I have what I think is a good drum take.  The vibe is right, the fills are executed nicely, etc.

I am noticing that the kick drum, while sounding good (thanks to Rip's articles) is a little inconsistent.  The drummer is very dynamic which is a good thing on most of the project's tunes but on a 4/4 R & R song, I needed the kick to be consistently strong through the whole tune.

I am not a drummer so I sometimes have difficulty knowing just how close to perfection I can get without asking the impossible.  If these questions sound dumb, please bare with me.

1)  Can I compress the drum track to get a more consistent drum volume?  If so, what settings should I start with?  Specifically, how should I set the release time so that the compression is acting correctly in relation to the next hit.  I am thinking that there may be a formula to determining the release time in relation to the beats per minute of the song.  I don't want the compressor to change the tone of the drum.  I just want to bring up the volume of the weaker hits in relation to the stronger ones.  Should I use a limiter or compressor?

2)  Should I just edit the track and replace certain kick hits that I find too strong or too weak?  I can do this easily enough but I don't want to if I can avoid it.  Which is the better general solution - edit the drum track or compress it?

3) Generally speaking, just how much compression is used on drum tracks?  Are they normally pretty heavily compressed?

General drummer question:  I know that a key to getting a good drum track is consistent playing but just how picky should I be?  No one is perfect, right?  I am assuming that all drummers are inconsistent to one degree or another.  I am not looking for perfection.  I am sure that others have successfully dealt with this.  Let me also say that, this guy kicks arse in a live situation.  He never speeds up or slows down the song.  He knows how to tune a kit and is a very tasteful player. Once he learns his parts, he plays them consistently (compositionally speaking) every time and can always be depended on to be where he is supposed to be.  This is why I like him so much.  My questions should not be construed as critical of him.  I want to find that point where he is doing his job and I am not asking the impossible.

I am a guitarist by choice and an engineer by default.  Thanks in advance for any help.

Ok, fair enough!  This is why I keep coming back to this forum.

Being somewhat of an amatuer at this, I find that I need to get away from the track for a couple of days and then revisit it after my ear rests.  If I like the track when I have listened to it again, I will let it be.  If not, I'll edit it to even out the kick hits a bit.

Next question.

I am not running any compression or anything else during the recording process.  When we did the take, he peaked the meters once or twice.  I am assuming that I can simply replace those with lower level hits to get rid of the peaking.  I have always heard that I should avoid peaking the meters in digital recording but I cannot actually hear anything wrong in the one or two places where he peaked them.

In general, would you redo the take if any of the meters peaked?  Like I said, on an individual drum (kick for instance) I can simply edit that hit.  However on an OH mic or a room mic, if the meter peaks, does it ruin the track, in your opinion, or are we once again back to simply trusting our ears?  Will anything in mastering or mixdown suddenly make it obvious that a meter peaked?

Thanks again, Rip.

The kick track needs editing.

Thanks again.