recording drums (as a guitarist) sucks.

  • Thread starter Thread starter GreenDank
  • Start date Start date
G

GreenDank

New member
I posted this at another site I go to, but I don't think anyone felt my pain.

No matter how I do it, recording drums just sucks. I thought I'd crank out a QUICK 3-minute song yesterday, and I spent the whole day goofing with the drums. This time I used my drum module (a Yamaha TMX) and a DIY trigger set-up (piezos mounted on PVC stands basically) to do the various drum sounds on separate tracks. Took me freakin' forever to nail it.

It takes me even longer when I program an external drum machine or clicking with a mouse in a computer-based program. Then it sounds hella fake to me since it's so "in time." Then you I go nuts trying to de-computerize it.

I've realized this is why I seldom record anymore. The drums are too damn time consuming. I may just do 1 or 2-minute songs here and there, but make it up in the quantity of them rather than 4 or 5 (or even 3!) minute ones that eat up so much time.

Man, if I were to try to do a whole album these days it'd take me a damn year.

Anyone else have this issue?
 
Yeah, I have some nice drum samples and use midi loops to trigger them, but would rather have more feel and variation in my tracks. I actually spent yesterday building a PVC rack for some e-drums (Remo pads which I'm converting with piezos). I'm hoping this will solve my problem, however I'm gonna have to spend some time learning to play the things worth a damn.
 
JeffLancaster said:
Yeah, I have some nice drum samples and use midi loops to trigger them, but would rather have more feel and variation in my tracks. I actually spent yesterday building a PVC rack for some e-drums (Remo pads which I'm converting with piezos). I'm hoping this will solve my problem, however I'm gonna have to spend some time learning to play the things worth a damn.
Click to expand...

I built a set like this, and it worked pretty well (but i love playing a real set so I gave up and bought one evenutally). Here is the thing though, the timing on playing an eletronic set like this (in my experience) is odd. I used an alesis DM5, and a keyboard sustain pedal to control the open/close of the hat. With a normal hit hat, when you lift your foot the current state of vibtration of the hat cymbals is transerred- so if you hit the hat before opening, you still get the distictive shhhhhhick sound. With the electronic version, it is either on or off. So, with a normal hi hat, i can be hitting the hats in nromal time and lift my fiit with plenty of variance and the shhhhhhhhick of the hat rigning open then closing will sound great, with the electronic kit, if you lift the foot just after you hit the hat trigger, all you get is the closed sound and then the chick when you step down. I had to learn to be more precise with my foot, and be sure to hit the hat trigger after i lifted the pedal. This felt really unnatural to me, and since i suck at drums to begin with, it was just too hard to get comfortable using the hat right, and i realized why i like an acoustic set.

Sorry if this is convoluted, but it might help point out a bit of a differnce for those htinking of going digital withteh drums.

Daav
 
If you really like making songs, but hate recording drums, let a real drummer handle it. If you can't find someone locally to jam with, record the material and post it on HR and see if someone will co-op with you. Could end up with some nice drumming!
 
jaykeMURD said:
If you really like making songs, but hate recording drums, let a real drummer handle it. If you can't find someone locally to jam with, record the material and post it on HR and see if someone will co-op with you. Could end up with some nice drumming!
Click to expand...


good ideas. that would probably yield the best results!
 
hell...recording drums(as a drummer) suck's too. :D .....send me some tracks sometime and I'll see what I can do....I won't be offended if you don't use them. ;)
 
Last edited:
brandrum said:
hell...recording drums(as a drummer) suck's too. :D .....send me some tracks sometime and I'll see what I can do....I won't be offended you don't use them. ;)
Click to expand...

I sent you a PM.
 
As a guitarist who records drums, I have to say that getting a good sound with acoustic drums can be hard for me. Especially the bass drum. The last 2 tracks I recorded, the BD sounded so terrible that I used a midi keyboard into my old drum machine and played the bd live. I will say that I always have the best results doing anything remotely funky using brushes on the hihat and snare. You can whack the snare as a rim shot with the shaft of the brushes (the hihat, too), but you also have the whole dynamic range from the brushes. I also add sampled cymbals because they sound really crisp and tight played up a fifth or an octave. Maybe it's because my real cymbals are rock-weight and just too heavy for recording.
 
I'd be willing to put some tracks down for you too man. I'm always interested in playing along with different people and different styles. send me a pm if you'd like.
 
yea man it sucks, i recommend the korg v1600 16 track to record drums with cause it records 8 inputs at once that way you can mic the drums up all over the place and tweak the sound out after with the built in effects and bounce recording and what not...plus it has a built in metronome so its easy to record all the instruments if you do home recordings like me...check it out man its a good piece of machine


GreenDank said:
I posted this at another site I go to, but I don't think anyone felt my pain.

