recording drums...

[OnTheBlackRock]

ok they way i record bands drums now is i mic the snare and the bass drum and then have to over heads for the cymbals and toms... then from the analog out on the mixer into my sound card onto one track... I've noticed some of you record each and every piece of the drum set on individual tracks... why would you do this? adding effects to the drums would be so much easier if they were on one track instead of about 8... please give me your input.

also I use a D112 for the kick and Shure KSM137's for the overheads and a Shure SM 57 for the snare all through Joe Meek preamps into a behringer board (sux i know)

 

[WATYF]

Why would it be harder to add effects to 8 tracks? You bus all 8 of them to an Aux and add the effects once to one track (the aux) and voila.. you're done. Takes just as long to add effects to 1 track of drums as it does to add them to 8 tracks or 12 tracks.

The reason why it's not ideal to drop the drum mix to one track is because you may find later on in mixing that there's some element of the drums that needs to be brought-out/dropped/back, but if all the drums are on one track, then you can't do that.

And the reason you mic each component is so you have full, independent control of the drum mix. There's a host of instances when you'd want separate control of the hi-hat/cymbals/toms.


WATYF

 

[OnTheBlackRock]

nice.

alright thanx.. I'm gonna try miking all the drums today and through the direct out on my mixer send em' straight into different channels on the Digi 001 and let yah know how it goes...

 

[WATYF]

No prob... I use a digi 001 too.

The mic positions I prefer are:

1 Kick
1 Snare (1 under snare if possible)
1 Hi-Hat
3 Toms
2 OH
1 Ride
2 Room

Since I only have 8, it's usually a varied combination of those positions, but something to that effect.

Having all those positions allows you to do a lot of things. Bring in more-room/less-room to add/remove natural reverb. Bring out the hi-hats during driving parts and take them back during soft parts. Bring up the snare "buzz" for softer ghost notes. Get a nice sharp "bell" sound from the ride. Bring out the toms for any tom based beats... etc. etc. (the list goes on)



WATYF