The Language of the Crash Cymbal

[rasputin1963]

What does a crash cymbal "say" in a mix?

 

I'm noticing that the placement of your crash hits in a pop/rock arrangement can MAKE OR BREAK the sound you're going for.

 

Misplaced crashes sound really bad.

 

 

I'm thinking a crash hit "says":

 

 

Here's my Hook

 

Here's the beginning of a phrase

 

Here's a climactic moment of my arrangement

 

Notice this! Feel this!

 

Let's smooth out a rough juncture of an arrangement by adding some white noise between measures/sections (to disguise rough entrances or ungainly shifts in tempo)Crash needs to be used sparingly, I think... If not you potentially misguide your listener as to where your "hit/emphases" or "hook" or new phrases are. There are other drum combinations which can also signal emphasis or hook-i-ness.

 

Many places in your arrangement, I'm discovering, do NOT need a crash hit at all.... even if they are emphatic moments in the song.

 

Thoughts? Your philosophy of the Crash?

[samtrips]

I play drums and I don't use a crash cymbal. Can't afford a new stand for my sickly old cymbal. It's absence hasn't bothered me. It's more the fact it's on full sick pay.

[MikeRivers]

 

What does a crash cymbal "say" in a mix?

 

GET THAT DAMN MICROPHONE AWAY FROM HERE!!!!!! And those drum sticks, too. It HURTS!

 

Crash cymbals are better seen on video than heard in audio.

[tremolounge]

If I ever put another band together, I'm not gonna allow the drummer to have any crash cymbals. Any good drummer should be able to use his or her head and generate "excitement" (or provide accents) in a more aurally pleasing way... IMHO....

[Rudolf von Hagenwil]

has one word, but a few loudness levels to pronounce

[bp]

Peter Gabriel had it right on his third album.

[tremolounge]

Peter Gabriel had it right on his third album.

 

:thu:

 

No cymbals = BIG part of that album's sound!

[blue2blue]

Ah... a chance to be contrarian...

 

I think the problem is not crash cymbals -- it's 'bad' drummers (drummers who never figured out when and how to use a crash) and bad engineers and mixers who either get them too loud/splashy -- or suppress them in the mix to the point where they sound like some other instrument, maybe coming from another room.

 

The worst are the mixes where the drummer overplays and the mixer squashes the ride or crash down to the point where they sound like a weird hi hat.

[Philter]

In this thread: people who can't hear high frequencies as well as they used to.

[John Bartus]

An old studio adage from the 70s said that a drummer played the drums hard but the cymbals softly. It's so easy for a drummer to overplay the crash cymbal. In addition to everything already written before, it's also a way for the drummer to say, "Look at me!"

[UstadKhanAli]

In this thread: people who can't hear high frequencies as well as they used to.

I think they can hear it well enough if they're complaining and discussing it....

[UstadKhanAli]

 

Ah... a chance to be contrarian... I think the problem is not crash cymbals -- it's 'bad' drummers (drummers who never figured out when and how to use a crash) and bad engineers and mixers who either get them too loud/splashy -- or suppress them in the mix to the point where they sound like some other instrument, maybe coming from another room. The worst are the mixes where the drummer overplays and the mixer squashes the ride or crash down to the point where they sound like a weird hi hat.

 

 

Yeah, there's a lot of that going on. But there are some really great sorts of music where there's none used, and it sounds wonderful. So I don't know that what you're saying necessarily contradicts what some of the others are saying. In rock music especially, a well-placed, well-recorded crash, something that has this gorgeous bloom, is such a cool thing.

[blue2blue]

Well, sure, the keyboardist doesn't play every patch on his synth in every song, eh? The guitar player doesn't use every technique he knows in every tune.

 

Knowing how to play something pretty much implies knowing when to play it. Yeah?