No matter how I do it, recording drums just sucks. I thought I'd crank out a QUICK 3-minute song yesterday, and I spent the whole day goofing with the drums. This time I used my drum module (a Yamaha TMX) and a DIY trigger set-up (piezos mounted on PVC stands basically) to do the various drum sounds on separate tracks. Took me freakin' forever to nail it.

It takes me even longer when I program an external drum machine or clicking with a mouse in a computer-based program. Then it sounds hella fake to me since it's so "in time." Then you I go nuts trying to de-computerize it.

I've realized this is why I seldom record anymore. The drums are too damn time consuming. I may just do 1 or 2-minute songs here and there, but make it up in the quantity of them rather than 4 or 5 (or even 3!) minute ones that eat up so much time.

Man, if I were to try to do a whole album these days it'd take me a damn year.

Anyone else have this issue?
Click to expand...
 
...

thanks for the tips and responses, ya'll.

Every once in a while you just gotta vent. I'll try to keep it down to a dull roar though.
 
it's alright dude....I still whine like a little bitch every time I have to set up or breakdown my kit. :o
 
I can relate, Green. I've been a semi-pro guitarist for more than 20 years, though I've usually had a drum set just for a fun workout. I've always worked with real drummers in studios, but when I set up my home studio a few years ago (to record some of my stranger non-commercial stuff), I began experimenting with drum loops and machines. The results were generally pretty bad, especially since my fusion pieces move through some complicated meters. (If you're interested, you can hear one of these tunes that uses some weak-sounding loops, Shades of Sharya, over at recordingmag.com in the October 2005 reviews.) Unfortunately, I don't like programming drum parts--I prefer to play them--but don't have room for a set of any type in my studio.

Last year, someone tipped me off to the toy-like Yamaha dd-55 pad machine. I laughed at first, but then read a few glowing reviews by experienced studio folks. I gave it a shot, and although I needed a couple of weeks to adjust to playing it, the results have easily been the best I've achieved from a non-set approach. Many of the sampled sounds are excellent and pre-arranged spatially so that I don't need to spend time panning them. Even the standard EQ settings are workable. The triggering is not perfect and a problem at times, but some practice time allowed me to work through most of the quirks. What I like most is that I can actually play my odd drum parts with sticks and pedals while achieving some decent human-sounding tracks. I usually use two main passes for my drum parts: snare and hi-hat go to a paired stereo track, and all else to another stereo track. Any other percussion goes to other tracks, of course.

I hesitate to recommend this machine to anyone, though, since a user needs to overcome any resistance to using such a cheap toy-like machine and then needs to spend some time learning it. It requires a special drumming style and needs to be approached as a separate kind of instrument rather than as a mini-drum set.

Send me a PM if you'd like to hear a sample in a few weeks. I'm close to wrapping up a 12-minute piece that puts the Yammie through its paces, and I'd be glad to forward a clip when I get a rough mix done.

It goes without saying, though, that when I need a really great-sounding drum track form some reason, I head to my local pro studio. Real drums will always rule for me.

Good luck with your search,
J.
 
brandrum and a dude called GreenDank??? Sounds like a match made in heaven! :p

As a drummer, I struggle alot with recording my drums too fwiw. But that's because I'm a drummer and not an engineer I guess.
 
I hate trying to do drum parts electronically as well, you spend so much time trying to make them sound real. For me and my buddy's first album we did it sans drums :) Lol, some people didn't like it but hey, we made a grand off it and were able to buy a PA system so...hah

Also, are people still willing to lay down some drums? I'm workin on a solo album and everything would sound so much better with drums (right now its just me and my guitar)
 
I just started using Drum Kit From Hell Superior and it takes me around 2-4 hours to completely finish 1 song for drums.

And that's even with me trying to copy and paste as many sections as I can.

But it sounds amazingly real.

And it takes so long because I put the time into it to make velocity adjustments so that it doesnt sound fake.

The fakeness is when every drum hit is 100% solid. And my Boss DR550 drum machine wont let me change velocity so it sounds hella fake.

The hits on cymbols especially fast and constant stuff like hats, snare, tom rolls, need to sound more random. Being in time is not the problem, its just having unrealist drum hits sounding 100% the same every time.

Im a guitarist also, and knowing that I want to record a perfect song with perfect sounding drums, its worth the time spent.

My goal is to use Drumkit From Hell Superior to record an album in place of a Drummer. So I am not going to take any shortcuts when it comes to quality.

If you want quick and easy then you need a drummer.

Good luck.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top