounding studio too.

Hey Warren - I love your passion for music! You are such an inspiration! Thank you for all your advice and know how...I truly appreciate your dedication! And hopefully one day I will "Produce Like A Pro" :-)

That's the prettiest sound treatment I've seen. Who needs art on the wall with those there?

Another excellent session....keep em coming bro...loving it.

Hi Warren, found you recently on t'internet and just wanted to thank you for some of the most educational and enjoyable tutorial/guidance videos I have experienced yet. Still a long way to go until I can be totally confident of my mixes, but with your help I have filled so many gaps in my knowledge/comprehension of this area of my passion. All the best from Hertfordshire, Jem W.

killer sounds, thank you warren

amazing sound thanks for the tour warren

Sounds epic, masterclass breakdown, thanks for sharing.

Have just started recording drum covers using 6 mics. i can just about manage it. your knowledge is impressive, hopefully someday i'll know half as much as you haha

Love it Warren awesome detail thanks for your great advice!

Awesome!!!! I cant wait to get home and watch this!!!

Full mix sounded incredible! I didn't like the snare soloed, but in the mix it was amazing! Would love to hear more full drum tracks!

Once again, and intriguing tour. I rather like the sound you got! In the future I'd be interested in hearing solos not only of individual mics, but all the mics on a source combined...specifically the synergy of how the 3 kick mics sound together, and also top and bottom snare.

Bless you Warren.

Happy to see another video on recording setup! Please do more. Getting the sounds right at the source is so key. Would love to see how you go about tracking a singer playing acoustic at same time. Thanks! Oh and were those vintage U87's on overheads or new ones?

NOBODY else puts out stuff like this, but you. Just a wild treat to see all that gear in such an incredible room and the explanation of your process. The value is in all those nuggets you dropped you chat through, so many people follow the RU-vidr guidebook and make the videos super short and with X amount of gags per minute etc, I’d rather watch something that takes the time actually necessary to explain the process.

Awesome and very informative, I'm learning a lot! Thank you!

I think I'll share this with some of my clients to explain why drum tracking can be such a beast. So many decisions need to be made. Granted if you don't have as many mics and mic pre-amps it's a bit simpler. Thanks for the video Warren

Thanks Warren .

amazing spx90. used to use one live regular in a venue i worked. If you like old school sounding reverbs, rolands dep 3 is incredible, sounds really wierd but just works great on snare and even vocals

Last year I started this journey trying to learn as much as I could about recording as I have original songs I wish to record. My first thought was natural acoustic recordings using just the natural space for effect. As I broused RU-vid every video seemed to scoff at room slap back n reverb. Video after video was about deadening the room. Then bout a week ago I came across channel where the guy incorporates the room ambiance into ever recording. Ok then I was right to begin with. Deadening the room is not as important as everyone makes it out to be. Right. So then I learn about stereo with two mics n how to avoid phase issues by equal distancing the mics. That seems reasonable but I've also seen mixes where the second stereo track was purposely put slightly out of phase. N wen recording drums u record several mics at various distances. Even if u have two over heads at equal distance u still have kick mic that will still receive the sound of the kick before the room mics. N some say both stereo mics should be a stereo pair exactly the same n then the guy that uses room ambiance in every recording using mics with two completely different characteristics like ribbon n dynamic. So one is dominant n he brings the other in for effect. So contradiction after contradiction n so many hours spent watching video after video only to realize I was right to begin with. N mics. Wats up with mics since u EQ it all anyway. U can make a rode nt1 sound like a Neuman u87 by EQ n tubepreamp. Comon now. I think it's about getting people to spend more money than they should. Listen u r mobile with just mic, preamp, maybe n outboard compressor n EQ n computer. U can go anywhere there is a nice room with great acoustics n record anything. U can even denoise the track if u r outside say in a natural amphitheater. Trick, I think, for room ambiance is outboard compression to reduce frequency clutter n spikes. N I continue. Y would u put the mic at in distance away from the source. Certainly not right on top on the source but at a distance or 8-12 inches from a vocalist starts to cut out volume n bass. Less intimate. It just seems that u should want as much volume n closeness as possible without boominess. I would rather have the full characteristics of the mic n take out wat isn't needed in the mix than not have it going into the track. For instance the video on miking acoustic guitar. U put a condenser in the lower corner under fret board tilted slightly away from sound whole. It had the most volume n clarity of any other position so y put it any other place. Just really doesnt make sense. Wen I hear a vocal I want it to sound like the person is singing right next to me in my hear n not 10 feet away. So many contradiction in methods. N I feel like my first instincts were right to begin with. Guess I wont know til I start recording.

