Need To Rec Double Bass Drum But Only Have 1 Mic??

[mplnckstrat]

Hey all....

I need to record drums for a band next week with double bass, but only have 1 kick mic. My mic situation goes like this:

Shure Beta 52 for kick 1
SM 57 for snare
SM57s for rack and floor tom (2 toms total)
Oktava MC-012s for OHs

What do I use on the "other" kick, when these are my options:

SM 58
Sennheiser E835
Samson CO2 pencil condensers (2)
MXL 2001-P
Groove Tubes GT-66
Shure KSM-32

This is for a 4 pc metal band w/1 gtr, bass, vox....Any ideas would be appreciated including alternate setups entirely.

 

[Disposable]

So there are two kick drums? So much easier with just a double pedal.
I'd say of those go with the 58... But I don't know anything...

 

[pipelineaudio]

two kicks are for live, double pedal for the studio.

If he's got two kicks, then like disposable said, go with the 58's, youll end up triggering the damn things anyway

 

[Disposable]

OMG... I actually knew something... hehe.
That doesn't happen often.

 

[geet73]

I would suggest just using two 57's on the kicks. Put the 52 on the low tom.

 

[Fire Dome]

two kicks are for live, double pedal for the studio.

If he's got two kicks, then like disposable said, go with the 58's, youll end up triggering the damn things anyway

what makes you say that??


Dave

 

[MetalMechanik]

Its so that both kick drums sound the same. If you put the Beta52 on the first kick and the SM57 on second when you do double bass one drum will have this huge punching you in the chest souund and the other will have a more mid range sound because the SM-57 doesnt pick up the extra low frequencies that the Beta52 does. But if you really want to use the Beta52 on 1 bass drum, put it on the first one.

 

[Cloneboy Studio]

Rent a mic so you can have the same mic in each kick, otherwise I'm guessing it is going to be annoying sounding. Make sure the kicks are tuned identically.

 

[BrendonW]

You should definately not use 2 kicks for recording. You can't tell the difference live if you had 2 different mics/drums, but in the studio it has to be perfect.

 

[geet73]

You should definately not use 2 kicks for recording. You can't tell the difference live if you had 2 different mics/drums, but in the studio it has to be perfect.

The problem with saying this is that there is a HUGE difference in feel. The drummer might not be able to play on anything but two bass drums.

 

[Cloneboy Studio]

Maybe put one mic in the center and a foot away from the kicks? Put a blanket "tent" over it to minimize as much cymbal leakage as possible though.

 

[tubesrawsom]

instead of using the 57s on the toms use them for each kick
then put a 52 on floor tom and 58 on rack

 

[Han]

two kicks are for live, double pedal for the studio.

If he's got two kicks, then like disposable said, go with the 58's, youll end up triggering the damn things anyway

Imagine this is a world class drummer, who prefers to play two kicks?

I have recorded tons of metal bands with either a double pedal or two kicks and I would say it's the other way around, a double pedal is for live, two separate kicks are better in the studio.

This is why: when using a double pedal, the one foot will always be harder than the other foot, due to the construction of a double pedal.

Besides that, you can record only one single kickdrum, in case you have two kicks, you can record them both to it's own track and eq them in a way you have sounds that fit together nicely. You can't do this with one kick and a double pedal.

And if you prefer to trigger them, which you even can do afterwards 'from tape', two kicks triggered and sent to a sequencer will give you more control, since you trigger different notes. So quantising by hand will be easier.

 

[pipelineaudio]

My problem is this. Unless it is an EXTREMELY good drummer, the kicking is going to sound so different as to sound fake. Add to that the near impossibility of tuning the two drums alike enough.

A good drummer, an EXTREMELY good double kick drummer, will " budget " his feet to have different responsibilities, and then if the one kick sounds different, so be it, it adds to the song.

In this day and age of bands that cant sing, play or tune, you just end up with a flubbity mess with two kicks

If its a good drummer, like cloneboy said, do a tunnel with a blanket, and it'll turn out pretty good. Wild Mick Browns double cannon's on Dokken's Shadow Life were recorded this way with a single FET-47, a pair of plastic chairs turend away from the drumset and a heavy packing blanket over the top of them and the ends of the kicks.

If its Joe Nu-Metal 182 Simpson, watch out, give him a double pedal