What kind of drum kit should I get for my rec studio?

[ACIDBANDIT]

I am finally breaking down and learning to play the drums. I have a small recording studio in my apartment (yes, I live in a apartment) and want to add acoustic drums to my songs. I can only use drum machines for so long (try 5 years) on my tracks before growing tiresome of the synthetic feeling I am really excited even though I know my neighbors will hate me forever. haha.

I took a trip to guitar center tonight to see what they had for 5pc kits with a price range of 1000-1500, which should be enough to get something quality, right?. The extremely friendly sales dude pointed me to a few different kits and I wanted to know if what he said had any merit to it and what you guys think. He mentioned a Gretch Catalina Birch with Zildjian "A" Prepack cymbals for 649.99 for the kit, 499.99 for pack of cymbals OR a Pearl ELX (export maybe?) amber fade kit for 629.99... and of course I know nothing about anything when it comes to drums so I wanted to do research before I committed to anything. What do y'all think? He also recommended these Vic Firth Muff pads to reduce the noise, however I have no idea how well these kind of things work of if they do anything at all.

I already play my shit pretty loud with my guitar and theres alot of old deaf people that live around me so I figured I'd prolly be ok as long as I wasn't playing for hours and hours at night. What else do I need to get started? What's a good way to set it up? Are there any kits that are easier to play for beginners? Like I said it will be used mostly for recording, so I don't know if there are any kits better suited for that purpose. Ah, I'm so excited!!!! I hope
I don't get kicked out!!

-=daveyboy=-

 

[sile2001]

Well first of all is that you need to take anything a guitar center sales rep says with a grain of salt . But he did point you in a decent direction. A whole lot of CD's have been recorded on the Pearl Exports (and yes, the ELX is one of the Export models). If you get them tuned up right, they will work for just about anything.

Now up at church we use that Gretch kit for our live set, and even after changing the skins and getting it all tuned in, it still doesn't sound like something I would want to use in a studio, especially the snare. Even when just tuned, the toms seem to somehow be boomy and overbearing without actually producing a pleasing sound, and we have yet to be able to get any sort of crack or any depth out of the snare.

I can't say this enough......don't skimp on the cymbals at all[/b]. If you put crappy cymbals on top of a decent drumset, guess what the whole mess is gonna sound like.......crap. Make sure and get good cymbals up front.

 

[Sloan]

buy a cheap set that has decent/good shells.
then use the rest of your $1000 budget upgrading cymbals, heads, and hardware.

My brother bought a CB drumset for $40 from a guy; did some upgrading and now it rocks. He's used that same set for about 6-7 years.