 

 

 

With regard to high frequencies... I can tell you one senior citizen in this thread has lost some high end, no question. It's not as crippling as you'd think. I hope. (If anything, my mixes tend to not be bright enough, at least comparing with the current norms. Not sure what's up with that. Maybe I'm nervous about stepping out over the edge. And, of course, maybe I'm pushing down the upper ranges I can hear but maybe 18K is blasting... Still, no one ever mentions that.)

 

That said, I certainly have no trouble telling when someone's hitting a crash on an unamplified kit. That's for sure. I'm sure I'm not hearing the highest overtones (and neither are any other humans, I don't think), but I'm certainly hearing the fundamental. (And, I have to say, however little of the top octave I have left, I certainly appear to have no difficulty telling the diff between a dull, oxidized cymbal from a bright, polished one.)

[Mark L]

I tended to use crashes (on up-tempo songs) at the start of choruses, at the start of verses after choruses, and at the start of middle-8s

 

I'm predictable, I know

[Philter]

I think they can hear it well enough if they're complaining and discussing it....

 

Ah, but crash cymbals cover a huge spectrum... Just like I can hear a bat squeek but I can't hear the full range of tones...

 

What's more likely: a key rhythmic instrument in western music is "wrong," or a handful of people on a forum are?

 

Crash cymbals are great. They are huge drama and excitement, they shimmer, they roar, they swell, they can be bright, they can be warm, they can be percussive, they can swell. They soar, they envelop, they can be mysterious, they can be an open question, and they can be a resolution.

 

You guys are just wrong, just like in every other old man thread that gets tossed up here grumping about one technique or another somehow being wrong. Maybe you're miking them wrong, maybe the arrangement is wrong, or maybe, just maybe, you're hearing wrong. But it's silly to think there's anything wrong with an integral part of western music.

[UstadKhanAli]

Are they saying it's wrong or saying that they don't like it? Aren't some of us saying that they're a beautiful thing when used properly? What does this have to do with people being old? I mean, there's a lot of cool music that's done without one, lots of cool music done with one. Just not sure what this has to do with being old when it's just a bunch of people expressing their opinions.

[blue2blue]

I tended to use crashes (on up-tempo songs) at the start of choruses, at the start of verses after choruses, and at the start of middle-8s I'm predictable, I know

I use 'em when they sound right. And try not to use 'em when they don't. I guess I try to not make music where formulas fit. That said... I don't think I attain that goal nearly enough.

[UstadKhanAli]

I also like 'em sometimes when they are used on, say, the "2", coming in as an unexpected accent. Adds a lot of life to a track when it's done like that. But yeah, I like 'em when they sound right, don't like 'em when they don't sound right!

[blue2blue]

Ah, but crash cymbals cover a huge spectrum... Just like I can hear a bat squeek but I can't hear the full range of tones... What's more likely: a key rhythmic instrument in western music is "wrong," or a handful of people on a forum are? Crash cymbals are great. They are huge drama and excitement, they shimmer, they roar, they swell, they can be bright, they can be warm, they can be percussive, they can swell. They soar, they envelop, they can be mysterious, they can be an open question, and they can be a resolution. You guys are just wrong, just like in every other old man thread that gets tossed up here grumping about one technique or another somehow being wrong. Maybe you're miking them wrong, maybe the arrangement is wrong, or maybe, just maybe, you're hearing wrong. But it's silly to think there's anything wrong with an integral part of western music.

Hey... I'm the other guy strongly defending crashes in this thread and I'm probably the oldest guy here. So don't go blaming old guys for this.

 

In fact, it's the modern rock (hope you can hear the sarcastic irony dripping off that modern -- since I haven't heard a new idea in rock in decades, I don't think) and modern metal songs where I hear the what strikes me as the some of the biggest lack of understanding of how to fit crashes in... you get drummers overplaying them and engineers bending over backwards trying to suppress them and it ends up sound really stupid. (To my old ears. )

[Lee Flier]

I freakin LOVE crash cymbals - if they're good sounding cymbals and played well of course. My favorite crashes tend to be the dark crashes where the impact is a little delayed and has a long decay - one that sounds almost like it's been compressed even when it hasn't. I even love it on some songs when the drummer rides on the crash all the way thru a chorus or solo.

