First drum recording advice?

[VesuviusJay]

Greetings percussion guru's! I am planning my first encounter with recording a full drum kit. I am building my sound room as I type. I just thought I'd start this thread to get some advice on preliminary preparations so that I have a smooth and productive experience.

First of all I have a set of stageworks drum mic's that consist of kick mic, and 3 dynamic mics. I know I also need a couple of overhead condensors. Are there any other mic's or preparations I should make for capturing the sound? I've know the more work you put in the prepation, the easier the mix down and mastering. So this is one for you seasoned drum recording veterans.

Also please advise as to what I should use as far as pre-recording effects such as compression, etc.

Lastly but not leastly, Im recording drums for fast death metal and grind core. Therefore I am going to have extremely fast double bass drum riffs and I need to EQ and set up accordingly so I don't miss a beat.

Thanks Everyone, this BBS is priceless!

[pratt]

first step, IMHO, is to ensure that the drums that you are recording sound as good as they possibly can....new heads tuned properly can make a world of difference.

I like to record dry signals so that I have the most flexiibility at mixing stage; having said that - I've tracked drums with some real light compression on the toms with good results

[theletterq]

What pratt said first of all...

If you can wrangle up a good pair of condensers, you may not need any more mics on the drums other than the kick and snare.

I also do not track with any effects, compression included (I actually hardly ever compress my own drums, but am forced to sometimes when recording other drummers.)

If you'll be recording two kick drums, you will need another kick mic, and I would suggest having two matching mics. Shure Beta 52 and AKG D112 are two good candidates. Alot of people around here prefer different choices, so as always, it is a matter of personal taste.

In all actuality, most death/grind core metal bands use triggered kicks for consistency and sound sake. If you have this capability, you may want to look into this avenue as well.

Good luck!

[tubedude]

Be sure to try the 4-mic-two-stick trick, its pretty good....

[Track Rat]

Tubedudes sugestion is a good one for sure. But for aggressive, in your face drums I still like some tight mics on the toms and a front mic. On an average kit, I like 7 mics, one inside the kick, one on the snare, one between the rack toms, one on the floor tom, a pair of overheads, and one out in front of the kick about 3 feet. Personally, only the inside kick mic is a dynamic, all the rest are condensors. The epiphany for me wa starting to use a large diaphram condensor out in front of the kit (the front of the kick mic, out about 3'). So much of the meat of the drums come from this mic and the overheads.
One of my methods of drum fattening at mix time is this. You setup a good mix of your drums, tighten up the kick and snare a bit with a compressor on each. Then I'll also assign the kick, snare and tom tracks only to a sub group pair as well and send that to a compressor and squash the piss out of it and bring it back to two channels as a stereo pair. I push this up underneath the existing drum mix to taste. It can be an effective fattener sometimes.

[tubedude]

Thats one of my favorite tricks right there...

[ZEKE SAYER]

In order to capture each kick lick, try cutting the kick drums Eq about 5-10dbat maybe 400hz and boost alittle at 50-63hz, and boost about 5-8db at 4.00khz and 2-5 db at 10 khz. This should give you a loud, clicky, fat kick drum sound. Don't forget to use compression. You can also try the quarter trick. (you take a quarter and tape it to where the beater hits the head.) also use hammer beaters instead of soft ones.......

[Blue Bear Sound]

Originally posted by ZEKE SAYER
In order to capture each kick lick, try cutting the kick drums Eq about 5-10dbat maybe 400hz and boost alittle at 50-63hz, and boost about 5-8db at 4.00khz and 2-5 db at 10 khz. This should give you a loud, clicky, fat kick drum sound. Don't forget to use compression. You can also try the quarter trick. (you take a quarter and tape it to where the beater hits the head.) also use hammer beaters instead of soft ones.......

Er... exactly how are you determining those settings without hearing anything or even knowing the signal chain??????

As the saying goes... "it depends....!"

[Tim Brown]

Exactly what I was thinking, Bruce.

For example, on my 28" Kick drums - when tuned as low as they will go- there is so much low end content that I actually have to cut the lows (80 hz) about 6db....otherwise, the attack just doesn't cut through.

I say try the 4 mic technique, and see how it sounds. The key is, as always, make sure the kit is well tuned. This can not be stressed enough. A well tuned kit will "sing" in a decent room, and using the "kick-snare-stereo pair" mic'ing technique allows you to pick up that sound.

Granted, most people are used to hearing a heavily processed and/or electronic drum sound these days....so much that many of them don't really know what a REAL drum actually sounds like.



