Gated reverb is an audio processing technique that is applied to recordings of drums (or live sound reinforcement of drums in a PA system) to make the drums sound powerful and "punchy," while keeping the overall mix clean and transparent-sounding. The gated reverb effect, which was most popular in the 1980s, is made using a combination of strong reverb

Reverberation

Reverberation is the persistence of sound in a particular space after the original sound is removed. A reverberation, or reverb, is created when a sound is produced in an enclosed space causing a large number of echoes to build up and then slowly decay as the sound is absorbed by the walls and air...

 and a noise gate

Noise gate

A Noise Gate or gate is an electronic device or software that is used to control the volume of an audio signal. In its most simple form, a noise gate allows a signal to pass through only when it is above a set threshold: the gate is 'open'. If the signal falls below the threshold no signal is...

.

Unlike most reverberation

Reverberation

Reverberation is the persistence of sound in a particular space after the original sound is removed. A reverberation, or reverb, is created when a sound is produced in an enclosed space causing a large number of echoes to build up and then slowly decay as the sound is absorbed by the walls and air...

 or delay

Delay (audio effect)

Delay is an audio effect which records an input signal to an audio storage medium, and then plays it back after a period of time. The delayed signal may either be played back multiple times, or played back into the recording again, to create the sound of a repeating, decaying echo.-Early delay...

 effects, the gated reverb effect does not try to emulate any kind of reverb that occurs in nature.

History

Perhaps the earliest known use of the gated snare drum technique was on the recording Mondo Bondage (first verse only) from the 1975 self-titled debut album

The Tubes (album)

The Tubes is the debut album of The Tubes. Songs from this album which received significant airplay include "What Do You Want From Life" and "White Punks On Dope"...

 of the San Francisco rock band The Tubes. The drums were played by Prairie Prince

Prairie Prince

Prairie Prince is a rock drummer. He was a member of The Tubes and a founding member of Journey...

. Recording produced by Al Kooper

Al Kooper

Al Kooper is an American songwriter, record producer and musician, known for organizing Blood, Sweat & Tears , providing studio support for Bob Dylan when he went electric in 1965, and also bringing together guitarists Mike Bloomfield and Stephen Stills to...

 and engineered by Lee Rhett Keifer.

Recording engineer Rudy Van Gelder

Rudy Van Gelder

Rudy Van Gelder is an American recording engineer specializing in jazz.Often regarded as one of the most important recording engineers in music history, Van Gelder has recorded several thousand jazz sessions, including many widely recognized as classics, in a career spanning more than half a century...

 used it on many of the songs on the 1976 album Velvet Darkness

Velvet Darkness

Velvet Darkness is the first studio album by guitarist Allan Holdsworth, released in 1976 through CTI Records; a remastered edition was reissued in 2002. According to Holdsworth, the tracks were originally recorded during a rehearsal session, after which the tapes were released by CTI without his...

by Jazz fusion

Jazz fusion

Jazz fusion is a musical fusion genre that developed from mixing funk and R&B rhythms and the amplification and electronic effects of rock, complex time signatures derived from non-Western music and extended, typically instrumental compositions with a jazz approach to lengthy group improvisations,...

 guitarist Allan Holdsworth

Allan Holdsworth

Allan Holdsworth is an English guitarist and composer. He has released twelve studio albums as a solo artist and played many different styles of music over a period of four decades, but first drew attention for his work in jazz fusion...

. The drummer on this recording was Narada Michael Walden

Narada Michael Walden

Narada Michael Walden is an American producer, drummer, singer, and songwriter. He was given the name Narada by guru Sri Chinmoy in the early 1970s and his musical career spans three decades, in which he was awarded several gold, platinum and multi-platinum awards...

.

Another early use of this technique was on the 1977 David Bowie

David Bowie

David Bowie is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s...

 album Low. Use of the gated reverb effect spread to popular music during the 1980s. Producer Mutt Lange was a pioneer at drenching the recorded drum sound in gated reverb. An early and prominent use of gated reverb was in Peter Gabriel

Peter Gabriel

Peter Brian Gabriel is an English singer, musician, and songwriter who rose to fame as the lead vocalist and flautist of the progressive rock group Genesis. After leaving Genesis, Gabriel went on to a successful solo career...

