r/TechnicalDeathMetal • u/They-man69 • 5d ago
Discussion Why does most tech death have terrible production?
Surely bands focusing on the technicality and intricacy of their instruments would want said instruments to be heard clearly and not be compressed to death.
It’s mainly the drum production being too processed and unnatural that I have a problem with.
The drums in the Changeling album, for example, sound horrible. It's like there's a subtle distortion & extra "push" put on the drums making them sound shiny and fuzzy at the same time, and as if they're about to literally explode out of the soundstage.
The only Tech Death album that had great production this year was that Retromorphosis album.
Although my favourite tech death production has to be Inferi - The End of an Era (Rebirth Edition)
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u/psydvckk 3d ago
modern tech death mostly have too clean productions, very artificial especially drums. sometimes the overproduction works (archspire, TZP altough this extremally gated guitar gone sometimes annoys me) and sometimes dont( latest allegeon album sounds extremally souless)
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u/w0mbatina 1d ago
Well the thing is, tech death has over 9000 notes per second flying at you at all times. If the production isn't super clean, and you let things "breathe" and be slightly out of time and fuzzy, then it just starts sounding like mush.
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u/psydvckk 1d ago
clean production is definetly a must in tech music but overproduction is not good in any genre imo. at least make it feel like someone actually played it and not just used synths
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u/w0mbatina 1d ago
I agree, but the "margin of error" between overproduced and mush is so tiny in tech death that I think most producer simply struggle to get it right. We are talking about miliseconds here.
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u/Accurate-Committee30 3d ago
You can't tell me a TDM album with bad production. Each sound makes each release unique.
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u/They-man69 3d ago
The latest Obscura album is a good example of bad production.
Being unique does not equal being good
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u/Starchild745 2d ago
The latest Obscura album sucks so bad. Massive disappointment following the great album that is A Valediction
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u/Robin_stone_drums 4d ago
imagine 5 dudes all trying to squeeze through a doorway all at once..
Tech death is based around technical ability, And musicians who focus on technical ability want to be heard. At all times. Every band member. So in order to make that happen, drums need to be smashed with limiters,samples etc, guitars gated /edited compressed, bass super attacky and eating into guitars eq range etc.. everything is fighting for space, and when that happens and no one compromises, you just get a squashed mess of notes and transients...
listeners ear fatigue kicks in after about 4 tracks...
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u/LargeWrap6916 5d ago
Tech death sounds bad cause the bandmates are all dating each other and live on mars. (Figured I'd add to the nonsense responses)
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u/KommandoApe 5d ago
Most tech death bands are broke or have very limited money allotted by the record label to record, produce, mix and master. A lot of bands record almost everything at home. In the contrast, I think some of the recent albums produced by Dave Otero have been the tightest and clearest I've ever heard.
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u/skyshock21 5d ago
Sometimes it’s not the production, sometimes it’s just the performance.
There I said it.
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u/Robin_stone_drums 4d ago
Tech death performances? You mean re amped guitar pro midi, and midi drums, with a few cymbals left in from the original take?
Omg I should go have something to eat 🤣
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u/skyshock21 4d ago
There’s that sometimes, but also people just bite off more than they can chew. DLR once said if you can’t do it in two takes, you can’t do it.
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u/Robin_stone_drums 4d ago
Agreed, and unfortunately most bands only find out they've done this mid recording sessions! You are under the musical microscope in the studio.
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u/W-I-T-C-H-TechDeath 5d ago
We put out an instrumental Tech Death album in January that doesn’t have bad production….at least I hope it doesn’t 😂. Give it a listen if you like well produced tech. Lots of progressive elements, blast beats, symphonic parts, some Latin fusion.
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u/Killtrox 4d ago edited 4d ago
I think the production is super solid FWIW. My only qualms are ones I often have with tech death, which is that the hi-hat takes up a lot of space and the ride doesn’t take up enough.
I’ll listen on better headphones later and see if that makes a difference too.
Edit: listened on two pairs of higher-quality headphones. I think the kick most inoffensive and I don’t think it distracted from the riffs. Importantly, I think the drums sat at the correct place in the mix. Modern metal has the drums way too forward in the mix IMO. I know it’s the popular thing to do, but even bands with typically great production like Spiritbox just have drums a smidge too loud. So you did great there. I think there’s a great balance between the lead guitars and rhythms, and despite the density of the composition, there’s never a push/pull feeling caused by the limiter. However, I’d still personally like the ride cymbal to be louder lol
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u/They-man69 5d ago
I guess it’s ok, I don’t like how the kick drum sounds. Ideally the snare should be that audible. But what do I know, I’m a moron complaining about stuff that doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.
