A's or E's?

[musicproject]

production tools...

hi to everyone from israel.

i think that in our times when there are so many musical directions and styles
it is important to stay open minded.
sure there is no replacement for a real players touch on drums or a real pianist on a grand piano but if you look closler on the music industry you will find that most peaple are looking for inovative things in sound and in technology.
and now to the facts :

it is true that e-drums feel is not yet perfect but as for the sounds, most of the samples today in e-drums modules and on softsamplers like bfd & dfh are
recordings of real acoustic drums in a real (first class) studio with real drummers !!! so all is left to put in is the "playing style" or players feel & touch
and that is where technology comes in. yesterday's all rubber pads did'nt have the feel of real drum heads and usualy hurt your hands after a few hours of playing but today's mash heads V-hi hats and other improvments like positional sensing together with carefully picked samples brings the e-drums forward to a better more expresive place where real drummers can enjoy playing them.

from a producer/sound engineer prespective - E-drums and midi in general gives a producer/engineer the tools to go deep inside a song and tweek the sounds and parts untill they best serve the song or the production concept.
even if you have the best drummer and got the best sound from an acoustic set in the studio, you are stuck with a general sound and the rest of the recording process is dictaded by that sound and style. sure there is sound replacer, drumagog and other tools to replace the drum sounds but then the players feel and touch get's lost. so why not save the players touch, feel, and style on a midi track and then change the sound acording to the production needs ? ? ? - enters E-drums !

if we had lives in a perfect world then everybody on this forum would have the perfect studio, perfect mics, perfect drums and perfect playing skills.
but let us get back to reality - not everyone can afford the perfect production envirment. e-drums gives you :

- abillity to play (practice & record) drums when your isolation is not good
enough
- you can change & tweek the sounds and even your performance after you
have recorded and still mantain most of your feel and touch.
- a vast selection of sounds from "acoustic" to "new age"...
- some good practice tools like metronom, backing intruments and sequences
in many styles.
- expressive and musical tools like melodic instruments and loops - all playble
from your drum pads.
- headphones rehersals !!!! yes! you can enjoy a good jam with your band with no ear ringing or demage to anybody and in general hear everything more clearly and in place then in a standart rehersal room with a PA system.
this requires a console, mic's on guitar amps or good amp modelling software like guitar rig, amplitube and others that today has a "live" mode.

that was longggggg.......

my studio : www.musicproject.co.il
pics of my studio : http://www.musicproject.co.il/SiteFiles/1/14/1415.asp

 

[sirslurpee]

I like the a-drums for recording. I also like them for practice, and performance. Although the e-drums do have thier purpose they are more for techno situations.

 

[Kasey]

Go here and listen to these...then tell me they don't sound "real".

http://www.clavia.se/MP3s/index.htm#ddrum

those dont sound real at all. thats... thats awful. can you not tell the difference?

 

[Tim Brown]

people who defend e drums are

1. wouldn't know a good drum sound if it slapped their ass and called them sally

2. think they're too cool for practice pads

3. really like bad drum tunings

4. capable of rationalizing the holocaust if you give them enough time

5. idiots who love boring things that are easy, like tv dinners

And of course, it was written by somebody with 24 posts.
Typical.

I own both. I have a ddrum soundsource that I trigger from an acoustic kit with built-in triggers. I built an internal triggering system that is exactly like the V-drum's trigger setup, so it will track and trigger exactly like V-drums will, but I'm playing on an acousic kit for feel. I tried the V-Drums and didn't particularly care for the mesh heads - but that's just me. As a metal drummer, I spent years working on trying to get a certain drumsound I liked - then just decided to go ahead and use what they guys I was trying to sound like used - and ddrum was the answer for me.



Tim

 

[PhilGood]

Go here and listen to these...then tell me they don't sound "real".

http://www.clavia.se/MP3s/index.htm#ddrum

Well...Simon happens to be a good friend of mine, and while the individual instruments sound like his (as I'm sure they are sampled from his kit) the whole sound is missing one great key element that all electric kits suffer from...too isolated! When you use about 12 mics on a kit, the little bleed through from mic to mic adds something (its called the room). Simon also uses 2 SM-7's for room mics, and tell me how you would add that to a sampled kit.

