I am always scared of attracting metalfaggots with slam-related posts, but by popular demand I am bringing your this exclusive tutorial on how to write and record your very own slam album in the comfort of your own home. Just follow these easy steps to SLAM DAT SICKNESS!!
There are already a zillion tutorials on the basics of recording, mixing and mastering so I’m not going to cover the fundamentals. Instead, I will focus on the specific aspects of making slam songs, since to my knowledge there are no tutorials about our favorite genre. I’m not saying it’s the pinnacle of achievement in terms of production, but I will walk you through how I made this ENPEDESTALMENT song:
[soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/57618311" iframe="true" /]
Here is what it takes:
DAW
That means ‘digital audio workstation,’ which is just a gay name for the application you will use to record, mix and program everything. The most popular ones are Ableton Live, Logic, The Reaper, Pro Tools and Cubase, but it doesn’t really matter which one you use, they are all good enough for slam. All the important parts will be done with plugins anyway so the DAW itself really doesn’t matter. I personally use Logic because that’s what Big Chocolate told me to use, but definitely do not spend any time reading tiresome debates about DAWs, just pick one and move on.
Audio interface
This is a gadget that lets you record sounds coming into your computer (unlike your shitty soundcard it has a preamp and all that). You want to get one with both instrument and XLR inputs so you can plug a microphone into it too. I have a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2, which I’m happy with and seems to get good reviews but there are a zillion options.
Vokills Vocals
As you might guess, this is the easiest part. Considering that I have the most faggoty voice of all time, if I can do halfway decent gurgles then I’m sure you can too. Compress the fuck out of them to even out the volume, put some delay and reverb on there and you are good to go. I don’t even bother recording unique vocals for each song, I just copied and pasted pieces of one vocal track for all the Enpedestalment songs and you totally can’t tell. I do NOT suggest using a pitch shifter because that will make your shit sound like goregrind, just keep practicing until you can do legit gurgles.
Searching for ‘joey sturgis tone’ on Youtube is a good way to learn about getting a siqq guitar sound (srs)
Guitars & bass
Expect to spend about 50% of your time on getting a good guitar sound. Getting a br00tal guitar sound is a big big topic, and without a doubt the hardest part of making #slam. The good news is that these days it can all be done in software, and you don’t need to mess around with real amps, cabs or any of that. You just need to choose one of the many amp sim plugins and you’re good to go.
There are a million options, but for slam I suggest using Toontrack’s EZMix 2 plugin for pure ease of use. Record two tracks, one panned hard left and one panned hard right, and throw on the EZMix rectifier or 5150 preset and you are pretty much good to go. Pod Farm is good too, but it requires a lot more tweaking to clean it up and sound tight.
These are the cuts I made for the guitar in the right channel, with similar but slightly different ones for the right channel. I routed them both to a bus which has a boost at 3k for clarity and a cut at 6k.
The real trick to making your guitars sound good is the right EQing. Specifically, it’s about making the right cuts– getting rid of the annoying frequencies that make it sound fizzy or shrill (500hz and 5-6k are the biggest offenders). You shouldn’t have to do this very much with EZMix, but if you want more info there are a lot of helpful threads on IMN recording forums such as this one and this one that are definitely worth reading. Also, route all your guitars to one bus and throw the EZmix ‘metal guitar bus’ preset on there (turn EQ and compression up all the way).
I’m not saying my guitar sound is the best, but I don’t think it’s terrible and I recorded it with a $140 LTD with crappy stock pickups and strings that hadn’t been changed in a year. That said, having a decent guitar and being able to play well make a BIG difference. The point is, this is what’s possible with a completely piece of shit guitar so if yours is decent you should be able to do even better (as Eyal told me, ‘The way you’re doing it wouldn’t even be good enough for our scratch tracks’ lol).
For bass, it’s best to have an actual bass, but you can also just play the bass parts on your guitar, pitch shift it down an octave and put a bass sim on it (EZmix ‘Rock Bass’ is good). That is what I did for this song– it’s a little muddier than a real bass but again this is slam we’re talking about so who really gives a fuck.
Superior Drummer with Meshuggahfag’s preset loaded– sounds pretty fucking great right out of the box, we just need to make that snare sound a little shittier!!
