How many tracks do you use to record drums?

How many tracks do you use to record your drums?

  • 2 Tracks?

    Votes: 39 8.5%

  • 3 Tracks?

    Votes: 51 11.1%

  • 5 Tracks?

    Votes: 67 14.6%

  • More than 5?

    Votes: 303 65.9%
  • Total voters
    460
At this point in the neighborhood of 8 I think.

Kick
Snare
Toms (2-whatever)
Stereo Overheads
Highhat
Ride

I have also had good luck doing the two overheads with kick and snare.

I really do alot of panning with the drums, which is why I use the ride and highhat mics. This lets me place them wherever I want.
 
I'm going to be evil and revive an oldish thread out of boredom. I voted 5, since that's the most common for me (kick, snare, 2 OH, room), but it really varies. Half of the time I'm doing it with three (2 BG4.1s and a D112, recorderman-style), and when i have the time i go all out:
Snare top, snare bottom, tom 1, tom 2, tom 3, tom 4, tom 5, kick 1, kick 2, OH 1, OH 2, front of kit 1, front of kit 2, room -- 14.
 
Depends on music...I have had two overheads and a kick.....to multiple mics on the snare and one for each tom........blah blah....there is no rule book people
 
On a standard 5 piece set I use 7 mics. A Yamaha subkick on the bass drum, 57's for the toms and snare, an overhead such as an AKG or a AT and a small hihat condensor. Works pretty good. I may add a second overhead in the future. I'm limited by my AD converter, its a MOTU 896HD and it had 8 inputs. :rolleyes:
 
i use as many (or few) as needed for the drums in the context of the song. some songs need everything mic'd--toms and all. some songs call for just an OH, kick, room and maybe snare.

usually, though, i tend to default to a mono overhead (V67), a mono room mic (dragonfly), over and under snare mics (shure 545 over and mxl603 under), and 3 mics on the kick (senn 609 inside the drum right next to the beater, EV RE38 in the hole and MXL V77 in front of the resonant head). with the proper placement on the snare i can completely null out the hihat from the snare mics, so sometimes i'll mic the hat and the ride--depends on if the song needs that emphasis or not.

so typically 7 or 8 tracks for drums. if i mic the toms (rare), i'll typically buss them to a stereo track. but it can be as few as 3 and as many as 14 or so (i've got a lot of toms :D).


cheers,
wade
 
input/ panned
1 kick= track 1 / center
2 snare top (bussed to track 2) / center
3 snare bottom (bussed to track 2)
4 hi tom= track 3 / hard left
5 mid tom= track 4 / center
6 floor tom= track 5 / hard right
7 hi hat (bussed to track 6)
8 ride (bussed to track 7) track 6 panned hard left
9 overhead left (bussed to track 6)
10 overhead right (bussed to track 7) track 7 panned hard right
 
coolsoundman said:
How many tracks(channels) do you use to record drums and still a very good decent sound?
Click to expand...

Somewhere between 16 and 18. I like to leave 6 tracks for anything else that needs to be recorded. This seems to satisfy a drummer's song.

If it is a guitarist's song, i use between 16 to 18 tracks for the guitar

For keyboardists and vocalists, pretty much the same formula applies. It is quite universal.
 
666

I use 6 mics, I have the worlds shitiest drum mic kit, ($150 CAD kit) which I can actually get some pretty decent sounds out of. BUt I like to put SM57 on the snare instead of the crap they provide. I want to use 8 mics so I can get some room sound, but I have my compressor eating up two of my channels. Guess I could put them with the overheads though...

Jonah
 
I usually use either 2 overheads and a kick drum mic or one overhead, kick and snare, submixed to one track on the tape recorder. I prefer to try to control the dynamics by playing the drum set well; if you need to mic every drum just to control the levels (rather than to get a certain sound) then there's something wrong with the way you are playing the instrument.

EDIT: I understand that a lot of people here work in a professional studio environment where it just isn't possible to tell a drummer who expects perfectly balanced sound to magically come out of reckless cymbal-bashing that the problem is his playing. But when you have the option, why not try to start by recording a good sound rather than recording a mediocre sound and trying to make it better?
 
Usually something like this:
D112 or similar on Kick
12" speaker on Kick
snare top (sm57 or similar preferably beyer m201)
snare bottom (sm57 or similar preferably beyer m201)
condenser on snare side (cardoid)
Tom1 (sm57 or similar preferably beyer m201)
Tom2 (sm57 or similar preferably beyer m201)
2 condensers for front left-back right (neumann) miking (cardoid) - Similar to this: http://www.homerecording.com/bbs/showthread.php?t=39030
2 omnis for stereo ambience
old Carbon-filter mic for hi-hat

all in all: 12
But everything can work and recording with just one omni condenser can work miracles.
 
bloomboy said:
I usually use either 2 overheads and a kick drum mic or one overhead, kick and snare, submixed to one track on the tape recorder. I prefer to try to control the dynamics by playing the drum set well; if you need to mic every drum just to control the levels (rather than to get a certain sound) then there's something wrong with the way you are playing the instrument.

EDIT: I understand that a lot of people here work in a professional studio environment where it just isn't possible to tell a drummer who expects perfectly balanced sound to magically come out of reckless cymbal-bashing that the problem is his playing. But when you have the option, why not try to start by recording a good sound rather than recording a mediocre sound and trying to make it better?
Click to expand...

Wonderfully put. No matter the number of mic's you still have to beat the players into submission ;-)
 
Anywhere from 6-10 mics depending on kit size.

1) Kick (inside)
2) Kick (outside/ in front)
3) Snare (top)
4) Rack tom 1
5) Rack tom 2
6) Floor tom
7) Overheads L
8) Overheads R
9) Room mic
 
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