Recording Drums - My Work in Progress

[MerlinTKD]

Okay, here goes: I'm on a quest to learn everything I can about creating and recording music myself, without having to rely or wait on others to get things done. Most of what I'm doing for myself is on the PC (amp sims, programmed drums), but the band I'm in isn't really interested in a totally digital environment.

So I got some basic drum mics, an 8 input interface, and my SO's laptop, and after a few weeks of trial and error (and error and error), here's the latest:



Just a couple minutes of solo practice on a new tune the band is working on (hence the 4 bar rest near the beginning). Obviously YT does what it does to audio, but I'd love any input or suggestions anyone has!

Gear:
CAD Stage7 Drum Mics
Audix OM2 (room mic)
Focusrite 18i20 Interface
(oh, and probably waaay too much parallel compression since I just learned how to it works )

 

[TedEH]

Something went weird with the embed, but I found the video anyway.

I'm unfortunately not near anything good to listen through, so I'd have to come back with decent headphones or something to offer any useful criticism, but it sounds good to me so far. Your kit sounds better than mine does, at least through laptop speakers, haha. I'm not hearing any weird ringing or anything from the shells, and your hits sound consistent, so it seems like you're on the right track.

 

[MerlinTKD]

Something went weird with the embed, but I found the video anyway.

I'm unfortunately not near anything good to listen through, so I'd have to come back with decent headphones or something to offer any useful criticism, but it sounds good to me so far. Your kit sounds better than mine does, at least through laptop speakers, haha. I'm not hearing any weird ringing or anything from the shells, and your hits sound consistent, so it seems like you're on the right track.

That's a start! . Learning a lot about parallel compression and how that works... which in turn is teaching me more about mic placement, etc

My kit lives at my bandmate's house where we practice, and wasn't able to get out there this past week... hopefully I can do more in the week to come.

 

[Seybsnilksz]

Sounds like a well tuned and mic'd up kit! Mix is muddy, but I don't think mixing was the main point. I would be delighted if I got tracks of this quality to mix.

 

[MerlinTKD]

Wow, thanks! Yeah, only basic mixing going in (and probably waaay overcompressed); I'm learning that, no matter what the source sounds like, by the time it's been rendered into various formats (esp audio->video->YouTube) its going to be compressed multiple times and seemingly a bunch of high end taken out. Or that's how it sounds to my ear, is that accurate?

 

[Seybsnilksz]

In terms of dynamic range compression, it seems just about right to me. When it comes to data compression, it doesn't sound too bad. But yeah it's often the highs that takes the most damage in that sense.

 

[Descent]

Sounds a bit muddy. I like the thick bass and snare but IMO it needs more snap on both, especially snare.
Low tom was iffy on the tuning.

Can you get away with this drum sound on EP - surely! As long as the main tonality is good and enough definition, you're OK.


On another note - thank you, thank you, thank you for posting and playing real drums, my head is spinning from all these drum sampler demos on here