Drums
Expect to spend a lot of time on the drums as well, which are obviously very important in slam. The good news is that getting a solid drum sound is pretty easy these days, and you can focus your efforts on what really matters, which is writing good drum parts.
You definitely want to use Toontrack’s EZDrummer or Superior Drummer plugins– the difference between the two is not huge for the purposes of #slam. Most people use EZDrummer and Drumkit From Hell, which is fine but imo is almost overkill. For this song I used Superior Drummer and loaded in the fggt from Meshuggah’s kit, but tbh the stock EZDrummer ‘rock kit’ or whatever would work just fine too. The first thing I did was delete about half of the pieces of the kit because they are not needed at all for slam and just get in the way when you’re programming.
Here is the recipe for trashcan snare: turn up ‘snare top’ for more ring, turn up ‘snare bottom’ for more crack/thickness and adjust to taste. Compress the top a decent amount so your gravity blasts won’t be too quiet.
The trickiest part will be getting that ringy trashcan snare sound that is vital to slam. You will not find any tutorials on this because according to most people ‘it fucking sounds like shit,’ but fortunately for you I figured it out. A snare is miked on both the top and bottom of the drum. The top is the ringy part, the bottom is where the actual snares are and is where the ‘crack’ comes from. So, what you need to do is send the top and bottom to two different tracks and turn the bottom way, way down so the ringy top head will dominate. You will not find this in any preset because like I said ‘it sounds terrible,’ so it will take a bit of effort on your part but NO TRASHCAN SNARE? NOT SLAM. Give the top head a boost at 500hz and 7k and you will have dat ringy, Eastern Euro budget slam snare! Because I love you, you can even download my Superior Drummer preset here (requires Metal Foundry).
The key to getting real-sounding performances is to draw every note in by hand, one at a time. Also note that I am pretty sloppy, with the velocity of each hit varying quite a bit– this is important so it doesn’t sound too perfect.
Throw the EZMix ‘Metal Kick’ preset on your kick drum and ‘Metal drum bus’ preset on your entire drum channel and you are good to go sonically, and you can focus on actually writing the drum parts. This is CRITICAL to good slam, because drums are the lead instrument. The basic rule is that the guitars are relatively simple, laying down the foundation of the song, and the drums are more complex, adding the variation and dynamics that make it interesting– it is very very important for slam that you push yourself to write unique, highly-polished drum parts that work closely with the guitars, not generic double-bass-metronome crap.
I suggest actually tapping out every drum part on your desk with your hands to make sure they are what a real human being would do, then once you have it figured it out in your head, program it. There is no shortcut, you just have to draw in the notes one at a time (the screenshot above is Logic’s Hyper Editor, but every DAW will have something similar).
Oh and for bass drops just use a TR-808 kick drum tuned down to 50hz or so with a very long decay and compressed a bunch.
Mixing and mastering
The last part is putting it all together. Again, there are a zillion tutorials on this by people who are much more qualified to talk about it than I am, and you should read them so you understand the fundamentals. But here are a few slam-specific guidelines:
- Turn off mic bleed completely in EZDrummer/Superior Drummer. Room tone and all that do not really have a place in slam; there’s no space for it in the mix.
- The ride bell is a very very important part of slam, much more so than any other genre (see CEPHALOTRIPSY). Put it on its own channel in your mix so you have lots of control over it.
- Mastering is really complicated, but also really important. Unless you have a good handle on the nuts and bolts of this stuff, I suggest just using iZotope Ozone’s ’12ax7′ preset for mastering. That will make your guitars sound a LOT thicker and brighter and the whole mix in general much louder and more dynamic.
So there you go, that is all your need to SLAM DAT SICKNESS on your own, please let me know if you have any other questions! Liek ENPEDESTALMENT on Facebook and say thank you to MR EYAL LEVI of AUDIOHAMMER STUDIOS for teaching me all this shit as well as TOONTRACK for hooking me up with Superior Drummer and EZMix!
1rd?
Hmmm, so I have to buy a usb audio plugin interface thingy? Is there a way through those programs (I think I’ve downloaded reaper) to just record from a mic plugged into the pc? i wanna experiment with just putting my mic next to my IRL guitar amp to get some shitty lo-fi tones. Is this doable? Obvs not the best solution, but i’d rather not have to spend another hundred bucks on something I’d use a couple times.
pls rspnd
Yes, you can certainly do that but it really is going to sound like complete shit. Miking a cabinet is NOT easy, so what you come up with will probably sound so crappy that you will be bummed and give up. But yes it is definitely possible.