Thank you very much for this...

This is just totally great as usual, I did however misread the title and thought you were recording a hybrid drum kit setup, ie a digital/acoustic drum combo, which i thought was a bit different and is something that would be very cool to hear about, especially how you would go about balancing a hybrid kit.

Thanks so much for the valuable information and sharing this awesome video! much appreciated.

Wow @ Warren Huart you got a GREAT sounding drum recording there!

Awesome Gear and spot my Friend ...👍👍👍👍

This video is a great demonstration of why not to choke the snare drum. Many times I’ve been disappointed with the room mic sound because I choked my snare.

Hi Warren, Really enjoying your posts, so brilliant! Now the latest offering here is so cool , and don't get me wrong I am not taking the mick here but your text person has had me in stitches while you were giving it our muso banter chat of Paiste , Overheads etc etc you've forgot to pass on the muso chat to the type setter... oh man so funny !! Keep up the good work no bad vibes intended.

Hi Warren. Thanks for all the great content. I’ve been watching all your drum recording videos (all awesome) and I wonder: on the 2 mic hi hat setup, are you bussing both mics to one track in PT, so committing the balance to track? How about on the toms? Thanks again, chief! I appreciate you!

Thick and wide! Love the drum sounds. Have you ever built a drum sound for a song around overheads? When you solo the overheads I hear almost everything I would need. Thanks.

paiste 2002 were my favourite cymbals . kicking my self for selling them. I had the 17 and 15 crash, set of signiture series hi hats. I recorded alot mysefl with the paisties and always found that you could really get such a variety of sound of the cymbals just with equing your overheads (when using overheads mainly for cymbals) roll them off quite high and you get a really crispy bright cymbal sound, leave the body in and you get a reallybroad sounding cymbal. Nothing ever poked out. they were also great live, i find alot of cymbals partcularly live give of so much horrible stuff when played hard. paiste 2002 dont and they last aswell

I am doing marvelously well, thank you very much.

Your a legend

Another goodie...very very clear. I use much of the same gear in the same way. The outside kick head with a hole in it can vibrate more if the internal drum muffling is more center shell barely touching the batter head...if it touches or leans against the back head you get more of a cardboard sound which I don't dig either. Do you have the overhead 87's in cardioid?

Really interesting! I don't think I'll ever have anything like that number of mics to record drums with. I have a condenser, a dynamic, the mics on my Zoom H4n and a couple of weird diy electrets so I guess I'll be experimenting a bit. I'd not have thought of mics in another room. Will have to try that. Getting sample hits is a great idea too. What purpose does the blanket serve? Thanks for showing us what you do. Love it!

thank you!

I love that you're not above using cheaper microphones, like the Audix D6, ADX-51, and D112 for example, right next to some very high-end microphones.

Hello, amazing video and amazing channel. One question, is this room useful for any kind of sound or just a specific sound? what I mean is if I want to record a heavy kind of metal drums or jazz or pop or whichever kind are there better rooms for that kind of recording or can you record all kinds of genres in this room?

An awsome video and the drum sound is to die for.....especially then you love more intense forms of Rock like Metal Core or Djent.......Warren could you please make an instructional video about the specifics for metal core drums. I only play guitar, keys & program drums......but since i will soon record the first EP of my new San Francisco based Metal Core band......I could use some advise.......I don’t know if you know Bill Putney who produced and recorded Northlane and Invent’Animate.......as i write you this I’m still searching for the right place to start my recording studio......is tough then you don’t have a big budget to find a place which will give you such a big live room with high ceilings which are essential for a great drum sound.....just as NRG’s studio there LP recorded Meteora......in my mind I’m kind off chasing for this sound........thank you ....Greetings.....Samine 🎼🎶

Another INCREDIBLE video!! Just for reference, how far apart are your two L & R overheads from each other? Do you fiddle with their position alot, or do you sort of have a default place you like to put them? i.e. a foot left of the snare, or between the ride and the floor tom..Many thanks, Warren. Patrick.

