Sonnox Oxford Drum Gate 2 Overview
Smarter Gating, Clever Alignment, and Easy Punch
A few years in the past, when a wave of “subsequent technology” drum gates hit the market, we ran a ballot throughout the Produce Like A Professional Academy, YouTube, Fb, and Instagram. Round 14,000 responses later, one plugin got here out on high: the unique Oxford Drum Gate.
Quick ahead to NAMM this yr and Sonnox quietly launched Oxford Drum Gate 2. On paper, it’s an replace. In observe, it’s a critical evolution.
Sonnox describe Oxford Drum Gate 2 as the entire toolkit for tidying up acoustic drums, and that’s precisely the way it behaves in an actual session. This isn’t solely a gate, it’s a full drum cleanup and enhancement system constructed round Detect, Decay, Align, and Stage, plus MIDI triggering and MIDI export for substitute or reinforcement.
I put it straight onto a combined rock monitor by The Final Worldwide, simply to see whether or not it may enhance an already completed drum combine. I instantiated it throughout each shut mic, chosen the suitable supply sort, kick in, kick out, snare high, toms, and let it do its factor.
The outcomes have been rapid.
Clever by Design
What makes Drum Gate 2 completely different just isn’t solely its gating accuracy, which was already glorious. It’s the mixture of:
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Supply conscious defaults
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Frequency acutely aware damping
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Part and alignment correction
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Levelling and hit consistency instruments
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MIDI set off and MIDI export choices
When you inform it what the supply is, kick, snare, tom, hats, and many others., it intelligently configures itself. No infinite tweaking simply to get into the ballpark. It understands what it’s processing and responds accordingly.
One necessary element from the information explains why it feels so “good”. Oxford Drum Gate 2 makes use of an clever Machine Studying strategy to inform the distinction between kicks, snares, toms, and hello hats by timbre, not by loudness. That additionally explains an enormous shift in comparison with conventional gates. The principle management in Detect just isn’t a dB threshold, it’s a Confidence Threshold, that means how intently a success matches the chosen drum sort. So as an alternative of combating quantity variations, you’re separating drum sorts even when spill is louder than the hit you are attempting to maintain.
That alone makes it quick.
Detect That Retains Ghost Notes
This tonal classification strategy can also be why the “ghost notice” state of affairs is dealt with so properly. As a result of it’s separating by tonal profile reasonably than pure degree, you’ll be able to preserve quiet snare ghost notes whereas gating louder kick spill.
If the automated classification just isn’t excellent on the odd hit, you will have fast, sensible instruments for effective tuning. You’ll be able to Study a low confidence hit you wish to preserve, or Take away a excessive confidence spill hit you wish to gate out. In different phrases, you aren’t trapped in infinite parameter adjustments, you’ll be able to merely educate it what to do on the few downside hits and transfer on.
From Sloppy to Surgical, In Seconds
With the whole lot bypassed, the drums sounded aggressive and thrilling, nonetheless there was bleed and ring in every single place. In a dense combine, that blur turns into an issue.
Participating Drum Gate 2 immediately:
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Tightened the snare decay
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Decreased extreme cymbal bleed
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Elevated perceived punch
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Introduced ahead transient assault
The snare specifically went from broad and barely smeared to laser centered and chopping straight by means of dense guitars and vocals.
On heavy rock mixes, the place you’re competing with wall of sound guitars and large synth layers, this turns into a real benefit. It provides the kick and snare an outlined entrance edge with out having to over EQ or over compress.
Decay and Resonant Management That Sounds Pure
One in all my favorite facets is the frequency acutely aware management within the Decay part.
As an alternative of a single launch time that treats the whole lot equally, Drum Gate 2 provides you instruments to form the tail musically. The information calls out Resonant Decay, which lets drums resonate naturally of their basic vary whereas the remainder of the spectrum tightens sooner, which is right for controlling cymbal spill.
On toms, that is precisely what you need. You’ll be able to body the tom’s basic vary with the frequency handles, preserve the physique and weight, after which use HF Damping to progressively tighten the excessive finish the place the spill lives. There are Commonplace and Adaptive modes. Adaptive is designed for the true world state of affairs the place spill sits in the identical normal frequency vary because the drum physique, which is usually the case on ringy toms and snares.
