AbuseTheMuses
New member
Okay, I this is my first time micing up a drum set for studio recording. I have done live sound drum mixes for years but am quickly discovering that this is a very different creature. Here is the problem: I have a wierd 'popping' sound from my kick drum. Let me say first that my setup is very ad-hoc mishmash of stuff i have accumulated over the years. I have no budget to expand and very limited work space, a less than ideal room (corner of a cluttered concrete basement) but I am determined to get this as right as I can.
Here's the setup:
It's a 4 piece drum set with a hi-hat and single crash cymbal which I have off to the left side of the kick drum along with the snare and hat, while the rack and floor toms take the right side. This makes it easier to get 2 distinct room sounds with one more emphasizing the cymbals and one more the toms.
My gear for this project is 2 different condensers (1 large D, 1 small D) as room mics, and 2 different dynamics (both cheapy) for close mics, and a Behringer analogue mixer for preamps and levels and a digital standalone to record to.
By using the condensers for one close and one far room mixes, and one of the dynamics between the hat and snare, I got a nice even mix of everything but the kick.
SOoooo... here's the final problem: I put my trusty pillow in the open-faced kick drum to muffle the ringyness of it, I rested the last dynamic mic (the general purpose Tascam) on the pillow inside the drum, just like I did for live drum micing, hoping to add a bit of snap and oomph to the reasonably well balance mix I have so far.
I don't get the 'snap' I want or the 'oomph' either, I get a sort of hollow mid-bassy howling noise instead of an "oomph", and a high-midsy 'pop' noise instead of a 'snap' that just sounds kind of awful and doesn't really fit in with the rest of the mix. If I get it loud enough to give the kick drum some heavy presence, it becomes that much more apparent how detatched it is from the rest of the mix. It sounds as if someone went in afterwards and overdubbed a kick drum. It sounds like digital clipping on playback too but I have checked that nothing on the mixer or recorder is ever above zero so it can't be digital clippyness distorting it, just sounds like it.
I have tried all sorts of EQ solutions like dropping the mid EQ (my first thought on the 'popping' sound, or the high EQ, or both to get it more smooth so it blends in better and sacrifices the snappy element of the sound in favor of at least blending in better, or just figuring on how far inside the drum the mic is placed. I just can't make this sound go away. I wonder if it is just not doable with this mic and it is just overloading. I assumed dynamic mics were pretty hard to overload though, but I can't get another one right now.
So have any of you gurus out there in cyberspace had this problem? Is there some EQ/placement hint I can be let in on? I want a bit of 'oomph', and some 'snap, and a sound that doesn't stand out from the rest of the mix. All I have been able to get is a 'howl', a 'pop', and a sound that seems like it was overdubbed.
Here's the setup:
It's a 4 piece drum set with a hi-hat and single crash cymbal which I have off to the left side of the kick drum along with the snare and hat, while the rack and floor toms take the right side. This makes it easier to get 2 distinct room sounds with one more emphasizing the cymbals and one more the toms.
My gear for this project is 2 different condensers (1 large D, 1 small D) as room mics, and 2 different dynamics (both cheapy) for close mics, and a Behringer analogue mixer for preamps and levels and a digital standalone to record to.
By using the condensers for one close and one far room mixes, and one of the dynamics between the hat and snare, I got a nice even mix of everything but the kick.
SOoooo... here's the final problem: I put my trusty pillow in the open-faced kick drum to muffle the ringyness of it, I rested the last dynamic mic (the general purpose Tascam) on the pillow inside the drum, just like I did for live drum micing, hoping to add a bit of snap and oomph to the reasonably well balance mix I have so far.
I don't get the 'snap' I want or the 'oomph' either, I get a sort of hollow mid-bassy howling noise instead of an "oomph", and a high-midsy 'pop' noise instead of a 'snap' that just sounds kind of awful and doesn't really fit in with the rest of the mix. If I get it loud enough to give the kick drum some heavy presence, it becomes that much more apparent how detatched it is from the rest of the mix. It sounds as if someone went in afterwards and overdubbed a kick drum. It sounds like digital clipping on playback too but I have checked that nothing on the mixer or recorder is ever above zero so it can't be digital clippyness distorting it, just sounds like it.
I have tried all sorts of EQ solutions like dropping the mid EQ (my first thought on the 'popping' sound, or the high EQ, or both to get it more smooth so it blends in better and sacrifices the snappy element of the sound in favor of at least blending in better, or just figuring on how far inside the drum the mic is placed. I just can't make this sound go away. I wonder if it is just not doable with this mic and it is just overloading. I assumed dynamic mics were pretty hard to overload though, but I can't get another one right now.
So have any of you gurus out there in cyberspace had this problem? Is there some EQ/placement hint I can be let in on? I want a bit of 'oomph', and some 'snap, and a sound that doesn't stand out from the rest of the mix. All I have been able to get is a 'howl', a 'pop', and a sound that seems like it was overdubbed.