No, they don't sound real. Close, but not enough.

My opinion on electrics is I would use them to quickly compose a song and get the idea down. For the real session I would set up acoustics and get the full natural sound.

 

[Toker41]

Niel Peart uses the very same Roland V-sessions I use. If they are good enough for him.....

...also, those that can't get a "real" drum sound from the V-sessions simply don't know enough about how to tweak them. It's not as simple as plugging them in and using the presets. The presest, like ANY kind of gear, are useless for anything other than a starting point. It took HOURS and HOURS to tweak just one drum set sound on my V-sessions. They sound just as "real" as any drum kit I have ever recorded over the last 25 years.

 

[Tim Brown]

Well...Simon happens to be a good friend of mine, and while the individual instruments sound like his (as I'm sure they are sampled from his kit) the whole sound is missing one great key element that all electric kits suffer from...too isolated! When you use about 12 mics on a kit, the little bleed through from mic to mic adds something (its called the room). Simon also uses 2 SM-7's for room mics, and tell me how you would add that to a sampled kit.

No, they don't sound real. Close, but not enough.

My opinion on electrics is I would use them to quickly compose a song and get the idea down. For the real session I would set up acoustics and get the full natural sound.

Easy, play the recorded sounds back through a pair of PA speakers in a room (playing as loud as an acousitc drumkit in the room would be), and record those with a pair of room mic's and add that back into the mix - those are called "trash tracks", and their purpose is to add some crap to the mix to make it sound less sterile and isolated.


Tim

 

[PhilGood]

Easy, play the recorded sounds back through a pair of PA speakers in a room (playing as loud as an acousitc drumkit in the room would be), and record those with a pair of room mic's and add that back into the mix - those are called "trash tracks", and their purpose is to add some crap to the mix to make it sound less sterile and isolated.


Tim

More sage wisdom from Tim!!! I like it!!

 

[Newbie-Doo]

I own a Tama Rockstar with Zildjian and Wuhan cymbals, as well as an extensive electronic kit (Roland, Akai, and Simmons; also with Zildjian and Wuhan cymbals). I have them back to back, like Neil Peart.

There's some pics at http://photos.yahoo.com/kuzinrob/

QUOTE]

Dang! All those drums and only two hands and feet to play them with!

You must need a rope & pulley system to drop yourself into the middle of that set!? Sweet Jesus! Gigging must be fun. hahaha

 

[Newbie-Doo]

Well...Simon happens to be a good friend of mine, and while the individual instruments sound like his (as I'm sure they are sampled from his kit) the whole sound is missing one great key element that all electric kits suffer from...too isolated! When you use about 12 mics on a kit, the little bleed through from mic to mic adds something (its called the room). Simon also uses 2 SM-7's for room mics, and tell me how you would add that to a sampled kit.

The fact that your average joe doesn't have Simon Phillips' skill, quality of drums and a world class tech to tune them for him, professional recording facilities and equipment makes the argument moot.

If you are talking about your "average" home recording enthusiast with a soundcard, a couple of mikes, and a living room or bedroom to record in, the electronic drum kit's drum sounds will come out a lot better sounding than an acoustic kit.

 

[PhilGood]

The fact that your average joe doesn't have Simon Phillips' skill, quality of drums and a world class tech to tune them for him, professional recording facilities and equipment makes the argument moot.

If you are talking about your "average" home recording enthusiast with a soundcard, a couple of mikes, and a living room or bedroom to record in, the electronic drum kit's drum sounds will come out a lot better sounding than an acoustic kit.

But they will still sound like electrics. I'd be able to pick it out, and so would you. The question was, do they sound real? The answer was no, but close enough.

 

[Tim Brown]

But they will still sound like electrics. I'd be able to pick it out, and so would you. The question was, do they sound real? The answer was no, but close enough.

