My latest, most favorite drum sample.

Very nice, but won't the petals fall off from the vibration?

Hi Backwoods,
 I don't really have a formal studio I have a building that is dedicated to music production but I primarily work on the road or on location. For the past 5 years I've been doing more work with e drums at my place but now I want to get back to the sound of acoustic drums and live playing so I set up my kit in the production room as I continue to try to redefine it as the "live" room.

 As far as isolation here at my place I have used different rooms for the various instruments and I patch a bunch of headphones out so that stuff is isolated but players can see each other.

 The music building is detached from the "shack". I have often put stuff in both buildings and tracked it all simultaneously.


 With my latest attempt at a dedicated live room I am setting up the drum kit as a feature and hoping to keep it mic'd up and ready to go.

 I encourage bass players to go direct so it's easy to have the drummer and the bass player jamming in the same room.

 I use GK Ultraphones, which are isolation headphones, for the guys in the drum room so they can easily hear the sound going to the DAW.

 I used to encourage bands to track live all together in big room but after 5 years of doing demos with e drums I have become more accustomed to over dub production and working forward step by step. The idea of doing full live takes is great but I have found that only a few bands rehearse their new material enough to make the possibility of fixing stuff in edits all that easy. Sure, I can perform reconstructive surgery, but I'd rather do that on just the drums and bass and get that squared away rather than have to fix a flub on a full 24 tracks.  I still do that full tracking on occasions and that's when we put stuff all over the place and in the other "shack" we call the house, but I hesitate to perform multi-track surgery on that stuff any more. I don't like to find that I am working harder than the musicians did unless someone gives me a good reason. :-)


 With regards to the drums, I usually just use a simple mic-ing setup and I like to isolate the kick mic with blankets as demonstrated by Bruce Swedien. I actually did not do this on my last drum tracking session and I regret it. I like to build a box out of stiff rockwool panels and then I cover that with a blanket.

 The other spot mics are just isolated by virtue of the close mic-ing proximity.

 I like the sound of room mics and I gravitate towards that tonality so it is helpful that I avoid bleed from guitar cabs and such.

 At my place I am still in the process of moving the kit around and finding the place where it and the room work the best. I think I am close... but I'll always second guess that snare. ;-)

 In the past I have done a lot of live work with full bleed etc. There's nothing wrong with working that way but there is less potential for performing clean edits after the fact with all the bleed. I like the sound of bleed, I just don't enjoy editing it all the much.

 I am a sucker for live music and all the foibles. I like stuff to feel a bit edgy, but lately I have been trying to set up a place where we can get the clean and modern drumming sound which I hope will become a natural compliment for all the commonplace DAW magic we can do know a days.

 I don't think I did a good job of answering your question... but I tried. :-)


 best regards,
mike




 

Hi Steve,
 I stumbled on this site and placed an order for a new drum head which they supply:

http://www.inkedbyevans.com/

The service turned out great with the exception that I had wanted to contact them after I uploaded the image and they offer no contact info. So I just let it ride.

 I later found out about this outfit, which has a great reputation for making someone available as a contact through out the process.

 http://www.vintagelogos.com/

 I'll probably try them at some point as well.

 Here's a 1/20th scale of what I sent in:



then I selected the TAMA logo that they supply the line art for, and they add their brand logo and display a "proof" like this:




I just got done playing it and it has made the kick sound much better than it had with the damaged resonator. :-) Good Times.




best regards,
mike

Ruined???     :-S

I like the TAMA logo. The last head had one just like it.

You can choose to not have that.

There is no practical way to opt out of the Evans logo, but I think the other service I linked too would do exactly what you ask for.


best,
mike

That was for you bapsi.

;-)









The mosquitoes are fierce this month.

Thanks Obi!

best,
mike

Thanks for the info, the head looks great. I may have to avail myself of their services.

@Mike, thanks for sharing! I have always wanted a kick with my own personal logo but never looked into. You have reignited my quest for a customized front kick head. Now to just decide what I want it to look like or say...

IK Obi


@Mike, thanks for sharing! I have always wanted a kick with my own personal logo but never looked into. You have reignited my quest for a customized front kick head. Now to just decide what I want it to look like or say...

Hi Obi, Yes I hear what you are saying; the same thing happened to me. Finding out about these services reinvigorated an old interest of mine. When I was younger I had, on occasions, taken the time to hand paint and hand letter the kick head for bands I've played with.

It was always a lot of fun to have a band "logo" on stage even when we were just playing for beverages and food.


For the past few years I've been interested in printing some of my digital pictures at large scale so I got to do two fun things at once with this.

:-)

best regards,
mike

I used to have mine done by a local screen printer who used to cut the mic port too.

It was fairly expensive though and never looked as good as that.  I only ever went for single or two-colours I could never justify the price of full colour.

Most of mine were not that tasteful in the art department although I did have a set of three based on some old bomber 'pin-up' style nose art which were quite fetching.

I'll see if I can dig out some pictures.