I think I am onto it. Had a week here I can finally diagnose and tune up our drum kit, mic placement etc.
So I got new heads for the Yamaha Tour Custom Maple shell kit. Tuned the tops up, bottoms a shade lower. Snare the opposite. This is what I read seems to work well.
Bass drum I have done something funky. For attack I have bonded a thin dense neoprene rubber pad to the bass drum head. Using the plastic side of the beaters. This comes from my car-mat-on-foot theory. Put a thin condenser mic aimed at the beaters. And true enough sounds sick! For poof I have placed a mic in front of the drum in the standard spot. Now I can absolutely tune the attack and decay with precision. The rubber also dampens the drum head. pretty cool.
One overhead mic and one on the snare.
Now the snare I am having issues with. Sounds too rattly, and well buzzy. I need a new metal snare thingy, but also am going to put a rubber dampener on the head too see if that stops the buzziness.
Any other tips?
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this is an mp3 i used adobe premiere I guess it uses the flv ext
this is an mp3 i used adobe premiere I guess it uses the flv extension even though it's only an audio file. Lots of stormy days here on the west coast we've had no power one day, then off/on today.
http://www.fmrecords.ca/Monstabeat.flv
ok these are raw tracks and I've iso'd them a few seconds each... 1. snare with a PVM22 2. O/H withMXL603s, 3. Bass drum rubber pad/snap track MXL603 4. Bass Drum front MX2003a 5. Drums frontal (I like this pov) MXL990. Finally altogether for the remainder
my son is practicing using his iPod and ear muffs so lots of starts/stutters to pick up the song he's playing to - that is the reason for the odd timing
I had trouble initially keeping the neoprene striker pad on the bass drum head, so switched to a urethane on 3m. That was hated, so went back and made the neoprene work. We are using the plastic side of the striker - it sounds great live.
I also used a urethane on 3M 1"x3" for the snare to dampen that head. I could really use that on the toms too, to stop them from ringing too much.
Yes, this can work. I've done it successfully a couple of times.
Yes, this can work. I've done it successfully a couple of times. But more often than not, the bleed of the rest of the kit into the mic that's on the beater side of the kick creates more problems than it solves. So it depends on the drummer, drums, and the style of music.
Post some examples when you get there.