The trick I learned for recording live drums is (especially assuming the drums are physically behind most of the rest of the band as usual), to set up an "X/Y/K" mic tree as follows.
Using a mic stand that has both an adjustable boom and a mounting thread on top of the vertical stand piece. Screw a 5" two-mic T-bar onto the vertical stand and use that to mount two SM57s in an X/Y coincident position. It's helpful to place a small piece of foam between the 57 heads (which are otherwise touching) to isolate them from vibrating against each other. Place the mic stand in front of kit at the centerline of the kit with the 57 pair facing back towards the kit, parallel to the ground (or maybe tilted slightly down to the toms if the drummer is a cymbal animal or has the cymbals mounted way low), and pointed to even spread across the drums. Elevate the mikes to a height about midway between the tom heads and the cymbal bottoms. Pan these two mikes just a few degrees L and R on the mixer to get a very natural sounding stereo spread (not too wide now.) Then mount you favorite cardoid kick drum mic (I like the e602 myself, but use what you like) to the mic boom and hang the boom down in front of the kick at your favorite front skin or port hole placement (if you prefer to lay the kick mic inside the drum on top of the blanket/pillow, that's fine too.) Then pan the kick to dead center of the 57 stereo spread.
Before you say, "but I woun't get a good cymbal sound if I don't mike them from above", I respond, "try it first." Yeah, maybe overheads would be preferable, but this is a live situation and comprimises have to be made somewhere. In this case you are *maybe* sacrificing a little clarity (which is probably lost in a live situation anyway) but by pointing the coincident cardoids back you are gaining maximum bleed rejection. Besides, if you really think about it, if you are in the audience, you are hearing the drum kit from the front, and they sound just peachy, don't they? The rear facing coincident pair does a great job of naturally reproducing that sound and still give you a decent natural stereo image with good bleed rejection. Then the kick on the third channel just brings your drum mix in over the top for a great backbeat.
Also, I personally don't take anything off the FOH unless it is from direct outs on the channel strips and those direct outs then come in through my desk. Depending on the FOH post-fader mix for decent recorded sound is like depending on someone wearing dark colored sunglasses to color balance your video. What sounds like a good mix for live playback through the PA system is usually not the best mix (and far from it) for a recording. The two have entirely different needs. If you need to take from the FOH, take from the direct outs only (as I often do for vocals, especially if I am to lazy to DI
) and then ride the record levels yourself.
HTH,
G.