Electric Vs. Acoustic drums.

Electric Vs Acoustic Drums.


  • Total voters
    91

Wack

New member
Hi, I was wondering Which you guys preferred. Electric drums, or acoustic drums for recording? And Why? I'm Unsure to go with drum mics for my set, or an electric set for no distortion. I've mostly seen people with acoustic sets, I assumed it was for more real drum sound. I figured with an electric drum set i wouldn't have to worry about distortion/bass trapping. Which do you prefer?
 
I think you should go with mic'ing an acoustic set. Electronic drums are... ya know, electronic. Acoustic drums also give you a chance to experiment with sound. Some drum plug ins sound great, but it doesn't give you the same sense of accomplishment when you get a good sound out of an acoustic kit. Whatever suits you.

What do you mean by distortion? If you mean distortion as in guitar effect, then your mic levels are WAY too high.
 
[/QUOTE]What do you mean by distortion? If you mean distortion as in guitar effect, then your mic levels are WAY too high.[/QUOTE]


I meant distortion as in, my last demo recorded my drums sounded like fuzz. It may have been the mic(s) that's why I was wondering. The bass Drum rattled the whole set and it picked up every bit of noise from the set. Maybe the mics were positioned wrong? I tried many different angles.
 
The bass Drum rattled he whole set and it picked up every bit of noise from the set. Maybe the mics were positioned wrong? I tried many different angles.

Sounds to me like the mics were doing their job. It's not the mic's fault that your drums rattled. Get rid of the noise your kit is making, put new skins on, tune it properly...THEN maybe you can make a judgement about micing drums.
 
Thank you for the advice, Ill change all the heads and have to get the tuning to perfection. So I'm just going to stick with the acoustic set as that's what everyone seems to prefer. Thanks guys :cool:
 
I usually use a hybrid of both worlds.

Cymbals on samples & drum modules suck, suck and then suck. The kicks and toms on electrics are generally good.

In the end, it depends on the song. A lot of times people like what the songs they like were done with.

I'd like to be a purist and say real drums 'cause that's what I grew up on but the truth is that on some songs real drums sound worse than drum machines, and the opposite is true too.
 
In my humble thingummyjig, there really is no contest. Electric drums are pretty neat and apart from some of the irritatingly loud thuds from the kick pedal {you'd be surprized how much those sounds travel}, will cause your neighbours to love you. The electric drums, triggers and samples are getting better, more realistic and I guess, easier to store. More and more mainstream songs use them and clubs, churches, studios and 'homeys' have demonstrated how versatile they are.

But they are not acoustic drums.

It's partly my age and I'm unashamedly biased but it's acoustic drums for me. Though I'm not a drummer, I had a kit for 13 years {a Mirage} and it served me well and I was fortunate that my neighbours never bothered about the noise. Then when my family and I moved to our present place in 2003, I started to feel a little self conscious about noise so I gave away my drums and bought a Roland TD6 which I thought was a good idea. But, you know, though I liked the kick and some of the toms and snare sounds, the hi hat and cymbals just never did it for me. I made all kinds of modifications, bought a better brain that had 8 outputs, a mesh head snare for rimshots etc but after a year I went back to an acoustic set and sold the Roland. I bought an Arbiter flat-lites kit {the whole thing can be stored in two bags} and set about reading up on micing drums and listening to drum sounds in a way I hadn't before and began experimenting with different snare sounds and trying to see how I could get some of the sounds that I realized I dug. In the old days, once all the other instruments got on board, I was dissatisfied with my drum sounds. I could never work out why I got better sounds {and a kick you could dance with} with a small cassette recorder in my pre-multitrack days.
I'm no expert, but I am of the opinion that there are a number of different ways of recording drums and many variations of sounds across the kit. As frustrating as it can sometimes be, it's also great fun and truly rewarding figuring out different strokes. You can do so much with acoustic drums. Which is not to say that you can't with the other guys.
As for electric drums, I have to say, for the most part, I like them. But I don't want to use them.....
 
I have acoustic drums, and I always use samples on my drum tracks. It's easier, quieter and the only people who will ever know that they are fake are the people who use the same sample library that I use.

If acoustic drums weren't so bloody loud, I'd use them more, but that reason alone, I rarely use them. So I guess in a sense, I prefer samples.
 
Honestly, there are some samples out there that I could not identify as "fake" in a mix. So... It's really hard to say.

I go "accoustic" only because I don't have the software to do otherwise.

I imagine samples would be hot as hell for a few songs... But I would start to miss the variety of sounds I can get with drums n' mics.
 
I know it's not popular, but I voted 'electronic', for a couple reasons. There's no acoustic or phase prob's for one.. For 2, midi and samples ARE getting very good, the best ones out there, maybe some of you guys can tell the difference, but 99.9% of the world can't. Rubber pads are kinda sucky, but your sticks bounce on mesh heads just like real drums. I think the avg HR joe with the avg kit and avg room can get a better sound out of elec. drums vs real ones.

