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This isn't so much a question, as an example of how I recently mic'ed a metal drum kit for a session.
All I was recording was the kit (minus a few scratch tracks), so my resources were plentiful.
Also, I am not mixing this project - my purpose was only to provide enough quality drum tracks for the mix engineer to work with.

B/c the drummer actually had two kicks, and wanted uniformity from them, I had to buck my usual setup and settle for an odd choice for floor tom. See below.

Kick (x2): 421
Snare: SM57
Rack Tom (x2) SM57
Fl Tom: Beta52(!)
OH (x2): 414
Room: Bluebird
...and I did an M/S setup to test (for myself) w/ 2 Fatheads in a Blumlein M/S.

Since I only had one 52, I decided to mic the kicks w/ the the 421s, which happens to be my choice for Fl Tom. My remaining options for the Fl Tom were then a CAD KBM kick mic, the 52, or another 57.
Things being what they were, I decided a little extra bottom couldn't hurt and went w/ the 52.

So I suppose my one question is, what do you think of my decision? Is this a typical way to mic a metal kit (excluding the Fl Tom issue)?

I'm really a less is more person as I grow as an engineer, but I wanted to cover my bases.
The M/S setup was a beginning to me exploring different ways to mic a kit w/ less mics. It was placed about 8ft in front of the kit and roughly at the level of of the "meat" of the drums.

Your thoughts are greatly appreciated!

Comments

soapfloats Tue, 03/02/2010 - 01:06

Thanks Dave.

Usually some of my best ideas come out of adverse situations.
I'd be happy to use the 421 on kick (or bass amp, for that matter) and the 52 on fl tom if I didn't have enough applications for my pair of 421s already.
I sense a D112 and another 421 or two?
(After the FF800 and API 3124, and better monitors, and machine... or before?)

Again, I'm just providing and example of a session and hoping to start a conversation.
If you'd like, I can provide some rough drum mixes - just let me know.

soapfloats Fri, 03/19/2010 - 22:29

Here's a link to a stream of a mix of one of the tracks we did.
Only processing is some HPF and LPF here and there. Otherwise, just panning and levels.

[[url=http://[/URL]="http://www.soundcli…"]SoundClick artist: Soap Floats Recording - page with MP3 music downloads[/]="http://www.soundcli…"]SoundClick artist: Soap Floats Recording - page with MP3 music downloads[/]

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