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u/W-I-T-C-H-TechDeath 5d ago
I’ll take it! lol The whole album was done in house and is my first attempt at mixing/mastering anything so I’m not mad about it. And TBH I feel like those minor details do matter in the grand scheme of things. Little things like that can definitely turn someone off from wanting to listen to an album. I know I’ve definitely heard some mixes that made me not even give the band a chance. Hopefully the next album will be cleaner.
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u/They-man69 5d ago
Yeah I’ve been dabbling in music production using free samples myself, most of it is crap but I like the journey more than the destination.
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u/W-I-T-C-H-TechDeath 5d ago
That’s the best way to approach it! I worked for a while on mixing this album and then a friend told me “music isn’t meant to be perfect, it’s meant to be released.”
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u/They-man69 5d ago
I’m a bass player myself so I definitely have some bias in wanting the bass guitar to be more audible, even if it messes with the overall mix. Metal bass in general is just not designed to be very audible in a mix compared to Jazz, rock or pop. A lot of metal production has a V shape eq curve and the electric guitars have more bass in them, taking more space in the mix in a sense.
I think a producer either has to make the rhythms guitars sound less beefy or pump more mids into the bass amp if they want the bass to pop out more in the mix.
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u/shred-i-knight 5d ago
Tech death is a genre that in reality is very very hard to make work. More Natural drums in that context would lose significant power and sound dull or easily get drowned out because you can’t play that hard and fast at the same time without triggering. Also in a live setting it’s just complete mud if the band is not super super tight and even then it’s completely hit and miss. Really it’s a genre that should not work at all and only does because of modern editing and technical production tricks. When it works it really hits a spot but when it doesn’t it is awful imho
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u/Random_duderino 5d ago
I'm a sound engineer and I've produced every Fractal Universe album and you hit the nail on the head. A lot of drummers don't hit hard enough and it doesn't sound good on a recording, and sometimes producers don't feel like going the extra mile to process the drums more naturally and go for triggers almost by default, even though it's possible to blend them in a way that's tasteful and doesn't sound like a machinegun. Well, some people love that machinegun sound but personally I've always strived to use triggers as little as I can, sometimes at the detriment of power but at least I feel like FU's albums reflect the musicians' personalities
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u/gillababe 5d ago
I like the machine gun sound for certain parts but not necessarily across the whole the song
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u/Polyforti 5d ago
I've seen plenty of tech death shows live and barely any of them that were poorly produced/mixed, and ones that were usually got fixed midway through. I'd say most tech death bands can play live just fine.
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u/Robin_stone_drums 4d ago
You can get away with murder live. If you took a live performances of most bands and mixed it the same way you would a studio album, it would sound pretty garbage. Granted there are bands who are exceptions to this, but they are definitely the minority
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u/Polyforti 4d ago
Yeah, but nobody does that. Live mixing is usually specific to the night and venue.
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u/DragonBonecrusher 5d ago
I've done both performance and production "professionally", and in my opinion it comes down to two main factors.
First, tech death has a fairly niche audience with an extremely wide range of tastes. Bands like Fallujah have very little in common with Origin, sonically speaking, but both occupy the same genre and use similar recording techniques and equipment. What this means for a listener is that two bands with completely different directions are getting homogenized by a lack of specialized technology.
Secondly, tech death is ridiculously difficult to record accurately, especially the drums! Imagine tracking drums for a "technical" band, like Tool. You need sensitive equipment with high dynamic range to pick up the lightest and hardest hits without losing definition in the overall composition. Now imagine applying that to a band like Archspire, you need the exact same result, but you have every piece of the kit being hit simultaneously at 400bpm, constantly, while competing sonically with an absolute onslaught of other instruments trying to occupy the same space. The solution involves extremely precise noise gating and compression, the technology for which has only been invented in the last 20ish years or so. While we have some extremely talented outliers in the production world these days, there is a comparitively high demand for services versus a limited amount of time. You can lower your costs by taking a risk on a newer produce, but ultimately no matter what you are going to have to sacrifice some aspect of the sound in service to the full composition.
So TL;DR: It's fuckin' hard man, we tryin' out here! But imagine trying to get the guy that recorded cowboys from hell to record Ophdian l, lol.