As usual, great video mate. I have a quick question, however unrelated to this video. What program do you use to capture your screen while you're giving the tutorials in Pro Tools?

Very nice!!! Cool Block!! Keep it up please :-)

Hi Warren, thx for sharing what mics are used and positioning and how they run through the SSL and other gear to PT. I compose and mix in the box these days, occasionally recording gtr's, voices and maybe winds, my room is not big enough for drums, even so, the lessons learnt from you can still be applied in the digital environment eg, the kind on room reverbs that can be set up, sending the kick to different eq's, comps, and mixing 2 or different kicks with varying fx, hey, I'll try anything! I'm new here but as it was oncesaid, I'll be Bach", Sorry, rap attck, must terminate. Thx again.

Love the video warren thanks for showing us the setup. A question I have is why do you mic the bottom head of the toms? What benefit does that give you? And do you print the bottom and top mics together or are they separate during the mix? Thanks

Fantastic! Many thanks for taking the time and effort after a long day to create such an amazing video! I assume that all of the compression and EQ (where used) got printed directly to "tape" during the recording? If yes, how is the signal flow when you play back the drums, like you did to demonstrate them to us in the video? Obviously the signal goes through the SSL again... so if you would use EQ and comp on the SSL during playback, would it affect the sound a second time? Sorry for this question, but as someone who has never worked on a big console, these things are not always self-explanatory. Many thanks, David

Amazing! I can even hear the sound of the rims in your snare setup. Is part of the snare ring coming from the spx90 or is it how you eq? I can only get an SM57 to work with a dry or muffled snare. I use an Audio Technica dynamic which sounds ok, but not quite it. Might be my cheap channel strip which seems to compress even with the compressor off. I'll have to mod it for 24 volts or something. Doesn't seem right in the wave forms.

Great job Warren. I liked the fact that you mixed rack mount preamps with the console. Did you cut a little at 400Hz for the overheads during the tracking of this session?

NICE

Aloha Warren, Happy New Year,too. Great vid & details. Helluva great drum sound & a Hu-Room. Any suggestions on Addictive Drums, to beef them as close to real? I'm thinking 'reamping' my AD trax. Thx again.

This is great, thanks so much! What do you recommend as a budget preamp for use on drums that can get similar to the API or Neve, or even the SSL sound? Something in the hundreds of dollars per channel vs the thousands of dollars per channel.

I've been binge-watching your videos a bit and hear you say quite often that you do not like the 'basketball' kick in sound. However, to me that is exactly what a D112 *always* sounds like. What makes you choose that mic so often and why not a D12 or B52 etc?

Hello Warren! First of all I would like to thank you for the amazing videos and material, there is a lot of knowledge in just one video, really helpfull, thanks. I would like to know more about your approach in mixing drums. By the time you're mixing, do you usually put the overheads and room tracks ''in phase'' with the snare top/bottom tracks? Is this common? Thank you very much Warren.

Super video !!! But what speaker is there on the meter bridge seen from the left, left .....? middle ......? and then Yamaha NS10!

So cool, can u comment on the monitors in the control room? Cheers.

Thank you for a great sounding explanation and good video of what your process is...I was worried a bit about the drummer hitting the U87's...thats just me... : ) I wouldnt mind hearing how you like to tune the drums, and if you alter tuning considering the key of the song and/or tempo. I may have missed it but do you compress the subgroup on the SSL?

Hey Warren, love the vids man. How are you gating your toms so tightly?

Have you tried Milab mic's? Not sponsored or anything, but I used a pair of DC-96's recording string quartet earlier this year and they are bloody great! Hand made swedish quality :)

Hi Warren! Brilliant video, I love that hallway mic, it sounded beautiful! I have a question I need answering as I'm tracking a band in studio within the next coming weeks, and want to be able to have my guitarist in the control room, while the head and cab are mic'd up in the live room, but I've always wondered how you would go about that in a professional studio - like, what's the signal flow? Because obviously a long unbalanced Jack lead is just going to introduce a disgusting amount of interference, and chaining Cannon/XLR's just seems impractical I've tracked guitarists in the control room before, but had to go to so much effort to make it work and would really appreciate the help :-) thanks in advance - Jack

Great video! Is the drumming playing My Hero?

