Newbie recording drums...

[cooterbrown]

Hey,

Gathering information before my son purchases an 8-track recorder for his band (high school age). The manuals of a handful talk about everything BUT recording drums. One mentions a drum machine - but that's not recording drums.

This would be recording in the basement as most bands start out doing. They have a PA, so they have monitors and a mixer and two drum mics (bass drum and condenser overhead?)...

Does anyone have any tip on getting the best sound IN to the recorder? (we still have to learn how to mix the sound once in)...

Thanks!

 

[joro]

Hey,

Gathering information before my son purchases an 8-track recorder for his band (high school age). The manuals of a handful talk about everything BUT recording drums. One mentions a drum machine - but that's not recording drums.

This would be recording in the basement as most bands start out doing. They have a PA, so they have monitors and a mixer and two drum mics (bass drum and condenser overhead?)...

Does anyone have any tip on getting the best sound IN to the recorder? (we still have to learn how to mix the sound once in)...

Thanks!

To mic the kit properly you will need more than 2 mics.
a dynamic for the snare
A dynamic for the hats
at least a pair of dynamics for the toms
a Kick mic
and two overheads (condensors preferred a matched set usually)
so you will probably need more than 8 tracks if you want to capture the sound of the kit in a more isolated format in order to mix them with all of the other instruments and vox.
You can do a search in the mic forum for all the different ways people have mic-ed kits to see which way you may want to go with this.

You could also use all the mics for the kit and do a stereo mix on your board and send two tracks (stereo) to your recorder but, that will def take some time with trial and error....

 

[JimmyS1969]

Start HERE.

There is much information in the stickies at the top of each forum. Most questions will be answered by reading those.

Once you have some more specific questions about particular pieces of gear or whatever, someone will surely be around to help.

Welcome to the forum!

 

[mjbphotos]

The best sound you are going to get is recording one track/instrument/voice at a time. Otherwise you are going to get more of a 'live' sound with lots of bleed between mics.
How many/what instruments? How many singers? How many mics? Is everything mic-ed into the PA? Does the PA have channel sends?

 

[cooterbrown]

The best sound you are going to get is recording one track/instrument/voice at a time. Otherwise you are going to get more of a 'live' sound with lots of bleed between mics.
How many/what instruments? How many singers? How many mics? Is everything mic-ed into the PA? Does the PA have channel sends?

Thanks for the reply!

Here was my theory based on chatting with folks.

1 - record a "group" track. Something to them to follow.

2 - Then record each instrument.

3 - They have : Drums, Bass, Lead, Rhythm, 1 singer.

4 - Further questions were going to address direct patch vs. mic'ed amps. But I'm not there on my reading yet.

5 - The PA is a Peavey XR1212 Mixer. But I don't exactly know what role that will play (as you can surmise - this in in it's infancy)

BUT - one thing we do know that after the 8-track Purchase - there is no more money for more drum mics. Two is it and when they play live - they rarely use the over head.

But again - this is in a basement room.

@Jimmy69 - I will follow that link also.

Thanks!

 

[RAMI]

I agree that 2 mics will be very limiting for drums. But I also don't think you need a mic on every drum to get a good drum sound. You can do extremely well with 4: Snare, Kik, and 2 overheads. I don't see any need for a hi-hat mic and the toms are optional, not crucial.

 

[mjbphotos]

Also consider skipping the stand-alone 8-track recorder. All you need is a fairly new computer and a decent audio interface.

 

[dreib]

Make your son quit playing music before its too late.....you've been warned.

 

[grimtraveller]

Also consider skipping the stand-alone 8-track recorder. All you need is a fairly new computer and a decent audio interface.

On the other hand, a standalone 8 track recorder for a high schooler could be the perfect all in one entry point, help him get his feet wet and see if he'll then plunge his whole body in.

 

[Tom Hicks]

More mics on every part of the kit = phase problems for beginners. Meaning; the same snare hit is arriving at each different mic at a slightly different time. This gives you comb filtering problems.

You want the sounds phase aligned, meaning they arrive at the different mics at the same time. Goggle the recorderman drum micing technique.

And x-y overhead technique also.

Both are easy ways for newcomers to get good drum sounds with a minimum of fuss

 

[cooterbrown]

Thanks I will look these up.

We purchased a Tascam DP03 and the experimenting has begun! I'll let you all know how things turn out.