Geting the best out of cheap mics!

[DELBOY1977]

Hi guys! I'm a newbie so go easy on me! Looking for some free professional advice on home recording my kit. It's an old Pearl World Series which I've owned for 14 years or so. It sounds beautiful in a studio set-up, in fact I've rented out to a couple of studios in the past as it sounds so great. I've always used analogue but a friend has given me a copy of SONAR to play around with. I have a small Behringer mixer, a nice Groove Tube GT55 and 3 Behringer Xm1800s which were bought solely on reviews I read! I also have a Joe Meek VC3Q and Alesis micro-verb which I've used but I'm not impressed with! The queston is, WHAT DO I DO NEXT? (mic placements etc.) Any help would be appreciated! Thanks in advance from "sunny" Scotland!

DELBOY1977

[tbone36109]

i would suggest either
#1
groove tubes as and overhead and then a behringer mic on the kick(will need some serious eq) and on the snare
or #2
use 2 behingers as overheads(mainly to get a stereo spread) then one on the snare then use the groove tubes infront of the kick about 2 and a half or so feet away. Then copy the groove tubes track and run it through a low pass and use it as a kick track and the original as a room track. then eq and add whatever effects to the tracks till it sounds as best as you can

[random.hero]

DELBOY. I have a pearl world series! its good to know someone else has one... they dont make them anymore, thats a shame.
great kit for recording...
good luck, and for recording...
make sure to use moon gels, remo rings, mini emads, or something else to dampen the drums. In my opinion, it sounds better that way.
sorry this post is dumb, i just need to go to sleep now, good luck!

[DELBOY1977]

Originally Posted by tbone36109

i would suggest either
#1
groove tubes as and overhead and then a behringer mic on the kick(will need some serious eq) and on the snare
or #2
use 2 behingers as overheads(mainly to get a stereo spread) then one on the snare then use the groove tubes infront of the kick about 2 and a half or so feet away. Then copy the groove tubes track and run it through a low pass and use it as a kick track and the original as a room track. then eq and add whatever effects to the tracks till it sounds as best as you can

#2 sounds good to me! This was my original plan as I thought the Groove Tube would catch the kick well plus some ambient noise and at least I'm getting some stereo spread with the dynamics. Time to look out the old 40 band EQ!!!! Thanks for the tips guys! I'll post some sound clips soon!

[DELBOY1977]

Originally Posted by random.hero

DELBOY. I have a pearl world series! its good to know someone else has one... they dont make them anymore, thats a shame.
great kit for recording...
good luck, and for recording...
make sure to use moon gels, remo rings, mini emads, or something else to dampen the drums. In my opinion, it sounds better that way.
sorry this post is dumb, i just need to go to sleep now, good luck!

It's a small world! I'm using remo rings and a little bit of gaffer tape! I've had a few offers for my kit but it's too beautiful to part with even though it doesn't get used as much as it used to. I've now got a backlog of recordings using the drum map on sonar which I'm going to erase and play over. Thanks for your help!

[tbone36109]

keep in mind to use my second method you will want to make sure you have the groove tubes recording to a seperate track than the other mics. if you can only do 2 tracks (left and right) i would say the groove tubes by the kick and the behringer on the snare. these 2 will need there own tracks(the behringer may need a bit of work and the groove tubes track needs to be able to be copied and pasted into 2 tracks that way you can use one of the copies for the bass drum and one for the room/sorta overheads.

[NegadivOne]

Whatever you do, make sure you take your time and really experiment with getting the placement right. Little changes make a huge difference.

[tbone36109]

Originally Posted by NegadivOne

Whatever you do, make sure you take your time and really experiment with getting the placement right. Little changes make a huge difference.

im definately ganna have to agree