There may be additionally a very helpful perform referred to as Shorten Decay, which adapts decay primarily based on hit energy. Softer hits can shut sooner, louder hits can ring naturally, and also you shouldn’t have to compromise in both course.
Lastly, you’ll be able to select how exhausting you need the gating to be with Achieve Discount. You’ll be able to go full exhausting gate if you would like, or again it off so a bit life nonetheless passes by means of.
Alignment That Truly Fixes Actual Issues
Now we have all acquired classes the place part relationships are… questionable.
Just lately I used to be despatched a session the place the underside snare mic was by some means forward of the highest snare. Bodily unimaginable until the tracks have been edited outdoors of a gaggle. Conditions like that may fully undermine punch and readability.
Drum Gate 2 does greater than gate. It aligns.
The Align part is designed to deal with time alignment, polarity correction, and part alignment throughout the package, rapidly. The workflow is easy, insert it throughout all drum tracks, set cymbal, overhead, and room tracks to Supply: Alignment Solely, then run Analyse.
In accordance with the information, cases are grouped robotically primarily based on monitor names. Kick and snare are aligned internally first, then toms and cymbals are aligned to the overheads, which function the timing reference. There may be additionally a easy A B test by way of Maintain to Bypass, so you’ll be able to immediately evaluate the aligned package in opposition to the unique.
Meaning:
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Snare high and backside regain coherence
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Kick in and kick out lock collectively
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Toms tighten up naturally
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Shut mics reinforce reasonably than smear
It’s ridiculously efficient at restoring focus.
Even Out Hits With out Killing Really feel
One other a part of the toolkit that issues in dense mixes is the Stage tab, which Sonnox name the Leveller. That is designed to even out dynamic inconsistencies whereas preserving expressive taking part in dynamics.
It really works by separating loud hits from mushy hits utilizing a Break up threshold, then transferring every group in the direction of Loud and Tender targets. In observe, which means you’ll be able to management the connection between backbeats and ghost notes with out flattening the entire efficiency.
It additionally contains Hit Clipping, which is a really combine sensible element. As an alternative of clipping solely the loudest hits hardest, it’s designed to clip every hit by the identical dB quantity for consistency, which might help drums reduce evenly by means of dense mixes.
Automation Pleasant and Combine Prepared
What I really like is that it doesn’t drive a static sound.
You can tighten the whole lot within the refrain for max punch, then calm down the decay within the verses for vibe. You’ll be able to let a snare ring deliberately the place it’s stylistically acceptable, or clamp it down when the association turns right into a wall of guitars.
It turns into a part of the combination technique reasonably than solely a corrective device.
The key, and it’s precisely what I ended up doing naturally, is to make use of alignment throughout the whole lot, and reserve the strongest gating selections for the shut mics. That mixture delivers cohesion with out over processing.
Triggering and MIDI Export
For triggering and reinforcement, the information confirms you’ll be able to set off the gate from an Exterior audio aspect chain or from MIDI, and you may as well export MIDI from detected hits for substitute or layering.
A extremely sensible workflow is MIDI Out Seize, the place you play by means of a bit and it information MIDI occasions to a file, then you’ll be able to drag that MIDI straight into your DAW timeline.
One compatibility notice that issues if you’re in Logic, actual time MIDI output just isn’t supported by AudioUnit, so in that world you’ll depend on seize and drag export reasonably than actual time MIDI output.
Ultimate Ideas
The unique Oxford Drum Gate was voted primary by 1000’s of engineers and producers in our group.
Drum Gate 2 takes that basis and provides:
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Machine Studying primarily based hit classification, by timbre not loudness
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Confidence Threshold detection that retains ghost notes whereas eradicating spill
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Resonant Decay, Adaptive mode, HF Damping, and Shorten Decay for pure tails
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Automated time, polarity, and part alignment throughout the package
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Leveller with break up targets plus hit clipping for consistency
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Exterior set off and MIDI export for reinforcement or substitute
In the event you combine dense rock, trendy pop, steel, or something the place reside drums want to chop by means of critical manufacturing weight, that is going to make your life simpler.
It doesn’t substitute good engineering. It enhances it.
It makes punch clearer.
It makes decay controllable.
It makes alignment easy.
So far as I’m involved, this can be a winner.
Have a marvellous time recording and mixing.