 

'Course, I love it just as much hearing a bunch of thundering toms and little or no crash... just depends on the song...

 

I just love drums and percussion, almost any kind. In case somebody didn't know that by now.

[paulz]

I'm a fan of the old saw "every crash should also be a ride, every ride should also be a crash"

Sure it's a bit of an overstatement if you take it literally esp as you go to 24" flat rides and little teacup splashes and all that - but I think it has something to talk about it overall approach and even cymbal selection in terms of having a couple of "go to" cymbals that exist at the core of a trap kit.

 

I think there can be a tendency sometimes to treat a crash as sort of a dry 'triggered' event and just drive into a crash and tend to produce just one sound that is just a big accent without a lot of dynamic or tonal variation from crash to crash an maybe doesn't even fit with the rest of the drum phrase.

It's an overgeneralization, but I personally find this more in players who are mainly interested and only used to playing rock and camp out on the hats for basic time keeping by default or the guys that pride themselves on "I play REALLY HARD...ALL THE TIME". I'm not saying rock players have to be like that or even that most are - just that it's one of those things that can develop if someone gets musical tunnelvision.

I think that spending a lot of time on a ride as timekeeper, especially at more moderate dynamic levels gets a drummer in touch with dynamic tonal variations that you can pull out of a cymbal and the line between a heavily accented hit in a ride phrase and a crash starts blurring and you wind up getting a more controlled and interesting sound than a fatiguing

Boom Boom, crack, CRASH

Boom Boom, crack, CRASH

Boom Boom, crack, CRASH

 

The crash hit becomes more its musical function of an accent than a mechanically recurring sonic assault

[tremolounge]

 

.... The crash hit becomes more its musical function of an accent than a mechanically recurring sonic assault

 

 

That's a good point -- because if the crash is overused, it ceases, by definition, to have any value as an accent.

[Philter]

Hey... I'm the other guy strongly defending crashes in this thread and I'm probably the oldest guy here. So don't go blaming old guys for this. In fact, it's the modern rock (hope you can hear the sarcastic irony dripping off that modern -- since I haven't heard a new idea in rock in decades, I don't think) and modern metal songs where I hear the what strikes me as the some of the biggest lack of understanding of how to fit crashes in... you get drummers overplaying them and engineers bending over backwards trying to suppress them and it ends up sound really stupid. (To my old ears. )

 

I'm sorry blue, it's not really about literal age... it's about a state of mind.

 

I agree with Lee here. I love dark crashes that bloom.

[Cry Logic]

Cymbals are like exclamation marks.

And we all know that using too many

exclamation marks can defeat the purpose

that was originally intended .. yeah?

 

Have you noticed how the majority of

rap and dance music doesn't use cymbals?

 

Not so for Metal which sometimes seems

to want to emphasize every beat!

 

My wife sees cymbals as "old fashioned".

She dismisses music with too many cymbals

as "Cymbal Music", a derogatory term in her view.

[Jotown]

 

Cymbals are like exclamation marks. And we all know that using too many exclamation marks can defeat the purpose that was originally intended .. yeah? Have you noticed how the majority of rap and dance music doesn't use cymbals? Not so for Metal which sometimes seems to want to emphasize every beat! My wife sees cymbals as "old fashioned". She dismisses music with too many cymbals as "Cymbal Music", a derogatory term in her view.

I agree about the exclamation marks. And your observation about their lack of representation in hip-hop, rap, and dance is also a truism. There are styles that just don't use cymbals anymore.

 

I have noticed to that because of a lack in a real sounding way to use cymbals in sequenced music they aren't used as much, and the way that they are used has become cliche.

 

But in the hands of a good drummer who has taste and good sounding cymbals they are pure magic.