tiny bedroom for drums: cymbals? mics? treatment?

[igtmfo]

Guys, I'm waiting for the Akai DPS24 to be rereleased with improvements (?) so I sold my Roland VS. Now back in the day Roland boards were very fine sonically for the money. That was in the 80s when I owned one ... the VS2400 to me was too toy-like in operation, though the sound was pretty clear and direct (not rich though) ...

I'm worried that my tiny bedroom, just bare walls, will suck for recording live drums. I want to do retro tunes that are between Cat Stevens (quiet side), Beatles, and Big Star (on the loud side)

I just bought a Pacific EZ shell pack (Guitar Center unloaded the hardware for resale, which I won't complain about). I'm the "overshopper" on the Web but you guys have been down this road way before me so hoping for input ...

On this board I've read fewer mikes are best. So I want to buy a kick drum (?) to go along with my 421 for snare (I've got already) plus some overhead/tom condensers (maybe the cheap MXRs on Musicians Friend? .. or would these be overbright in the mix?)

And heads: thinking about some fairly live retrofit heads like Aquarian Studio-X's (or being low-maintenance and knowing nothing about drum tuning, should I get 2-ply heads like G2s, though I'm afraid because I once owned Evans hydraulics I should shy away from dead heads ...)

This little room will be "slap happy" so should I invest in Auralex wall treatment, or can I get away with egg crates on www.eggboxes.com?

Thinking of the Sabian AAX studio cymbals, would these be too bright given my bright room and cheap condenser overheads?

I just hope to have a manageable, low-maintenance, somewhat "live" sound in a miserable room (at low cost yet) ... a room I've never heard on tape.

Thnx everybody for my long miserable rant, just trying to save money and avoid "gear-guilt" .. I want to spend maybe $1500 more tops at this point ...

[Supercreep]

First things first:

Do you own or rent this property? House or apartment? Does the bedroom in question share any walls with neighbors?

If you don't own it, and you have neighbors you are in trouble. They can shut you down permanently, real quick. If you can work something out with them beforehand, that's the best. Anyway, I'll assume this is your place and you can do some work on it.

In your spare time you should be reading along in the studio construction forum at HR. You will have already noted Ethan Winer's site... Bookmark it. You'll be back again and again.

You will realize very shortly that achieving any significant attenuation of your drums is difficult and expensive. Fortunately, treating the room acoustically is not (so much). I doubt you want to build a room inside your room and then deal with ventilation and then treatment, so let's skip right to treatment.

Consider the dimensions of your room. I imagine your celings are low and the room is like a box. If it's not square, you're one step ahead. Carpet on the floor already? Looking good. What you are looking for in this seriously comprimised situation is to create a good mix of reflective and absorbent surfaces and possibly some diffusion. You don't want to cover your whole room with auralex. That will kill some HF and some HMF and that's about it. You definitely want bass traps. Serious as a heart attack, most of the difference will be right there. Build your own, or prepare to pay for the real thing. Ignore foam bass traps. You want Corning 703 or equivalent, and if you can't get it, you want to compress thick fiberglass insulation in a frame you built yourself and then cover it. These go in the corners. Hang them high so they cover where the walls and celing intersect too; also a corner. If your celing is peaked, you may want to consider one up there, too.

Put bookshelves along parts of one or more walls. Put books of different size in the shelves. If there's room for a couch or easy chair that's nice too.

You're going to want to find and fix everything that rattles or vibrates, weatherstrip your windows and doors (I'd make something to cover up the window, too). and you should have a good start.

Sold on that Akai?

-Casey