Maple or Birch?

DrumRookie

DrumRookie

"That" kid.
So lately I have been looking around for a new kit which I will be buying this summer.
I've been thinking about either getting a maple kit or a birch kit, and my main purpose for them is going to be for mostly recording and maybe some potential gigging.

I have my eye on the PDP X7 6 piece maple kits right now, and I've been hearing good things about them.
The same goes for the Gretsch Catalina Maple and birch kits.

But if I see any sweet, used kit's show up on my radar I will be taking them if the price is right. :D

I've been hearing about how birch is supposedly better than maple when recording due to the wood being "naturally EQ'd". What are the advantages of birch over maple in that respect?
I'm worrying mainly about getting enough low end from a maple kit, and I'm wondering how much of a difference is between the two in the studio. And I'm also wondering if it's going to be a big loss if I don't get a birch kit.

*Edit*
I forgot to mention that I will be buying a snare separately, most likely a Pork Pie or PDP maple, brass, or acrylic snare. I like the brass one the best so far.

I appreciate any feedback, thoughts, or what you use and why.
Thanks everyone!
 
Last edited:
I prefer maple. But really, none of that matters. A lot of people really focus on shell material. It's not that important. No, you don't want basswood or any other cheap entry level crap, but maple, birch, oak, etc will all yield great results and you probably won't be able to tell the difference. What is important is the heads you use and tuning them properly to get the sound you want. I'd say with toms and kicks, the overwhelming majority of the tonal characteristics are gonna come from the heads you choose and how you tune them.

Snares are a little different. Shell material matters with snare drums. Not so much with toms and kicks.
 
Greg_L said:
I prefer maple. But really, none of that matters. A lot of people really focus on shell material. It's not that important. No, you don't want basswood or any other cheap entry level crap, but maple, birch, oak, etc will all yield great results and you probably won't be able to tell the difference. What is important is the heads you use and tuning them properly to get the sound you want. I'd say with toms and kicks, the overwhelming majority of the tonal characteristics are gonna come from the heads you choose and how you tune them.

Snares are a little different. Shell material matters with snare drums. Not so much with toms and kicks.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the input Greg!

I was thinking as far as head selection goes: Frosted EC2's for the toms, frosted EC reverse dot for the snare, and a Powerstroke 3 on the kick.

What are your thoughts on the EC2's, and what heads would you recommend for a well rounded sound?
 
DrumRookie said:
Thanks for the input Greg!

I was thinking as far as head selection goes: Frosted EC2's for the toms, frosted EC reverse dot for the snare, and a Powerstroke 3 on the kick.

What are your thoughts on the EC2's, and what heads would you recommend for a well rounded sound?
Click to expand...

I personally feel that Evans coated heads suck. Their coating is weird and they just don't sound that good. If you want coated heads, Remo or Aquarian makes better stuff, IMO. Having said that, I'm a huge fan of the clear EC2's and use them myself. They'll do just about whatever you want them to do, and with a little piece of moongel they can flatten out bigtime and sound like coated tom heads. I use clear EC2's with G1 resos on my toms and I think they sound fantastic.

I've tried lots of snare heads, and for me, the Remo Powerstroke 3 is pretty much the only one I use now. I have 4 snare drums, and they all have a Powerstroke 3 on it with an Ambassador Hazy reso. And don't forget the snare wires. I've upgraded my deeper snare drums with Puresound 30-strand wires and they're really powerful and snappy. The plain ol coated Remo Ambassador is also a pretty good snare head, but they don't last very long.

For kicks, the Powerstroke 3 you mentioned is a good head. I like them, and most kick heads work very well. I'm personally a big fan of the Aquarian Super-Kick and the Evans EMAD, although the built in dampening ring on the EMAD is a piece of shit. Sounds good though. Basically, any head with a built-in dampening gimmick is gonna fail prematurely. The Super-Kick is the only one with a dampening ring I've ever used that's lasted. If you use wood or plastic beaters, use a falam patch. Not necessary with felt beaters.

