Drum Recording Technique Needs Major help Fast!!!

[MaTai2]

Alrighty...lemme say first of all I am not a drummer, I play all of the other instruments (in pop music) but not drums...I was trying to help this church produce a cd that captured their "music experience"...lemme start by describing the room

Big Big room, not a mega churh but at least as large as one of the commercial office spaces that doctors rent (if you took out all of the walls)

This puppy has a corrogated tin roof etc with metal beems running to support it. We are on a hollow wooden stage with a plexiglass sheild set up to stop cymbal noise from killing the rest of the band.

So I set up a click track and have the guy play, he's decent, not too bad anyway but I notice the snare has a really bad ring. I don't know too much about snares but this one is smaller than most others (maybe a "picollo" snare) Anyway, I can kind of hear that ring on all of the other drums too so I go into the ladies rest room grab some Feminin napkins, and stick em onto the snare and toms to reduce the ring.

I am using 2 sm 57's,

1 over the snare and right by the crash (it's aimed at the high hat and crash, kind of away from the snare.

1 on the snare

3 clip mic's (can't remember brand names but they sound great on other stuff so they are prolly fine (may be radio shack something or others) attached to each drum.

1 other sm57 over the ride and other crash.

One beta 5+something (can't remember maybe a 52) on the kick.

And guess what...I track it all out and it sounds like crap! Total crap...I don't know what to do? I am thinking of picking up some rode nt-5's for overheads and trying again, but I need some serious help. How should I be doing this.

I thought of trying the 2 drums stick/ rope from kick method I just read about, but then how can you gate your snare and lose the ring. THe pads I put on it kill it so much it just sounds like crap! Even if I could manually mute out the snare ring, how could I get control of the snare to make it sound like what I want it to sound like if I have these overhads playing in? And if I am gonna use this 3 mic technique, but I wanna add a snare mic' wehre should it go for phase issues? Sorry for all of the questions but I need major help...is my tampon solution just killing all of the drum sound or what is going on? GRRRRR

Matt

 

[bingbing]

Well Matt, before I begin I must say that I am a novice at recording, just getting into it. I am a percussionist, so perhaps a bit of this is intuitive to me. I also am reading a couple of books on recording before I splurge on the equipment. Since no one else has replied yet, I'll at least get the ball rolling. Here is what I gather.

First of all, you may want to locate internet info on drum tuning, which may help the ringing a bit.

The "napkin" idea is probably not a bad idea on the snare (some people use wallets), but I would be hesitant to muffle the toms. Those overtones do a lot for the recording (that is, unless the toms are ringing like crazy, in which case tuning and some lightly taped gauze would be a better option). I'm interested in how heavily muffled each of these drums is, including the snare. I would try to muffle the drum in a way that is least confining, but eliminates the ring.

With what little I know about mic's, your choices seem reasonable. The mic on every tom isn't necessary, but not necessarily bad. Two well placed and well chosen overhead mics should pick up the toms. After that is seems to boil down to EQing. From what I've read, that is where engineer's "signature snare drum" sounds are completed.

I hope this helps a little, and perhaps some more experienced recording folks can elaborate or correct me.

bing

 

[drumtracks]

Hey Matt,

This is David from Professional Affordable Drum Tracks.

Don't panic everything is OK! First thing...get between 5 to 12 One inch square pieces of duct tape and place around the edge of the snare head. This is enough to dampen (some) of the overtones on the snare. Now tune that drum up so it won't ring as much plus it will give you a crispier sound expecially for pop music. The room you are using to record will lend itself to a Big drum sound if you listen closely.

If you don't have a small (small) not big (small) pillow in the bass drum put one in. We are going for moderate overtone elimination. We want the drums to speak and let Eq take care of the rest. You have to leave enough tone to eq.

Go ahead and lay down your tracks...most guys will argue with me but in the future try to avoid SM57's on drums if you can.

Lay down the tracks and eq with a Classic V figure. 30 band or bigger gives a nice rich sound. This will pull your cymbals..ride, hi-hats, crashes, to the front and help to crisp up the snare a bit.

The bottom end of course will be enhanced because the lows have been boosted and will also beef up the toms.

If you have access to compression with your current rig, put some on the snare and bass...if you have to because of the lack of channels cables or inputs compress the whole drum kit.

That will do wonders right there!

Now normally I would suggest adding a touch of reverb and it still may be needed but, with your current recording envirement it may not be necessary.

Take care and stay calm,
David

 

[MaTai2]

Hey david, thanks a ton...I feel myself breathing again. I had been able to mix everything down pretty well for a beginner, at least everything up till this project...It was totally destroying my confidence!

"Lay down the tracks and eq with a Classic V figure. 30 band or bigger gives a nice rich sound. This will pull your cymbals..ride, hi-hats, crashes, to the front and help to crisp up the snare a bit. "

I did have one other quick question...what is a classic V figure? and what is 30 band?


Thanks man!

Matt

 

[drumtracks]

"Classic V" is the shape you place your sliders on an EQ So imagine Having 30 sliders(Bands) And positioning them in the shape of a "V" Mids are low to non existantant, Highs and Lows are brought to the front because you have raised them on the EQ.

Check that out and see if that wont help you!
David