Soon to begin my first drum recording experience.

M

MatthewH

New member
in a few days the drummer from my band will come down and set up her gear in my bedroom, id like to know possibly some ways to help improve the sound of the drums in an untreated room. i can take up sections of my carpet, as i used those office squares (out of simpleness) should the drums be set on hard wood floors, for a brighter sound? i also have a large piece of MDF board (4f by 5ft approx) should i use this to reflect any sound? and the best place to position it if i was?
i plan to close mic each drum separately (snare top and bottom) plus hihat/ride depending on how they cut through, + 2 cheap matched overheads and a LDC as a room mic, any tips for where to position the room mic?

any other tips or things noobs commonly miss let me know, this will be the beginning of the first 'official' recordings of my band, so you'll hopefully see a lot of me in the mp3 forum and here asking for tips.

if this is all too messy and jumbled let me know ill try rewriting it thanks :)
 
Most likely the drums will need to be on a single piece of carpet so they don't slide around. Otherwise experiment liberally with moving the carpet squares around.
 
oh the carpet tiles dont slide, i use this adhesive spray stuff, never had a problem on foot, so i assume drums wont be a problem either, if they are though, i can sort that, thanks for the heads up ^^
 
I would concentrate on a 4 mic set up first. I'm not saying only use 4 mics (though that's what I would do), but get a good sound with 2 overheads, snare and kik first.

You shouldn't NEED a bottom snare mic, but if you do use one, you'll have to deal with a polarity issue between the top and bottom mic. Personally, I don't think a bottom snare mic is necessarry. Same with a hi-hat mic. If you set up your overheads properly, 90% of your drum sound should come from them. I would use the mics you're planning on using for snare bottom and hi-hat on the toms instead.

You're going to think I'm a miniailist, but a room mic is also something I wouldn't bother with unless you have a great room, which I think you said you don't, or at least you mentioned that it's an un-treated bedroom, which leads me to believe a room mic won't pick up anything good.

Of course, this is all just my personal opinion based on my experience, but I invite you to experiment away, that's how you learn what works and what doesn't. It certainly doesn't hurt to over-mic a drum set because you can always decide to NOT use any tracks you wish to get rid of.

Good luck.
 
okay thanks, yeah, ill definitely start with the 4 and see how it goes, i was leaning towards the two snare mic option because the music we do really drives on that on the button snare and kick, so i though a thicker snare would be better for the sound and feel, but if ill get the same results without it i may as well leave that. ill have a mess around with tom mics also, since like you said i can drop out what i want, thanks!

P.S i thought with the polarity issue (phase) i could switch the phase in reaper, which would remedy the problem? though i didn't read into this much, so i may be mistaken.
 
MatthewH said:
i was leaning towards the two snare mic option because the music we do really drives on that on the button snare and kick, so i though a thicker snare would be better for the sound and feel
Click to expand...
OK, I might be mis-understanding what you mean. But, if you mean a "thicker" sound as in "fuller", "warmer", or "more bottom end", the bottom snare mic will do the exact opposite. It will just give you more of the sound of the wires on the bottom of the snare.

i thought with the polarity issue (phase) i could switch the phase in reaper, which would remedy the problem? though i didn't read into this much, so i may be mistaken.
Click to expand...
No, you're right. That's what I meant by dealing with the polarity issue. I didn't know what DAW you used or how easy it would have been to flip the phase (which in this case is actually polarity, but we know what we mean. :) ). But, yeah, that's what you got to do.

Rock on. :cool:
 
The polarity switch (mislabeled "Phase") in Reaper will correct polarity inversion and can sometimes be used to treat phase issues. All good DAWs have a simple polarity switch on each channel. In Pro Tools you have to use Audio Suite.
 
thanks for the speedy replies! i just thought the extra rattle from the snare would give the snare the top end pop which i wouldn't get with just one mic, but never mind that ill just experiment and ill get an answer either way :)
 
Pleas epost a sample of your recording when you can. I would like to hear what it sounds like. I personally do the recorderman technique plus kick and snare. Then I added i mic the toms and the another on the front head of the kick. I then add a room mic. The thing is that 95% of the drums are on the first 40 mics. The rest are there to give a little emphasis. I do think I can get by with the just the first 4.

The thing i learned from recording my own drums was that first and foremost, the drummer has to be the mixer. If a ride is too loud but the toms aren't then the drummer has to hit the cymbal quiter or hit the drums harder. This was rough lesson for the drummer to learn but the first time he focused on it the track sound 100000000% better
 
yeah i most definitely will! and yeah, ill just try and get the best sound possible with the smallest amount of mics, and use what is necessary, to the most extent.
+ thanks for the tip, i did read that something like Keith moon would play his crash and ride quietly to give him self more room for a big drum sound, ill talk to my drummer about it, so she has time to put some thought into it and we'll just work from the first few scratch recordings, cheers :)
 
yep. that what he did. The best things is just record, record, record. I am best friends with my drummer so we sometimes just hang out and mess around with mic placement and such. That is the best thing to do.
 
I'd spend the majority of my time and effort getting the drums themselves sounding good, the majority of bad recordings I have done started with horrible sounding drums and expecting to do miracles in post which normally means sample replacement at which point micing becomes insignificant. Spend a few hours with your drummer and get his snare and kick sounding fantastic with no eq and you'll be pretty golden.
 
Glyn Johns configuration or Recorderman configuration. I agree with RAMI. Focus 4 mics on the kit first. XY, kick & snare? Spaced-pair, kick n snare?
 
somewhat unrelated... I absolutely love recording and mixing drums... Especially with good drummers. Speaking of good drummers, I trip out at how clear Billy Cobham's kit is in the Mahavishnu Orchestra recordings.. They aren't monstrous but they have such a clean, crisp and punchy sound. As soon as I find a crazy ass drummer I'll try to get some sounds in that flavor.
 
illumination said:
Speaking of good drummers, I trip out at how clear Billy Cobham's kit is in the Mahavishnu Orchestra recordings.. They aren't monstrous but they have such a clean, crisp and punchy sound.
Click to expand...
I love Cobham's drumming on the first three Mahavishnu albums. Mind you, I love McLaughlin's guitaring, Hammer's keyboarding, Goodman's violining and Rick Laird's bass playing !
Part of the reason why Laird's bass is able to sound so thick and syrupy is because of the clean and crispy recording of Cobham's drums. Some of that was due to engineers Don Puluse, Robert Honablue and Ken Scott, some of that was due to the way Cobham played, kind of like what Stephenmodel was saying here
first and foremost, the drummer has to be the mixer. If a ride is too loud but the toms aren't then the drummer has to hit the cymbal quiter or hit the drums harder.
Click to expand...
 
illumination said:
Speaking of good drummers, I trip out at how clear Billy Cobham's kit is in the Mahavishnu Orchestra recordings...
Click to expand...
They were robably the only non-hard-rock I really got into as a teenager. I wore out that "Birds of Fire" album and still can't figure half of it out. :D

Cobham can do a single stroke roll on a bucket of water without moving any water. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top