High hat overdubs..

[Blaize86]

I read ..or saw on You Tube..a Bonham fan..Bonhamology…and fine drummer stating that they used high hat overdubs on Over the Hills and Far Away and South Bound Suarez. I’m surprised Bonzo would even entertain the thought. Anyone confirm that?

[woz70]

South Bound Saurez... without a doubt.  If you listen super-carefully you can hear the hi-hat being hit open and closed simultaneously on a few occasions, and there are also a few two-handed snare fills that happen at the same time as hi-hat hits - impossible without either at least three arms, or by overdubbing.  They probably decided that the driving hi-hat was a super important element of the song, and a natural playing style (coming off the hats to do fills etc.) spoiled that flow.

Over The Hills and Far Away...  I don't think so.  There's a huge amount of drum separation on this song (I reckon they'd been listening to  Steely Dan's 'Can't Buy A Thrill' album a lot, and that uses similar over-accentuated panning of drum kit elements.  "Dirty Work" has very similar drum production), and I think the hi-hat is just very close-mic'ed and panned off to the left.  It's not doing anything slightly odd, like in 'Saurez..'.  To my ears 'Houses of the Holy' sounds like the first album that they'd properly experimented with close mic'ing instruments in the drum kit, rather than using the tried-and-tested Andy Johns technique (which in its most basic form only requires two mics, a good sounding room and an excellent drummer).
'Over The Hills...' is a great example where you can hear this - at the beginning the drums sounds close and dry (not really possible without close mic'ing), but as you get to the guitar solo they open up the room/ambient mics and the drums start to 'breathe' and sound far more live.  Really interesting bit of production!