Electronic Drum Kits

[David Artis]

Hope this is the right place to post this...

I have recently sold my old home that had a completely separate 1500' studio on 2 acres (my wife's first case of the Jone's she ever had).

My new location to record will be a 320 sq ft room above my garage in my new home. Because of this I will need to do the drums via an electronic kit. I have ton's of sampled drums that are excellent and can certainly make these kits sound real.

Because I am not a drummer and usually hire someone to do the drum tracks I really have no idea what a really good electronic kit would be that would allow a drummer to feel as comfortable as possible and have the necessary action to emulate an analog drum kit as close a possible.

I would like to be forearmed with information before going down to the local music shops to take a look.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

 

[Xdrummer]

You could try to use drum triggers to trigger samples from an acoustic kit - thus allowing drummers the most realistic "feel" while playing. However, using triggers requires a lot of trial and error to get the right placement and head tension to trigger as accurately as possible.

If you do choose to go with a electronic kit......mesh heads feel much more "realistic" than the rubber pads (and are "safer" since the rubber pads do not absorb the impact well - a potential for wrist/arm injuries. The mesh heads tend to allow too much rebound......but with a little trial and error, the feel can be ajusted to feel relatively realistic.

I use to sell drums - so I had a chance to really disect a few brands - I am not a fan of the Yamaha e-kits and don't care much for the Alesis kits (I've not tried D-drums or the new Simmons kits) - so I can only offer a personal thumbs up for Roland kits (I've been using a TD-10 kit for many years with no problems.

I don't think they are still around - but several years back there was a company called SDS that used actual drum heads on rims as a trigger - they were very good triggers and felt just like drum heads (they were).......but as indicated, I don't think they are still around.

 

[shackrock]

I've also been seriously considering getting electronic drums. For me though, I would ove an "all in one" solution - so it has everything I need to plug in and record... it'd be especially nice if I could record the mini triggers and it came with samples already synced up and good to go on the kit... if that makes sense.

If anyone else has any experience please share!

 

[Vhyle]

I've been playing drums for 13 years, and for the last 3 years, I've owned a Roland TD3 kit. It's a very basic electronic kit with a mesh snare, but I do enjoy it. It's no replacement for the real thing (and I'm kicking myself in the ass for ever selling my Pearls!), and they do take a lot of getting used to. The mesh heads are fairly realistic-feeling as someone said, but the rubber ones aren't. Although you can adjust sensitivity levels on each piece, they still aren't as dynamic as real drums.

But anyway, I've recorded a LOT with these V-drums and they aren't bad, after a lot of tweaking and experimenting with the recording.

I got a pretty decent sound out of them... you can hear them here: http://www.myspace.com/algarothsyum (not intending to plug)

But the problem is, at least with my basic kit and no mixer, I can't adjust/EQ each drum and cymbal separately, unlike a mic'd acoustic kit. I'm sure you can with a more advanced kit and the right hardware, but I personally can't. All of my drums are recorded in a stereo single track, and I dupe it and pan them 50% left and right. That at least makes them sound more full and present. It's the best way I've discovered to do that with electronic drums.

EDIT: But in my band, I do play an acoustic kit. It just wouldn't work well for live playing.

And another obvious advantage is you can play whenever you want, with very little to no disturbance to roommates and neighbors. Unless you just don't care.

 

[suprstar]

Yeah, I feel your pain.. I have a TD-8 kit, it has an additional 2 direct out's on it, so I end up with a 4-track mix - snare on direct 1, kick on direct 2, everything else on the stereo master out's. That's IF I was using the module's drum tones, which I don't, I don't really care for em.

So the alternative, which I do - record the midi, run it thru ez drummer. The vsti give you an 8-channel mix, kik, snare, toms, OH's, hihat all separate, so you can apply eq, compression, and fx on individual drums. Best $100 I ever spent, drums sound awesome now imo. The rest, well .... recorded in a concrete box basement, what can I say ... Still waiting for 'ezguitarist' vsti

http://www.supr-star.com/songs/ - stuff I'm currently working on, everything on there is 100% vdrums + ezdrummer. There's some covers in there, a local band decided they sounded better than his acoustic drums, so he used em too