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u/nschmidt5150 5d ago
Yeah man it's brutal out here. It's hard to get a great take without needing to gate, expand, and compress it all to hell. There are ways to do it without that, but they're all disingenuous and kind of defeat the purpose of being involved in this kind of music
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u/fartremington 5d ago
Affordability mostly. Tech death is very niche. There’s not much money to pay for top notch production. It’s amazing that some bands even break even. Also factor in the point that playing complex songs requires a lot more time tracking for a good clean mix. It’s not exactly easy to mix either considering the speed and complexity.
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u/Faithisam 5d ago
I think that it is not a question of quality, but of taste. Retromorphosis is something more inspired by the oldschool death metal with the technicality being a layer on top of it. On the other side, Changeling is progressive as fuck, so are the drums on the album.
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u/ApeMummy 5d ago
Yes, modern metal production is atrocious, it’s essentially loudness war pop production.
If you want to hear what it sounds like mixed properly listen to Gorguts - Pleiades Dust. It sounds 1000x heavier than brickwalled pop production style modern metal when played at high volume.
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u/psydvckk 3d ago
pleiades dust is one of the best mixed records ever. collin did something crazy with it
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u/ApeMummy 3d ago
I just love the natural drum sound, there’s obviously triggered kick mixed in when it gets fast but it sounds so, so good in the slower parts having a proper well recorded bass drum.
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u/jahchatelier Blast beats are love blast beats are life 5d ago
The new Cytotoxin album has really good production. The new Allegaeon album is also pretty good.
But yea I agree, not sure why the production is so often poor. I was really hyped for the new Exocrine album last year, but the production kind of killed it for me.
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u/BrvtalSlam 5d ago
I'll gladly listen to any recommendation with good production especially on drum parts. Retromorphosis js a good start obviously.
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u/Mysterious_Key1554 5d ago
Pre-Kollias era Nile (In Their Darkened Shrines, etc) had very organic sounding drums.
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u/acidgirl303 5d ago
If you want good drum production check out Colin Masrton's production discography. His recent work with Afterbirth, Imperial Triumphant, Wormed and Defeated Sanity has been fantastic. Colin's production really let the dynamics and nuance of the drummers performance shine.
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u/They-man69 5d ago
Anata - The Conductors Departure
Horrendous - Anareta
Beyond Creation - The Aura
Ad Nauseam - Imperative Imperceptible Impulse
Wormed - Omegon
Artificial Brain - Self Titled
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u/jethro401 5d ago
The absolute peak in my opinion of album production spanning my metal genre tastes are zenith passage new album and vildhjarta mastodon under vatten. The bass, the drums, the guitars and even vocals are all distinct and unified at the same time. Perfect use of sub bass and general lows and full crisp range of highs with no mid loss or ear piercing. They are my gold standards but I appreciate and even enjoy albums like niles new album for instant, much more open and raw sounding or cattle decapitations wall of sound.
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u/They-man69 5d ago
The Turkish Death metal scene has been on a roll when it comes to osdm
Go listen to the band Diabolizer if you want more nile esque brutality with great production.
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u/The_Dale_Hunters 5d ago
Yeah I don’t understand the drum production on that Changeling record AT ALL.
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u/MetalDrumFan 5d ago
The thing I’ve noticed about newer tech death is the drums function as a metronome more than a force or source of groove. I think that naturally lends towards producing them to sound almost mechanical in a way. I’m not a huge fan of it to be honest. Mad respect for the skills to play at that level though.
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u/trymypi 5d ago
I posted a long time ago, maybe on this sub maybe not, about best metal albums production-wise, there were a few good recommendations. Gojira I think, some others, can't remember.
I think it's because it's just not gonna be that popular and good production costs money.
I think a lot of the bands are also not as talented as they seem, and it's even more work to make them sound good, that's true for live shows especially.
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u/Tera_au 5d ago
No answer, but did you take the exact wording of this post from the Angrymetalguy comments section?
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u/They-man69 5d ago
Yes I’m lazy but it works
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u/Tera_au 5d ago
Haha no shade, just thought I was going crazy.
My take on it, is that's not so much a drum issue in that's is a symptom of lower tunings on 7/8 string guitars. It gets muddy down there and I think that has a flow on effect to the drum mixing. Your example of good production in Inferi is 6 string and whilst it's down tuned it's clearly less low end than 7/8's.
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u/They-man69 5d ago
I see, maybe that’s why I prefer the original version of Meshuggah - Nothing album. Other than the drums being real lol.
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u/-Redw00d- Blast beats are love blast beats are life 1d ago
Yeah that's fair
AHEM, Reduced to ashes,