Almost no bass trapping needed with Delta H z-acoustics. Beautiful.

Polska !!!

Great video as always... I have a question: Are you EQing or using the low cut on the U87's that you have on OH's?

Hey Warren I hope everything is well :) I had a question for you I have always wanted to know. When you are recording a 10 song record with a pro band or artist that has a big budget like Aerosmith or The Frey how many days and hours do you guys spend setting up mics, getting the sounds and all the jazz that goes into getting everything ready for tracking. 2nd how many days do you spend in the studio tracking for these songs. 3rd how much time does it save you when you hire a session drummer like Kenny Aronoff over having a drummer that is really good but does not have the studio experience that Kenny Aronoff has.

Why do you prefer SM57s instead of SDC's for the snare bottom mic? Thanks for the channel, really great stuff!

You look like David Hasselhoff in this video! Which I like =)

Great video as always Warren, thank you. A question - how important would you say bottom mics on toms are? If you're input-limited, would you rather go for bottom tom mics or a 2nd pair of room mics? I don't currently have enough inputs to record both.

Hi Warren, cool insights! I was wondering if you put the 'hallway mic(s)' back in phase in your DAW before you start mixing? Thanks in advance!

OHs are 46.5" off snare, but how far from each other? I remember reading a lot about the "3:1 rule" years ago, but haven't heard much about it lately -- does that distance between OHs not matter here? I had always thought they needed to be at least a certain distance from each other to avoid phase issues. Any insight, as ever, would be greatly appreciated! Thanks for another great vid, Warren!

Hey Warren. I know this is an old video but I have been just drinking all of them in the last couple of weeks. If you can remember were the toms gated? Or was that just mic placement? The bleed seemed really quiet. Maybe i missed something but i have been really fighting with a lot of bleed in my drum recordings

can you do a console setup full video

Hi Warren. What type of floor tom did you say that was that was? As luck would have it I've been looking for a floor tom. thanks for the amazing videos.

Great vid as always Warren!! Just one question: A friend of mine has just built his own studio, but at this point only has a small interface with 4 inputs, so, if you only had 4 inputs to work with, how would you mic a standard drum kit?

Sounds great! I have a question about handling gates on the toms vs. cymbal bleed. I have to wrestle with getting great tom attack while minimizing cymbal bleed when my drummer is playing fills that involve heavy hitting on both at the same time.

Hey Warren, I noticed you never seem to compress the kick out or snare bottom, but you usually do have comps on the snare top and kick in. Is there a reson behind this? Going to tape and pulling it up raw on the console after tracking, I'd want to hear relatively similar dynamics coming from both kick mics and both snare mics since I'd bus them together on a master kick as well as snare channel and apply additional eq or compression there if needed. But when one is more dynamic than the other, when bussed together, now I'd worry I can't easily deal with the dynamics as some hit are compressed more on say kick in, and kick out runs free, so the volumes of each mic would vary on each hit and I'd not have a consistent sound. What says you?

What is it about SSL pre's that a lot of producers don't like?

Hey Warren! Are those toms gated? It sounds like they are but you emphasized that you did nothing to them and that they are natural. Thanks for the video!

I think the problem the those crashes is that they are cheaper models. If you try HHX or HH models from Sabian they will sound better to your ear. HHx evolution for sure sounds so pleasing to my ears unlike an AAX. Just my opinion.

AEA mikes are brilliant...

Well done. We don't hear much of the room mikes though. In my opinion, the room acoustic and mics and mics placement used are far more important than the mic pre regarding the final sound.

Why the concert toms? I would have assumed that would give a thinner sound than toms with a resonant head. Thanks for the video.

Hi Warren! You're always going on about John Bonham's drum sound. Why do't you just use two Beyerdynamic M 160s on the overheads, put them through Helios modules, and mad compress them like Andy Johns did at Headley Grange, and be done with it?

Do you use the same amount of microphones and placement all the time, or do you vary it based on song?