Recording Drums

Posted: Mon Jun 30, 2008 9:11 pm

Hello all, i would love to record live drums, i just need advice on how best to approach this, although other than the obvious drum mics, i need some advice...

I am running a windows xp media centre, i regularly use usb interfaces for recording, for recording drums though i am unsure what kind of mixer/interface to purchase

Basically i want to be able to record 7 mics simultaneously on separate tracks through Nuendo 2...

Im sorry if this sounds simplistic, would an 8 channel usb mixer/interface do the trick? Can anyone reccomend me any that work a treat?

Thanks!

Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 4:47 am

I have the Phonic Helix MKII 24 fire wire mixer and it records great especially for the price, I paid around $ 600 new with 18 channels of simultaneous recording. Nice and quiet with lots of head room. That is will a 1.8 GHz PC with 512 ram using an external hard drive.

Posted: Tue Jul 01, 2008 5:07 am

Bravegravity wrote:

Hello all, i would love to record live drums, i just need advice on how best to approach this, although other than the obvious drum mics, i need some advice...

I am running a windows xp media centre, i regularly use usb interfaces for recording, for recording drums though i am unsure what kind of mixer/interface to purchase

Basically i want to be able to record 7 mics simultaneously on separate tracks through Nuendo 2...

Im sorry if this sounds simplistic, would an 8 channel usb mixer/interface do the trick? Can anyone reccomend me any that work a treat?

Thanks!

You don't need a mixer for the multitrack recording process. A digitizing interface with mic. preamps is the order of the day. You can mix "in the box" using Nuendo.

However, where you will run into trouble is using XP Media Center. Very few manufacturers support their interfaces under XPMC. Start from there and see what is supported, then come back here for comments on your shortlist. For drum recordings, you need pre-amps with good headroom.

I keep saying that 4 mics is quite sufficient for good drum recordings; more than that and phase problems become evident. Drummers always disagree.

Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 12:04 pm

any tips on how someone can go about "testing" or making a judgement on whether your preamp has good headroom?

i recently bought my first real preamp, the presonus ADL 600...2 channel tube pre...it sounds amazing, but then again all i have to really compare to is my presonus tubePRE (100$)...

Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 6:27 pm

Boswell wrote:

I keep saying that 4 mics is quite sufficient for good drum recordings; more than that and phase problems become evident. Drummers always disagree.

Simple is often better. If you can get a good mix with less microphones it normally sounds better IMHO.

The recorderman technique should be mentioned:
http://recording.org/ftopicp-91152.html#91152

and a good video of it
http://www.hometracked.com/2007/05/12/recorderman-overhead-drum-mic-technique/

That being said, I used to use as many mics as I could on drums, but have recently limited myself to just overheads and close micing the kick and snare. Sometimes so I can layer in a sample, sometimes just to make them a little bigger. Phase issues are real with lots of mics on drums! I know, I've been there! Aligning the phase of the close mics to the overhead can help, but it looses some of the apparent size.

If you are recording on a desk top I would recommend the M-Audio Delta1010LT. That leaves the door open for Pro Tools if you ever chose that route, and it is a very nice PCI sound card.

Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 2:20 pm

It all comes down to how much money you want to invest.

With something like a Presonus or other units that have 8 balanced microphone inputs is all that's necessary. It'll have some decent bundled multitrack software Then all you need is a bag full of SM 57's.

Conversely, you could use multiple inexpensive USB audio interfaces that only accommodate 2 channels each. Plug-in up to 4 units and you'll have 8 inputs. You just direct the software accordingly. Then you could feed those USB units from a cheap mixer with multiple outputs. Perfectly adequate for making demos.

Cheap broad
Ms. Remy Ann David

Posted: Sat Jul 05, 2008 6:12 am

You should also grab a copy of The Recording Engineers Handbook by Bobby Owsinski. It's basically a microphone manual with lots of good advice on how to get good results in different recording situations.

Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2008 1:44 am

For those who don't have a bagful of SM57's (I have only one), could one not record each drum separately, one at time? I realise this may be tricky.

otherwise can one rather opt for a less direct microphone, eg. a Samson, to record toms, snares & cymbals overhead, with the SM57 at the bass drum? This is what I plan to do when I'm completely up and running...

Posted: Sun Jul 20, 2008 2:34 pm

You have a drummer who can play the same track *exactly* the same repeatedly and when asked?

Posted: Sun Jul 20, 2008 5:47 pm

SeanG wrote:

Quote:

For those who don't have a bagful of SM57's (I have only one), could one not record each drum separately, one at time? I realise this may be tricky.

I'm a drummer, and I tried that when I first started recording. Believe me, it doesn't work very well. The drum tracks sound contrived and stilted. It's close to impossible to impart any sense of dynamics within the song. it would be like asking a guitar player to play his Barre chords 1 note at a time, trying to get all his attacks lined up.

Posted: Wed Jul 23, 2008 7:17 am

GeckoMusic wrote:

The recorderman technique should be mentioned:
http://recording.org/ftopicp-91152.html#91152

and a good video of it
http://www.hometracked.com/2007/05/12/recorderman-overhead-drum-mic-technique/

Very nice technique. I just tried this last night and wow. The imaging for the toms was better than I've ever had, and they sound great. I've decided, though that I need a new snare because it doesn't carry without it's own eq. I did add a kick mic (out of phase from the overhead setup) and then I could add a little snap to it. Overall it's an extremely simple and effective technique. I looked at the waveform of the two mics and they were spot on for phase with the kick and the snare both.

Thanks for the heads up for those of us who missed it mentioned before!

CHAD

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