The DTL Productions can deliver a world class rock sound on a budget. We do not charge by the day or by the hour. We spend however long it takes to get the best possible sound. By removing time constraints we give the artists we work with the peace of mind to focus on the most important thing - THE PERFORMANCE.

1. Pre-production

Before we start actually recording your songs we do 2 separate 4-hour pre-production sessions. At the first we listen to your band rehearse and try to get a feel for how the band sounds and assess if the project is ready to be recorded. We expect a certain standard of musicianship and quality in the music that leaves DTL Productions, so really it's at this first session we make a decision on whether or not the project is something we wish to be involved with. Given that we do decide to work with your project a second 4-hour session is spent recording scratch tracks to a metronome for all the material that is to be recorded.

Once we are satisfied with all the rough recorded scratch tracks. eg; the song tempos, arrangements and guitar performances have the right vibe. We move on to recording drums using the scratch tracks for the drummer to play along with.

2. Recording the Drums

A great drum sound is maybe the most important element in a rock song. The vibe lives in the drum sound. Rock music is a living, breathing thing it needs the human element. The randomness of life so to speak, so we decided to find a way to record a drum sound that was as good if not better than any of the best drum sounds out there.

There are 6 essential ingredients to a drum sound that will cut it for international broadcast standard

And here at DTL we’ve gone to great lengths to ensure the best possible result in all 6 areas.

1. The Live Room – Yooniq studios in Fortitude valley has a word class live room. The room has been scientifically treated for audio production and has an amazing vibe. More importantly the size of the room is perfect. When recording drums you need a big room with high ceilings to capture a full 3 dimensional sound. Yooniq is also equipped with ample baffles if a tighter sound is required.
2. The Microphones – Yooniq has a great microphone list, we also bring a few of our own along to add in. But all the good ones are used. Sennheisers on the toms, Shure SM57’s on the top and bottom of the snare. Royer’s for the Overheads, Neuman U47 & U87 are used for the kick and room mic’s. We also place a couple of Rode NTK’s around the room in various positions. When it comes to microphones they have to be the best. Basically the microphone solution we use is at exactly the same standard as any big studio in the USA.
3. The Mic Preamps – We use a combination of mic preamps. We bring out own DTL Creative Rack along with us to Yooniq. We have genuine NEVE 1073 preamps. Neve preamps have been used on countless hit records for decades, spanning every genre particularly rock.  The “Neve crunch” so to speak is so embedded in the rock genre that it is a part of the sound as much as a Marshall amp is to rock.  DTL Creative use “genuine” Neve preamps. There are imitations but if it’s not NEVE it’s not NEVE. Don’t risk it never sell yourself short!
4. The Engineer - Knowing what all the knobs do is one thing, but knowing which way to turn them is another. ARIA award winning producer/engineer Anthony Lycenko has been pulling the drum sound at Rockinghorse Studios in Byron Bay for years, he is the best. And that is why we use him to come in and supervise the set-up of the drum mics and set the sound every time we do a new project at Yooniq.
5. The Drum Kit - We have access to several different top of the range drum kits, we also could use yours depending on what it is. we'd make this decision with you at the first pre-production/ consultation session. Either way a fresh set of skins needs to be factored into your costs and if the project is an album we'd also look at getting in a few extra snares and atleast 2 different hat combinations. allow $150 -$200 for snare and hat hire in addition to your new skins.
6. The Drummer - You can have the best drum kit mic-ed up with top of the range microphones, set up by the best engineer, in the best live room hooked into the best mic preamps but if your drummer can't play then it's all for nothing. Generally speaking though we are confident that if we've gone out and set the room up that the drummer we are working with is up to standard otherwise it is unlikely we'd be involved. Drums sound best in rock when they are hit hard. Troy and Mike are always around to help you out by calling you a pussy whenever you aren't hitting them hard enough. Sessions at Yooniq are 8 hours, we aim for five or more songs per day. because of the pre-production recordings the drummer would have been rehearsing to the pre-production CD for atleast a week prior to recording. they are very efficient days when the rest of the band is a recording as we only need to focus on the drummer and making sure we get the best out of him/her. If the project is a solo project we also have a catalogue of some of the finest session playing drummers in Brisbane Australia. Their prices and styles vary and are made available via consultation.