True, but I guess it all depends upon what you are after - If I were just playing regular rock music - I'd probably still mic. Since I'm triggering from a drumkit rather than pads - I am still mic'ing the kit with the overheads - I'm using triggering rather than close mic'ing - I tune the sound source to match the drums pitch - except the kicks are physically tuned an octave above what the sound source is putting out. (because that allows me to have better mallet response against the heads for the heel-toe technique.)

My brother and I are working on some new material for a CD we're going to release (we actually have some label interest from a few small labels he knows) So when we get this stuff recorded - I'll post a few 30 second samples. We wanted to do a "Doom/Black" metal project, so we're doing some originals and a couple of covers by bands like the Plasmatics and Venom.



Tim

 

[Tim Brown]

More sage wisdom from Tim!!! I like it!!

Just a lot of time experimenting. When I had my studio up and going - I spent more time experimenting than I actually did recording....which kind of sucks, but I learned a lot of tricks while doing it.



Tim

 

[PhilGood]

Just a lot of time experimenting. When I had my studio up and going - I spent more time experimenting than I actually did recording....which kind of sucks, but I learned a lot of tricks while doing it.



Tim

That is EXACTLY the boat I am in. I spend more time trying out mics and gear and running tests than I do recording. I like my sound, but I am trying to tweak it to my idea of perfection. Now I may have to re-locate the entire setup. Grrrr!!!

 

[johnny5dm]

Perhaps this isn't worth a whole lot, since the majority of this thread is pretty old, but to anyone looking into getting V-drums (or other E kits), here are my thoughts. I've played a TD-7 kit for about 3 years now at a church I go to, and for awhile I was able to keep it in my apartment at the time. The bottom line for me is that I now HATE playing the V-drums compared to real ones. I'm not entirely sure what's missing - could be the nuances, the lack of dynamic range, the terrible cymbals - but whatever it is, I never feel right playing them, and I don't get into the music the way I do with real ones. That said, when I was in my apartment, the V-drums were AWESOME. Just the quiet sounds of sticks hitting rubber for my roommates. I could practice anytime I wanted to, and never really bother anyone. Pretty cool. However, for recording, I'd stick with the A-drums. They really do just sound so much more "right" and natural. Granted, the E-drums are easier to record, but as someone mentioned above, no serious professional drummer would record with E-drums. If you're looking to continually improve your drum sounds, A-drums are the way to go. It will definitely take more work and time, but I think it's worth it.

 

[daveparker]

Thought I would add my comments.

I have just finished a project using E-Drums (TD8) that were triggering Drums from Hell.
I get much better recordings this way rather than using the onboard sounds which do suck!
DHF also simulates bleeding between mics and gives you room mics. I can also
put all the drums to separate tracks using ReWire and mix them just like an acoustic
set. Also, when compaired to recording my A set, DHF just sounds way better and
gives me more options as a producer. Don't like that particular roll, just edit the MIDI,
that crash sounds funny in the mix, swap it for a different one, want to swap to a
wooden beater on the kick, just a few mouse clicks. Can't do any of that with the A's.

Having said that, I do hate actually playing the E's, much prefer playing A's. But
E's for recording are the way to go for me.

Dave

 

[Supercreep]

Anybody see Rush in Rio? Or own the CD?

There is a segment in which Neil plays The Trees soley on his V-Drums. Cymbals and all. I don't know why, other than he wanted to play the woodblock figures on the ride toms. Go figure.

Top of the line electric kit. Top notch engineers. Top notch talent.

Sounds like SHIT. SHIT. Pure unadulterated crap. Don't believe me? Listen.

If Neil can't make them sound right, how are you going to?

Now go ahead and use them in conjunction with your acousitic tubs, sure.

Use them because they're convenient and quiet and controllable.

Use them because you can incorporate interesting textures and sounds into your playing that you couldn't do without dropping your sticks.

Use them because they are right for the sound you are trying to achieve.

But we are talking apples and oranges here, and one can't possibly stand in for the other in any serious application.

-Casey