It all really depends on the sound you're after and what type of music you play. I'm a hard rock/punk style drummer, so I choose my heads for tones that will easily cut through fast, aggressive music. If I played jazz or classic rock or rockabilly, I'd use totally different heads all the way around.
 
Greg pretty much nailed it. Ive got a birch and maple kit, both Pearl sets, both mid-ranged models. They both sound good ,but I will say, I always got more compliments on the sound of the birch set and always found the birch set easier to tune then the maple kit.

I bet if you looked long enough you could easily find a birch and maple set used for little money and try both.
I see great deals everyday on craigslist, you can never have too many drums!
 
If the difference is only wood (not price, not diameter, not depth, not anything else), I would personally go birch myself.
 
I used to be a real Evans fan when it came to heads, but the frosted EC2s suck tremendously for recording.
Actually they don't feel right and are not pleasant to play...very stiff and thick.
Of course if you are a really hard hitter you may like hitting heads that feel like formica.

I have gotten to like simplicity...Remo ambassador coated works..albeit they don't last real long.
 
ive been playing drums for 30 years, i recently considered buying a new (used) kit and went into my local music store where they have 30 kits available for sale, im friends with the guy in the drum department, i spent about an hour tuning, playing with and hitting the drums of almost all the kits, some were $2000 kits, some were $200.some had thin heads some had thicker heads, what i learned is that,

*its possible to make a $200 kit sound about the same as a $2000 kit with tuning and head choices*

watch some you tube videos on 'how to tune' drums correctly, i learned a lot.
 
60ndown said:
*its possible to make a $200 kit sound about the same as a $2000 kit with tuning and head choices*

.
Click to expand...

I generally almost agree with that. In a live room or at a gig, a cheaper kit and a good kit can sound pretty similar. A lot of the nuances that make one kit better than another get lost in the room. But on tape, a mic stuck on each drum can really capture the difference. I used to wonder why DW kits were so expensive until I recorded one. My Mapex Pro-M records about a trillion times better than my old Rogers kit.
 
The type of wood influences the overtones of the sound more than the heads. I personally would never be caught dead with a birch kit in my studio. They sound too high pitched and "boingy". Maple is best for tuned up, articulate playing, mahogany is best for tuned down darker tones. Also, ply count and thickness of the shell makes a huge difference. A 3/16" thick 3 ply shell from the 50's is going to sound much darker and have more overtones than a 5/16" 10 ply modern shell of the same dimensions and wood species. Then there is the discussion of reinforcing rings, solid or plied, versus a non reinforced shell. A non reinforced shell has one fundamental tone with closely matched overtones. A shell with rings has a multitude of overtones because of the focusing of the resonant charachters of the thinner shell. They are harder to tune well because of these overtones but they sound beautiful when recorded.
 
cafehonda said:
The type of wood influences the overtones of the sound more than the heads.
Click to expand...

So you think the difference between maple and birch using the same sized shell has a greater impact on the overall sound than the difference between a 1-ply clear head and a 2-ply coated? Um, not even close.


There are differences in wood types, but the heads and how you tune them affect the sound more than anything.
 
I was just suggesting that all things being equal, as in the same sized drum with the same heads that the shell composition and construction has a very significant impact on the sound of the drum. You cannot get a birch drum to sound as dark and deep as a mahogany shelled drum regardless of which heads you use. It has a different character even if tuned to the same fundamental note. Now, some may like the brighter tone of a birch drum tuned low, to which I say "great", personal taste is just that. But different wood species sound different in a way that cannot be fully addressed with head selection and tuning.
 
My point being that instead of buying a seperate kit for each wood type, which doesn't matter that much, just swap heads and tunings and you can achieve pretty much any sound you want from any kit.
 
I like maple and birch. I have my real old Slingerland kit and I think those are soft mahogany with a harder laminate core (I'm not entirely sure about that though) and they have that really nice vintage and warm sound. Birch as a wood is hard, but a bit more elastic and it does give a slightly different ring to the shell. Maple is just hard and a bit brittle and gives a brighter sound. They're both good.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top