Surgant Dee how do I mic tha crickets that I done trappd to sound liek Cemetery Rapist’s vocals???? I just know that u have teh anser.
As a guy who interned at a music studio while studying at a music college (feelsbatman) I can definitely say that miking a cab takes way too damn long and your poverty practice amp will not sound good on tape, amp modeling is so much easier and you can tool around with the settings without having to re-record your parts.
Honestly, miking amps is way out of the bedroom slam league and only worth it if you high-end mics and amps. Otherwise it won’t sound any better than the presets in Logic or Protools
Okay, thanks for all the tips guys. I guess I’m just trying to say, Is it possible for me to dick around and write some stuff for fun with the Guitar/Amp/Computer/Computer programs I can rip (which the answer appears to be yes if I want shitty sound), or if I have to spend real life monies on this to get a decent interface.
Let’s say I wanna buy the “Focusrite Scarlett 2i2″ that you have, Sarge. If I got a guitar, and a guitar cable, and this thing that plugs into my pc… that’s all the hardware I need on that side? Then I just need to find software? Srsly thanks for this help, I’ve played guitar for a long time but have always been too lazy to get into recording myself.
Yep, thats all you need, the rest is all software. Its pretty amazing!
As an IMN whose actually done this, it’s not even worth thinking about.
^ what I was trying to say
Exactly. lol Just sayin that from someone who’s stooped to that level, its an awful way to record. Spend the 100 + bucks on an interface. If you have a Mac the jam by Apogee is a really simple, cheap interface that is pretty much plug and go. It pretty much only gives you gain control on the interface, but when you can do everything via the programs anyway, who cares? :)
Thanks for the tips on mixing and mastering, too. As a DIY guy myself, that helped loads and loads.
unless you’re going for a type o negative sound then it’s pretty much the only way
Many many many albums are done w amp modeling these days (esp if you include axe fx/kemper under that heading)
haha whoops i mean the $10 radio shack mic direct into a pc soundcard, that’s the only way to authentically get the type o paint can full of bees tone
Great post. No intentions of recording myself, but I love the science channel style “How it’s made” look into slam, and for that matter any time Big C breaks down a track.
can I get the st.anger guitar tone n snare plugins on dis shit???
hmmm.. but all this loox like it will take time away from my college sexcapades brah… on one side I luv slam n Pornogrind but on da other I do luv college-know-it-all pussy… Wut do?
DISREGARD COLLEGE PUSSY, ACQUIRE AMP SIM PLUGINS.
wait….
DISREGARD COLLEGE PUSSY ACQUIRE 40 YEAR OLD JIFFY LUBE EMPLOY MOSH
“I just copied and pasted pieces of one vocal track for all the Enpedestalment songs and you totally can’t tell.”
My inner recordingfag raged hard, and the rest of me laughed at him.
In b4 glut of post-ironic slam bands, resulting in “SYWH Slam” sub-sub genre. Also, in b4 the unthinkable: the inevitable schism in slam, in which fat, disgusting gorehogs feel compelled to defend “tr00 slam” from the influx of posers singing songs about wanting to smell girls’ drum thrones and lifting.
influx of posers singing songs about wanting to smell girls’ drum thrones and lifting
i support this glorious vision of the future
Inb4 post-ironic all-female feminist pornogrind/slam act called Queef that has pitchshifted samples of farts, burps, pukes and queefs instead of vocals.
inb4 it sounds like all other pornogrind/slam acts anyway
“I don’t even bother recording unique vocals for each song, I just copied and pasted pieces of one vocal track for all the Enpedestalment songs and you totally can’t tell”
I fucking love this. Way better than my “record as much as possible that fits in one take. Redo if I feel like it” method.
Very disappointed to learn that I actually have to know how to play guitar to get in on this slam business. :(( Can’t I just record guitar sounds from a MIDI? lol
Guitars are for oldfags, record some slam dubstep for the young kids
Slamstep would jibe nicely with the other current trends in dubstep atm, such as trapstep and crunkstep (srs)
I for one support this idea of slamstep genre.