Ya it's true, you CAN get a better sound out of real drums and mics. IF you have a great treated room, IF you have a great drum kit, and IF you're isolated enough to keep street / kid / furnace noise out, etc.. I have none of the above. Plus, I'm not a drummer, I kinda suck at drums, and it's a lot easier to edit midi than audio, move timing of a drum hit, change velocity, change that crash hit to a china, etc.

Not to mention all the noise.. I can play in the middle of the night, and my wife and neighbors still like me :D
 
electric and vts all the way ,i have an acoustic but in my room i can not make it sound good (its 10x10 with a pitched celing) ,vts gives me access to kits i dont have i can track late at night any mistakes are easily edited timming issues one click dont like the tempo one click again all sorted ,alot of people can not tell the differance when its in the track.

ok certain thngs you cannot do that you can on an acoustic but for 90% of the music i do vts is fine.
 
I use drum samples. But then again I am not doing rock or jazz or... you know, stuff that needs a real acoustic drum set. In fact, even if I use samples of acoustic drums, they get messed with so much that they end up sounding electronic drums anyway.
 
Acoustic will always yield the best results when done right.. but doing it right is hard and expensive. Having the right mics, right room, right setup, interface with enough inputs... not everyone has access to this, so when you dont electric will suffice. And yes there are some believable samples out there so it will work. But acoustic drums will always be the best.. just difficult to record properly.

And what you say about distortion... the only way you get distortion/fuzz/buzz from recording drums is when you have the mic pres too hot causing clipping.. turn the levels down until there is no clipping (never letting levels get into red) and you'll be good to go.
 
Thanks for all the info guys, I'm really unsure what to go with. I'm going to give the mics another try this weekend and see how it goes.
 
Wow... This is a great thread. I've been playing drums for 20 years, so take what I'm saying with a grain of that. hehe...

I started getting serious about recording my drums about a year ago. The recordings I made sucked pretty badly. Then I found this forum about 8 months ago, and my recordings have been steadily improving ever since. Comments that "recording acoustic drums is expensive" are definitely true, but then again, if you're trying to get the same sound out of electric drums, you're likely gonna pay more. I almost bought a $5000.00 Roland Electric kit some years ago, but decided to spend $1600.00 on a nice acoustic instead. Even with the kit included, I haven't spent on my studio what I would have spent on that electric drum kit, and I'm getting some pretty good results! The mics I use are mostly sub-par. I've been told my room is far from a "good recording space", and I'm sure I'm doing lots and lots of things wrong. But I'm thoroughly enjoying the ride.

Also, something to consider is - if you use electric drums, and you want to record your other instruments, a lot of the drum mics you would otherwise buy could be used on other instruments... So, if you go the acoustic route, you'll most likely end up with a better studio situation, AND better skills to record things correctly.

Anyway... I started a thread some time ago with the latest attempt at recording something in my basement, and have got good comments. If you want another guy's opinion and recordings to back it up, please visit here, and give it a listen.

Everything was recorded acoustically, and I had a blast doing it.

Also - if you can record acoustic drums and get them to sound half-way decent, you'll be able to record anything. It just takes a little time and practice, along with a few bucks. Talk to Greg L, and listen to his stuff. His mics are far from "industry standard", and his drum recordings are phenomenal. They are just as good, and in some cases, better than stuff you hear on the radio.

Anyway... Great thread.... Thanks for asking the question and starting the poll.
 
Yeah I'm Thinking drum mics would benefit me in the long run. any suggestions on a decent pair? All I've had the chance to use were some CAD PRO-7 7's. 7 piece set, they were fairly nice.
 
I just wrote a very detailed (and long) reply, but then I deleted it because I realised that it all boils down to this:

Unless you are (or have access to) a very good drummer, with the best mics and the best recording environment money can buy (which, with respect, not many of us are / have, which is why we're on a 'Home-Recording' forum!) then I would say you should do with either an electronic kit and / or midi programming.

It's all well and good saying acoustic drums are best - undoubtedly, they are in a live situation! - but in the real world of the home-recordist, the simplest and most cost-effective way of getting good (pro sounding) drum tracks for your music, is to go electro.

There's a whole stack of pro's out there using MODERN electronic kits, triggers and software because of the time, money and effort saved. And seriously, the sound is nothing short of BRILLIANT these days. Every parameter and every bit of programming can be tweaked at any time, and HERE'S THE TRUTH: 99.9% of our audience will not know the difference. All they will love is the killer drum sound you've got.

Sorry, this hasn't been as brief as I hoped, but in short I say, for recording, go electro! Your tracks will be transformed for the better. Programming drums is in itself a bit of an skill (maybe even an art-form), but you'll learn quickly and nothing yields such easy, pro-sounding results for us 'real world' (skint) home recordists!

Now, let the battle commence... ha ha ha....
 
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