Bang On The Drums
Spent most of the evening getting the drums prepped for some recording sessions.
Our drummer brought his kit over earlier this week. A beautiful DW kit. And I set about getting it all mic’d up. For this session I am using 12 microphones:
- Inside kick
- Outside kick
- Snare Top
- Snare Bottom
- Hi-hat
- Ride
- Overheads left and right
- Toms 1,2 and 3
- Room
For the overheads, I am going to try using the Recorderman technique. I generally use XY or spaced pair. But I have heard some good stories about the Recorderman technique particularly in spaces that have lower ceilings. We’ll see how it sounds. Easy enough to go back to XY or spaced pair. A few photos of the kit.
Does your drummer know he’s left handed? Beautiful kit!
Indeed. He’s been playing them that way for several decades. Makes it a pain for me to sound check without him in the studio. I cannot play southpaw.
I heard about this kit just after it was ordered. It certainly is beautiful 🙂
Sounds awesome. It does have a fourth tom which we are not using for the sessions. The hardware is stunning. I’m not sure if Jeff knows that once checked in to the studio, the kit can never leave 🙂
If you need somewhere to hide them I know just the spot 😉
Richard – I’ve always wanted to try recorderman setup but never actually got around to doing it – always have been too rushed to try anything other than L/R or XY. Can’t wait to try that!
I’ve been very happy with this kit. There are actually 5 toms, but I am only using 3 in the setup shown by Richard.
When I bring the FULL rig, I typically have:
22″ Kick
8″ Tom
10″Tom
12″ Tom (mounted near the hi-hat as an “aux tom”)
14″ Tom
16″ Tom
14″ Primary Snare
12″ Popcorn Snare
I have 4 snare drums – a 14″ DW 5.5 maple, a 12″ DW popcorn, a 14″ Black Panther 3.5 brass piccolo, and a 10″ DW popcorn that I use depending on the situation. I brought 3 of them for this session but will probably use the 14″ DW maple most frequently.
Cymbals are a mish-mash of lines, I just choose ones I like from a variety of manufacturers including Paiste, Zildjian, Sabian, and Turkish. I have a few other cymbals not shown in this setup which are more suited to lighter playing style gigs.