Big chocolate and twostacks did it on that century media comp a few months back
Comp? Is that like a mix-tape for old ppl?
yes, imagine if you taped a whole bunch of wax victrola cylinders together
link?
http://www.stuffyouwillhate.com/2012/07/hollywood-waste-summer-sampler-ft-big-chocolate-x-dj-twostacks-collabo/
Cool post, been looking to do some electronic stuff but not sure if my Macbook Air is really up to the task of making dubsteps. Should I upgrade? PS I will be using Logic Pro because work gives it to me for freeeee
It should be fine, esp for dubstep
Pleez to be seeing: Piratebay – top 100 – Applications – Mac.
Logic Pro, Protools etc. all there.
You could use Logic, but the amount of tutorials you’ll find for Ableton Pro with regards to dubstep is ridiculous.
youre doing it wrong.
all you need is:
acoustic guitar
bucket
tape recorder
beer
and a shitty voice
you will obtain much of the vagina.
and not be socially awkward… at jiffy lube.
good post though.
(srs)
I don’t even have a DI or nice pickups but have achieved a better sound… SARGE I AM DISSAPOINT!
^ METALFAGGOT DETECTED
digging my grave right now
please post your song that sounds better than this. But since you talked about pickups and not drums, bass, vocals or mastering it sounds like you were just talking about guitar tone on its own, which is pretty meaningless. Getting something to sound good on its own is one thing, getting it to sound good in a mix is something totally different. In fact, most guitar tones that sound good in a mix sound shitty when isolated.
I’ll admit I may have jumped the gun by saying outright that I had a better tone than you. It is actually better then mine. I am also afraid of being crucified if I show you an example of said sound. But I can’t back out now, I’ll look like one of those Call of duty kids who brags about his KD and leaves a game after one death.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dv2nlWKPoEo
I see you were going for that vintage Yugoslavian noisecore guitar sound. Not a bad choice as it’s very underrated, IMO:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcHCh92bAc4
PATERENI, holy fuck lolololol that band
I wood play bass for Enpedestalment if the sarge ever wants to perform live srs. YO D HOLLA ATCHA BOI!
Ha ha bass in a slamz band.
Also, let me know if you ever need rhythm clarinet or lead triangle!
Theramin reporting in
No IMN’s allowed? Like if that ever stopped their ass from ruining the party :\
That said, I’ll stick to acquiring college pussy rather than messing w/ Slamz, haha.
this post has excellent product placement!
This has inspired me to finish the slam song I was working on. Just need to finish guitarz and do weird guttural vox about chilling in the summer and hanging out with mah broz
“Room tone and all that do not really have a place in slam; there’s no space for it in the mix.”
pretty golden quote.
i’ve always wondered though, is how you would mix an 808 bass drop when you got so many low end freqs (i.e. basically every track) going on. is that they key to that compression? tightly sculpted eq’ing?
it’s written there lol
Yes, that’s basically it- the bass drop should be tuned to 50-60hz, and you just cut out enough of those frequencies elsewhere to make room for it.
made my own using your advice bro. check this shit out. http://soundcloud.com/womendrivers/friendship-maine
this is solid pissed off hardcore, nice work!! wood watch ur band roll around on the floor of a filthy basement until the set was cut short by the guitarist breaking off his headstock/10
also, from the title I was hoping this had something to do with The Maine. but i liek it anyway
Solid band name and art. Would download an album cause of those and forget to listen to it for a long time.
Riffworks T4 is probably the easiest to use recording software there is. Although it was definitely developed with guitar in mind, it can be used with any instrument. What’s really cool about it is that you set up your BPM, pick a drum loop (you have to buy their drum packages if you want something better than their demo drums; around $10 each), set up how many bars you want in your “riff”, and hit record. After it counts in (8 beats), you record your track, and it automatically adds tracks as you reach the end of the riff. Delete the bad tracks and add more layers, mix it,add effects, etc, then move on to the next “riff.” Easy as shit for demoing tunes, and they have a very useful free version (limited to 4 tracks, but you can bounce tracks to a single one to add more; the full version is $129). sonomawireworks.com
Wait…so there is a sub-genre that is trying to get the Lars Ulrich St. Anger snare sound? Dear Dark Lord what did he create?
i use a behringer q502usb for my audio interface. it’s 60 bux and it sounds decent. i also use a roland drum kit (as i am a drummer) and go direct, and that eliminates a lot of the need for eq’ing.