Drum Mic Clamp

[Whyte Ice]

Anyone use drum mic clamps in place of mic stands on your snare/tom heads?

My recording space is fairly small and everything is pushed together and not much room for too many mic stands.

Some questions for the people who have used a drum mic clamp on one of their drums.

01. When you hit the drum, do they rattle at all?
02. In the positions you can clamp on the drum, are you able to get as good of a drum sound out of it as you can when a mic is facing down on it?
03. Would these work with cymbals too?

The ones I found were at American Musical Supply for $12.95 a piece, if you know anywhere cheaper that I can get them at, please tell me.

Thanks in advance.

[mikeh]

For recording, I would stay with mic stands. Any clamp attached to a drum rim will pick up some vibration. In a live setting this is not a big deal - but in the studio, why risk any additional noise.

I'm guessing that at that price, the clamps you saw were Mic-eze. Actually these are good clamps which clamp onto the top (batter) rim. I use these live and have never had any real problem with vibration noise (but live ain't recording). However, depending on the type of mic you're useing you can have difficulty getting the mic where you want it - and keep in mind when recording mic placement is everything.

Concerning cymbals - no I don't think clips are the way to go. You need the mics high and again mic placement is everything, in particular with overhead/area mics.

Normally you can get the Mic-eze clamps at any large music store for about $14.00 - It may be worth buying a couple to try. If nothing else they may come in handy if you ever do live recording.

[vox]

I use the Lp Claws live, they don't rattle but sometimes the plastic head of an sm 57 will rattle especially on toms, a small piece of tape will fix it.
The claws are fairly flexible so that you can usually get a good mic position with them. One of their biggest advantages is that once you have found a good mic position the mic will stay in exactly that position relative to the drum even if the whole kit moves or the drummer adjusts the angle of the drum.

I agree with Mikeh though, for recording it is probably better to avoid the vibration and use stands.