Tim

[Blue Bear Sound]

Actually, for the purposes of education... let's take this a piece at a time...

In order to capture each kick lick, try cutting the kick drums Eq about 5-10dbat maybe 400hz....

first off, 10dB is A LOT... 2nd, without hearing it, it's guesswork....

...and boost alittle at 50-63hz, and boost about 5-8db at 4.00khz and 2-5 db at 10 khz.

I wouldn't boost anything during tracking period - get the sound right using the proper mic and mic placement....

This should give you a loud, clicky, fat kick drum sound.

You can't say that at all without hearing the context......

Don't forget to use compression.

Only IF NECESSARY.... and again, better off not using during tracking anyways, unless you really know what you're doing........

You can also try the quarter trick. (you take a quarter and tape it to where the beater hits the head.) also use hammer beaters instead of soft ones.......

If the sound you're after IS the sound of a beater hitting a quarter on the head, then fine.... but there's really no reason you shouldn't get the sound you're after without resorting to "tricks" if you use good recording technique.


Young Zeke - do more learning and less preaching!

[ZEKE SAYER]

Originally posted by Blue Bear Sound
Actually, for the purposes of education... let's take this a piece at a time...

B.B: first off, 10dB is A LOT... 2nd, without hearing it, it's guesswork....

Zeke: Actuly i HAVE heard it. Every day after school, i Play arould in the studio.


B. B:I wouldn't boost anything during tracking period - get the sound right using the proper mic and mic placement....

Zeke: I did not tell him to eq when tracking. I would use it after tracking but i can't with the setup i have right now.

B.B: You can't say that at all without hearing the context......

Zeke:Like i said, i have heard it. I know that i don't have as much nolegde as all of you guys, but i know enough.

B.B.Only IF NECESSARY.... and again, better off not using during tracking anyways, unless you really know what you're doing........


Zeke:I will agree with you on that one. But i have to say that the best kick or drum sounds that i have Ever got was by using compression.


If the sound you're after IS the sound of a beater hitting a quarter on the head, then fine.... but there's really no reason you shouldn't get the sound you're after without resorting to "tricks" if you use good recording technique.


Young Zeke - do more learning and less preaching!

We all have our own ways of geting some. (noting dirty do i mean by that ) ,but I'm not trashing any body, you asked for my input and i gave it.

Friends.......

[Fela]

Don't do that quarter thing. The quarter thing burns your drumheads up. I am a drummer and a recording dude. Don't do it. If you want more attack use a wood beater, or tune the beater side bass drum head up (tighten) a little, or use a second mike on the beater side (you may have to phase reverse) and mix the two. Or compress the kick twice later on, once for the attack 0-10ms and once for the sustain if the material calls for it. You can eq it between the compressions to get what you are wanting.

Don't do the quarter, penny, nickel, dime, thing OK ? OK ?

thanks

[luzer_kidd]

Has anyone ever heard of the 2 different types of perspective mic-ing on a drum set? The first is Drummers Perspective where the drums are panned in the speakers to how the drummer hears the drums, and audience perspective is when the drums are panned in the speakers to how someone watching a drummer from in front would hear the drums....

I would never use Track Rat's technique when he puts on mic inbetween the two toms... Well i wouldnt use it anymore after I got my new equipment. but i would suggest people not to do it that way...

personally i like the drummers perspective....
here is an example of how i would mic that
First always when panning volumes the snare drum the bass drum and the bass guitar always get panned in the center.. unless someone was looking for some kind of effect or something.

Also I would use 2 mics on the snare.. a really good snare mic is a shure sm57 they only cost 80 bucks and do a great job on that drum. One mic would be on the top of the snare wich picks up all the attack of the snare being hit. and the 2nd mic on the bottom of the snare wich picks up the resonance of the snares... most likely you would have to use the phase button on ur mixer or comp program that u use.... sometimes not if its a piccolo snare.. u would have to make the right choice at that time...

Ok back to perspective...
Lets just say you have a 5 piece kit I would want to use at least 8 mics well currently thats all i can use but after i upgrade what i want then i can do up to 16 but i wouldnt use that many anyway....

U have the snare and kick panned in both ears
the left tom and left overhead panned in the left ear
then the right tom the floor tom and right over head panned in the right ear...
so that you can hear the transition better of the drummer moving around the kit.... it makes a huge difference in your recordings....

well its 1 30 in the morning so im gonna go to bed.... i didnt proof read what i wrote so if something doesnt make sense and u want some more clarity u can either email me or reply in the forum....