Angels & Airwaves Drum Depth: TLA’s Fixes for Problem Room Mics

Dealing with unruly drum room mics full of unwanted cymbal wash can be a mix engineer's recurring nightmare. You want that spaciousness and glue, but not at the cost of a harsh, clanky top end. In a fascinating look into his mix of Angels & Airwaves, legendary mixer Tom Lord-Alge (TLA) reveals how he tackled exactly these kinds of problematic room tracks, transforming them from cymbal-heavy messes into the very depth that held the entire drum mix together. Let's dive into some of TLA's signature moves.

The Challenge: Overbearing Cymbals in the Room Tracks

The Angels & Airwaves room mics presented a common issue: a good deal of undesired cymbal information. As TLA himself puts it, sometimes tracks can be flat-out unusable. But before completely ditching a track, he explores ways to sculpt it into something useful, even if it means getting aggressive.

TLA's EQ Strategy: Forging "HiFi" Depth

When faced with excessive cymbal noise in the room mics, your first instinct might be to start cutting high frequencies. TLA, however, often takes a more counterintuitive approach.

Why Boost Highs When Cymbals Are the Problem?

On one of the room tracks, TLA slammed a whopping +10dB boost around 5kHz. Sounds crazy, right? His reasoning is to actually create a more "HiFi" sound, attempting to shift the annoying cymbal frequencies to a range that's less likely to clash with the guitar distortion. It's about reshaping the character of the top end, not just eliminating it.

Warming It Up with a "Boatload" of 50Hz

To counterbalance the aggressive top-end boost and add serious weight, TLA then cranked up a low-shelf EQ at 50Hz – by a lot. He explained his process: turn the EQ gain all the way up and then sweep the frequency until it sounds right. Even if the fundamental 50Hz isn't overwhelmingly present in the original room mic, a shelf EQ boosts frequencies above it as well, contributing significant warmth and body. This move is all about adding that foundational hugeness.

For more insights into EQ strategies for heavy mixes, check out our EQ Strategies for Mixing Modern Metal hub page.

Balancing the Levels for Cohesion

After these extreme EQ adjustments, the room track was, understandably, much louder. TLA then pulled the plugin fader down significantly, in this case by around 17dB, to blend this newly sculpted track back into the drum mix. The goal wasn't for this processed track to be loud, but to provide an underlying sense of depth and space that wasn't there before.

The De-Esser to the Rescue: Not Just for Vocals Anymore!

Here’s a classic TLA top tip: De-essers are not just for vocals! He frequently turns to de-essers, particularly emulations of the classic DBX 902, to tackle a variety of high-frequency problems on instruments.

Taming Cymbal Hell with a De-Esser

On another problematic room mic track suffering from harsh cymbals, TLA deployed a de-esser. His method is straightforward and effective:

1. Isolate the Problem: Engage the de-esser's "listen" or "detector" mode to clearly hear what frequencies the de-esser is reacting to.
2. Aggressive Range: Crank the "Range" or "Amount" control all the way up. This makes the de-essing effect very obvious.
3. Sweep the Frequency: Adjust the frequency control until you hear the most offensive part of the cymbal harshness being dramatically reduced or eliminated. TLA demonstrated just how close he could get by quickly dialing this in by ear.
4. Dial Back (Or Don't): Once the target frequency is found, you can dial back the "Range" for a more subtle effect. However, in this Angels & Airwaves example, TLA kept it quite aggressive.

The Trade-Off: Fidelity vs. Vibe

TLA acknowledges that such heavy-handed de-essing can have side effects. For instance, it might cause the kick drum in the room mic to sound a bit choked or "go thwump" when the de-esser clamps down. This is where the "fidelity vs. vibe" decision comes in. If a track is truly problematic but you need the ambience it provides, sometimes you have to sacrifice a bit of pristine fidelity to achieve the right vibe and make the track usable.

Applying the De-Esser Trick to Snare Drums

This de-esser technique isn't new for TLA; it's a trick he's been using since the '80s, especially for controlling hi-hat bleed in snare drum mics.
The key here is to use the de-esser in its "high frequency only" mode (if available). This ensures that only the high frequencies (where the hi-hat lives) are being compressed, leaving the body and punch of the snare drum relatively untouched, unlike a full-band compressor.

De-essing is a form of frequency-specific compression. To learn more about how compression can shape your metal mixes, visit our Metal Compression Secrets hub page.

When to Say No: The "Unusable" Track Philosophy

TLA is famous for his "10 pounds of salami in a 5-pound bag" approach to mixing – getting a lot out of what he's given. However, he stresses that just because a track exists doesn't mean you have to use it. He gets worried when he sees a session with, say, six different room mics. To him, that often signals that the core drum sound might have been lacking, leading the recording engineer to keep adding mics hoping to fix it. His preference? Two or three well-placed room mics (like a stereo pair and a mono mic).

In the Angels & Airwaves session, one of the C414 room mics was deemed "unfucking usable" for the most part. So, for large sections of the song, it simply wasn't used.

Selective Use: Making the "Unusable" Usable (Sometimes)

Even if a track is mostly problematic, it might still offer something valuable in specific sections. That "unusable" 414 room mic from the Angels & Airwaves session? TLA found a spot for it. While it was too much for the main groove, he brought it in only during the chorus sections.

His goal here was to add a little extra ambiance specifically to the tom-toms during these parts. Again, he applied a significant low-end EQ boost to this track to give it weight. The effect was subtle, not a dominant feature, but it contributed to the overall impression of depth in those key moments.

The Power of Dedicated Reverb: The AMS RMX16

Beyond manipulating the raw room mic tracks, TLA also relied on dedicated reverb units to build the drum sound. A significant part of the drum ambiance in this mix came from an AMS RMX16 reverb (or a faithful plugin emulation like the one from Universal Audio).

He used the RMX16 on an "Ambience" setting with a fairly long decay time (around 5-6 seconds), feeding the snare and toms into it. This created the classic "snare bomb" effect – that explosive, blooming reverb tail that was a staple of '80s rock and pop, and still sounds massive today. TLA mentioned that this reverb was printed, meaning it was committed to an audio track during the mix.

Bring TLA's Wisdom to Your Mixes

Tom Lord-Alge's approach to the Angels & Airwaves drum rooms showcases a master at work:

• Don't be afraid of aggressive EQ to completely reshape problematic sounds.
• De-essers are powerful, versatile tools far beyond just taming sibilant vocals; use them to control cymbal harshness in rooms or hi-hat bleed on snares.
• It's okay to mute tracks or use them very selectively if they're not working.
• Combine processed room mics with dedicated reverbs like the AMS RMX16 for ultimate depth.

These are fantastic techniques you can start experimenting with in your own productions. Imagine getting to watch Tom Lord-Alge himself apply these methods, explaining every decision, as he mixes a track from scratch. With Nail The Mix, you can!

Each month, members get access to real multi-track sessions from huge artists and watch world-class producers like TLA mix them live, sharing their secrets. If you want to see exactly how TLA sculpted these Angels & Airwaves drum sounds and the rest of the mix, check out the full Angels & Airwaves Nail The Mix session. You'll gain invaluable insights that go far beyond presets and truly help you Unlock Your Sound. Don't miss the chance to learn directly from the pros who mixed the albums you love – including this incredible Angels & Airwaves session with TLA.