, Phil Collins

Phil Collins

Philip David Charles "Phil" Collins, LVO is an English singer-songwriter, drummer, pianist and actor best known as a drummer and vocalist for British progressive rock group Genesis and as a solo artist....

 and Hugh Padgham

Hugh Padgham

Hugh Padgham is a British record producer. He has won many awards, including four Grammys, with Producer of the Year and Engineer of the Year. A 1992 poll in Mix magazine voted him one of the world's Top Ten Most Influential Producers....

's production of the third Peter Gabriel solo album.

Methods of creation

"Classic" analogue method The oldest, most "natural" technique can be done with minimal electronic processing. The steps for processing are as follow: At least 2 microphones are set up: close mic(s) (usually dynamic, to pick up the hit itself) and ambience mic(s) (usually condenser, to pick up ambient sound). Usually, there are 2 ambience mics in stereo pair to capture overhead stereo image. The whole drumset and all mics are placed in a very live room (i.e., one with huge amounts of reverberation and particularly early reflections from its walls, ceiling and floor). High-gain compression Audio level compression Dynamic range compression, also called DRC or simply compression reduces the volume of loud sounds or amplifies quiet sounds by narrowing or "compressing" an audio signal's dynamic range...  is applied to ambience mic(s) to capture rich reverb sound. Ambience mic(s) are fed through a noise gate Noise gate A Noise Gate or gate is an electronic device or software that is used to control the volume of an audio signal. In its most simple form, a noise gate allows a signal to pass through only when it is above a set threshold: the gate is 'open'. If the signal falls below the threshold no signal is...  with separate external key input. Close mic(s) are used as an external key for the noise gate. Hold time of noise gate is set to half a second or so (this would be a real duration of hit sound), followed by a fast release time. This causes the gate to allow only the first half second of reverb to pass though after each drum hit, before closing again. Optionally, close mic sound can be mixed in final result in some proportion to make a hit sound more "solid". This results in a very live sounding drum that is rapidly cut off with none of the overpowering secondary reflections associated with reverb. Note that this process is generally used in studio recording environment only: it's hard to reproduce such effect when playing live, though both Phil Collins and Genesis were able to incorporate it into most of their live performances.

Modern digital method When using digital reverb unit, it is possible to replicate classic scheme in much simpler steps: Only 1 microphone is set up: close mic. No real room for ambience is needed, all reverberation is done at effects unit Effects unit Effects units are electronic devices that alter how a musical instrument or other audio source sounds. Some effects subtly "color" a sound, while others transform it dramatically. Effects are used during live performances or in the studio, typically with electric guitar, keyboard and bass...  processor. Close mic sound is fed to reverberation unit, then to compressor, then to noise gate signal input. Same sound of close mic is fed to noise gate key input. Optionally, just as in the analog method, original ("dry") sound can be mixed in some proportion to gated output ("wet") sound. Each channel needs its own "reverb+noise gate" unit. Applying the effect on already mixed drums won't work properly. Most modern digital reverb units contain several "Gated reverb" presets, thus removing the need for a separate noise gate, compessor and commutation, effectively making it possible to get gated reverb sound from just single normal close mic or drum trigger. Also note that such setup does not require "live room" with huge reverberation ambience for the drumset and can be reproduced without major difficulties at live gigs Concert A concert is a live performance before an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, a choir, or a musical band... .

Usage patterns

Gated reverb is most commonly used for empowering drum sounds, particularly snare drum

Snare drum

The snare drum or side drum is a melodic percussion instrument with strands of snares made of curled metal wire, metal cable, plastic cable, or gut cords stretched across the drumhead, typically the bottom. Pipe and tabor and some military snare drums often have a second set of snares on the bottom...

 and bass drum

Bass drum

Bass drums are percussion instruments that can vary in size and are used in several musical genres. Three major types of bass drums can be distinguished. The type usually seen or heard in orchestral, ensemble or concert band music is the orchestral, or concert bass drum . It is the largest drum of...

. The technique became so popular and the "gated reverb" sound is so recognizable that many drum machine

Drum machine

A drum machine is an electronic musical instrument designed to imitate the sound of drums or other percussion instruments. They are used in a variety of musical genres, not just purely electronic music...

s and samplers

Sampler (musical instrument)

A sampler is an electronic musical instrument similar in some respects to a synthesizer but, instead of generating sounds, it uses recordings of sounds that are loaded or recorded into it by the user and then played back by means of a keyboard, sequencer or other triggering device to perform or...

 include some sort of "gated drums" setting. These sounds are usually referred to as gated snare and gated kick, omitting the word "reverb" word from the original name.

