How many tracks do you use to record drums?

**Synkrotron** · 03-20-2006

Originally Posted by brandrum

I voted three.

me too

two for stereo overheads and one for the kick

toms and snare get picked up by all three mics

having a mic on kick allows you to add umph to it

I recently recorded some drums with just two mics on the overheads but you have to be really creative with parametric EQ to pull up the kick

**Minion** · 03-20-2006

I use 7 or 8 ,You need one for every Drum so on a 5 Piece that is 5 Mics and you need a 2 or 3 Overhead Condensers for the Cymbals (one Panned Left and One Right and One Centered).....

I never thought or even tried to use Less than 5 mics....

Cheers

**mrface2112** · 03-20-2006

Originally Posted by phaqu

I mic/track all my drums, but, I try to get my overheads (X-Y usually) and kick sounding as good as I possibly can first. Then,if I absolutly have to,start adding snare and tom( in the mix). The tracks are there if I need them. More offten than not, I just end up using 3 tracks. Less phase problems that way to.

absolutely. i'd FAR prefer to use only OH and Kick mics in the mix if that's an option. and i always get the OH and kick mix bumpin before i add in the other mics. the OH and kick are the "foundation", if you will, of the entire drum part. the rest of the mics are just "sweetening".

it's funny too......"inexperienced" clients who come into the studio to record drums seem to think they're getting short-changed if you've only got 3 or 4 mics hung. kinda like in the mixerman diaries.

cheers,
wade

**scrubs** · 03-20-2006

4.........

**brandrum** · 03-20-2006

Originally Posted by Synkrotron

me too

two for stereo overheads and one for the kick

toms and snare get picked up by all three mics

having a mic on kick allows you to add umph to it

I recently recorded some drums with just two mics on the overheads but you have to be really creative with parametric EQ to pull up the kick

actually I use 6 mic's.....overheads and tom mics to channel one, and kick and snare mics going to channel two and three.

**Brad_C** · 03-20-2006

I use like 10 or more, each in a seperate track.

**Synkrotron** · 03-20-2006

Originally Posted by brandrum

actually I use 6 mic's.....overheads and tom mics to channel one, and kick and snare mics going to channel two and three.

I get ya

**TamaSabian** · 03-20-2006

I use 3-5 mics, it all depends on what kind of music the band is doing.

TS

**brandrum** · 03-20-2006

this thread has got me wondering.......I have a yamaha mg 12/4 mixer and a PreSonus FireBox....is there any way that I could for example have two mic's go to one channel and have two different mic's go to another?

**PhilGood** · 03-20-2006

Originally Posted by brandrum

this thread has got me wondering.......I have a yamaha mg 12/4 mixer and a PreSonus FireBox....is there any way that I could for example have two mic's go to one channel and have two different mic's go to another?

Well, yes! I just looked up that mixer and it says that is has 4 busses. 2 stereo and 2 grouped. There should be seperate outputs for each. The input of the computer doesn't know how the mixer is panned, just what input its coming in on. You should be able to group whatever mics you want to any given output. My current mixer has 20 channels and 4 busses. I group channel 1 (kick drum) and channel 11 (subkick mic) to bus 1 and send that to the first channel of my sound card. If it were just a stereo card, it would be the left channel. So long as I can split the stereo track to two mono tracks I could pan them however I want. With my current sound card I have 8 analog inputs. I group the toms (channels 3 through 7) to busses 5 & 6 of the sound card as a stereo group, with the toms panned.

You should be able to have 4 seprate outputs and group the channels together as you like.