Believe it or not but I have a Video from that tour in '76 (or whenever). It is incredible, I will look and see what he's using.
That is just evil music, people shouldn't be allowed to be that good ...LOL!!!

I'll get back to you.

Mike

Thank you muchly, launchpad! Actually, I'm wondering if he might not be using an acrylic kit. Those have that kind of loud, nicely-defined sound to them.

A good drummer LOL......Lenny White.

i'm sorta sure tha Lenny White was a Tama endorser at the time. crank that snare and wrinkle those toms!

Absolutely phenomenal drummer, yes. That album is one of my very favorites to listen to, especially for the drumming and the sound of the drums they got. And thanks for the input, everyone!

Consul,
I watched my video very closely and Lenny is playing "Slingerlands". Also the more I think about it, those are the exact sounds of those drums from 1975!! I owned a set from '76, and they are the same drums. Especially the snare, which luckily I held onto, and still play with my DW set. Can't beat that sound, open, slappy and full.
Ranch Rider wrote about crank the snare (correct) and "wrinkle" the toms, which is actually wrong for the times ('75-80). Everyone played very tight tensioned heads back then and that is really a tribute to good "open room" recording. Let it all hang/ring out. Look at John Bonham, he used 2- U47's in the room and that's It!! Granted a large amount of processing was used but never the less, micing drums with 2 room mics was a common practice in the early 70"s.
On the Return to Forever video, Lenny uses a snare mic, a kick mic and 2 overheads, thats all.

Mike

Whee! Thanks a lot, Launchpad and everyone else. It certainly is a tribute to the engineers of that recording just how good it is. I guess I'll just have to learn to be that good of an engineer. :) Someday...