Trouble in the "studio"

[Magnum Pi]

well, guys, here is the problem at hand. Our band has been practicing for the past few months fine tuning songs, etc, for our up coming release, which we are recording and producing ourselves, we are an "eclectic rock" band, with strong roots in late 60's early 70's rock, a definate touch of blues and a rather decent connection to 90's alternative, definatly unique.

Since our roots lay within the "older" styles of the music, we are seeking an alternative to modern recording techniques, the plan of action so far is to "room" mic using the different features of the room as natural effects, and thus far the sound is wonderful, the problems we are faced with are: 1. drums are lacking that certain tightness on the recordings, (they are definatly there when we play, but on tape it doesnt sound right" 2. it's too "roomy" no matter how we process the sound, the overall product comes out too "cheap"

we have tried many different solutions, and they seem to work, but as we fix one thing, we start to have a problem with something else,

we are using around 7 microphones for this project, 2 shure sm57's, 3 samson hypercardiods a dynamic mic and a radioshack uni, we have a 5 pc drum kit with 2 crash, 1 ride, 2 splach and the hats, 2 guitars, and bass, all with totally enormous wattage ratings, the amps face the drum set bout 10 feet away, and approx 4 feet from each other,
mics on either sides of the drum kit pointing towards the middle of the room, an sm57 in the dead center of the room and 2 more mics on the far sides of the middle of the room along the walls facing up and towards the upper overhead of the drums, a mic on the far wall facing the wall behind the amps and a mic down the stairs behind the amps pointing up,
all mics have a decent sound once again, except the drums are lacking

its an odd shaped room with lots of nice building features to it, it adds a nice sound to everything BUT drums, hard wood floors and an angled cieling, so if anyone has any ideas hook us up, email us at kevintmurph@yahoo.com or Magnum_314@hotmail.com
or reply here, email is prefered, but its up to you
thank you very much

Kevin Murphy
(Bassist) Magnum Pi

[James HE]

very simple. close mic the drums. close mic the amps. maybe leave one or two mics in the room. With all the instruments in the same space, the bleed through on the close mics will defintly still give the impression of the room. You could probably use distant mic to get the sound you are looking for on the kit, but not very effeciently or easily with the other instruments blaring away and eating up sonic space.

-jhe

[bantos]

just a little tip....when your chacking your levels, bring up your overhead mics first in the mix, then gradually bring up the kick, snare, etc...A lot a peole do it the other way but this way oughta make for a good overall mix

[ametth]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news..I'm afriad your sound is only going to get marginally better, if at all...Your mic collection is not adequete to get the job done, sorry but someone has to say it. If I were you, since you've already done all the pre-production, I would go into a 'real' studio and lay tracks there. Good luck.

[RockinRobert]

I have to agree to a certain extent with all of the responses so far. Ametth is correct in that you're only gonna go so far with what you have. But I also beleive that if you make the absolute most of what you have, you can still come up with some pretty good sounds...as far as release quality, I dunno.
Just like beauty, music is in the ear of the beholder, I firmly beleive that. If you use some of the close miking techniques mentioned by James HE, you should improve your drum sound quite a bit. If you can at all, I would record the drums by themselves. I know this might ruin the live vibe you're trying to capture, but it would help overall. Bottom line, if it sounds good to you, then it is good. Just be prepared for some people to slam what you have done on account of the setup you used. If your fans love it, who cares?? Sell them lots of CD's!! Lotsa luck! bOb

[bantos]

rockinrobert, you couldn't be more right about doing what sounds good to "you". The best advice i could give is follow your gut and dont worry too much about what other people are saying about "this sound" and "that sound". I'll bet once you find what your looking for nobodyy will be able to tell you what mics you accually used in the first place! Rock on!

[regebro]

In my limited experience with this, to "room" mic a set you need a room that sound right. Your brain will dampen out most of the "room" sound when you are in the room, but a recording will not. That means its hard to hear how a room will sound on recording. Also, it seems to me that the drum sound has a profound impact on the "cheapness" of a recording. I made a demo of a band in a very roomy basement, but the drum set was VERY good and had an excellent natural sound, and I close miced the bass and the snare, and took the rest of the set through one mic pointing at the toms. It sounded much better than expected, and really made the whole demo worth the while.

So I have to agree with the others here: Close mic the drums if you can. You need a very good room if you are going to do something else.

And if that doesn't work either: Go with "weird". Mic the snare side of the snare, let the bass drum bleed through the singer mic, whatever. Go for the strangest drum sound you can find. SOMEBODY will think "hey, man, thats an AWESOME drum sound. How did ya do it?"