While General MIDI

General MIDI

General MIDI or GM is a standardized specification for music synthesizers that respond to MIDI messages. GM was developed by the MIDI Manufacturers Association and the Japan MIDI Standards Committee and first published in 1991...

 does not specify particular sound characteristics for its drum kits, it does include two distinct snare sounds, sometimes referred to as acoustic snare (38) and electric snare (40), the latter usually implemented with a "gated snare" sound. Later MIDI standards such as GS

Roland GS

Roland GS, or just GS, sometimes expanded as General Standard or General Sound, is an extension of General MIDI specification. It requires that all GS-compatible equipment must meet a certain set of features and it documents interpretations of some MIDI commands and bytes sequences, thus defining...

 and XG include drum kits that specify gated drum sounds, most usually patch #16 (GS #17, with shifted numbering) named "Power drumkit" or "Rock drumkit", or patch #24 (GS #25) named "Electronic drumkit". Thus, for example, for snare drum, distinct sounds may be referred to as power snare or rock snare.

Notable records

Gated reverb as an effect was used on countless drum tracks during the 1980s, to the point that such a sound became a defining characteristic of that decade's popular music.

Phil Collins

Phil Collins

Philip David Charles "Phil" Collins, LVO is an English singer-songwriter, drummer, pianist and actor best known as a drummer and vocalist for British progressive rock group Genesis and as a solo artist....

 used gated reverb extensively in the early to mid-1980s, both in his solo work as well as working with other artists. He first employed it on the Peter Gabriel

Peter Gabriel

Peter Brian Gabriel is an English singer, musician, and songwriter who rose to fame as the lead vocalist and flautist of the progressive rock group Genesis. After leaving Genesis, Gabriel went on to a successful solo career...

 song "Intruder

Intruder (song)

"Intruder" is a song written and performed by English musician Peter Gabriel. It starts off his third eponymous album with the description of a break-in told through the eyes of the burglar, or "Intruder"...

". Examples of Collins's own music include "In the Air Tonight

In the Air Tonight

"In the Air Tonight" is a song by Phil Collins that first appeared on his 1981 album Face Value. It was recorded in 1979 and was the first single of Collins' solo career, and remains one of his best-known hits. The music video, directed by Stuart Orme, was released in 1981.-The song/recording:The...

", "Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)

Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)

"Against All Odds " is a song by British singer Phil Collins recorded for soundtrack to the 1984 film of the same name. It is a power ballad in which its protagonist implores an ex-lover to "take a look at me now", knowing that reconciliation is "against all odds" while considering it worth trying...

", I Don't Care Anymore

I Don't Care Anymore

"I Don't Care Anymore" is a song by Phil Collins from his second solo album Hello, I Must Be Going!.The song is very dark, which follows a vast majority of songs from the album...

, and the Genesis

Genesis (band)

Genesis are an English rock band that formed in 1967. The band currently comprises the longest-tenured members Tony Banks , Mike Rutherford and Phil Collins . Past members Peter Gabriel , Steve Hackett and Anthony Phillips , also played major roles in the band in its early years...

 track "Mama

Mama (Genesis song)

"Mama" was the first single from Genesis' 1983 self-titled album. It is recognizable for its harsh drum machine introduction composed by Mike Rutherford, which leads into minimalist synthesizer lines in minor keys and finally Phil Collins' reverb-laden voice. It remains the band's biggest...

". The British band Duran Duran

Duran Duran

Duran Duran are an English band, formed in Birmingham in 1978. They were one of the most successful bands of the 1980s and a leading band in the MTV-driven "Second British Invasion" of the United States...

 also made repeated use of the recording technique, heard prominently on the drums on the 1984 hit single "The Wild Boys

The Wild Boys (song)

"The Wild Boys" is the twelfth single by Duran Duran, released in October 1984.The song was the only studio track on the live album Arena, and was produced by Nile Rodgers, who had previously remixed the single "The Reflex"...

" as well as the 1985 James Bond

James Bond (film series)

The James Bond film series is a British series of motion pictures based on the fictional character of MI6 agent James Bond , who originally appeared in a series of books by Ian Fleming. Earlier films were based on Fleming's novels and short stories, followed later by films with original storylines...

 theme song A View To A Kill

A View to a Kill (song)

"A View to a Kill" is the thirteenth single by Duran Duran, released in May 1985.It was a stand-alone single, created for the James Bond movie A View to a Kill, and it remains the only James Bond theme song to have reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100; it also made it to #2 for 3 weeks on the UK...

.