W00t... I think I have the drum recording fever lately. It's because I want to record the drums for my band's demo bad.

Man, i can NOT play without shoes on. My feet get fucked up pretty good when i try to.

Doubles always look goofy to me, whether it is you, or John Longstreth, or whoever.

That said, they do sound good.

Are you doods going to be recording live, or are you rawking out to a prerecorded scratch geetar track?

Also, are you practicing with a metronome and all that good shit these days?

I can't do it with shoes. I need my feet to be flexible for the way I play... That said I have fucked up my feet a little bit. My right foot little toes have this habit of grasping the edge of the pedal, as you might observe... and for a while it was a bit cut up there, but my feet have gotten used to it.

I do like the sound of them (when they are tight). It kind of has a flow to it. But single strokes are forever more brutal.

We are going to record to a click, and I will have one of the guitarists with me to play along through headphones.

These days a lot of my practice is either free wanking or playing along to the Guitar Pro tracks, which I suppose sort of counts as playing to a click?

By some crazy coincidence our vocalist had recorded our last rehearsal and added his vocals to the very same songs I chose for this vid (we have about ten songs), sent the mp3s around. I've put the mp3s on Maplifiles for anyone interested. I rather like the recordings... nothing clipping, drums have a lot of room sound, pretty cool.

http://maplifiers.net/dload/

Where it be, homes?

I believe Torg must approve files beforehand.


OH BUT LOOK:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=R8IDIQM0

Ah, I see...

So instead of waiting and waiting for that studio to free up I've settled instead on recording the drums here at my place. I'm gonna borrow mics and stuff from a friend and just have at it.

Now I have eight inputs on my interface. So I figure... 2 overheads, 3 toms, 1 kick, snare top and bottom. I really wanted a room mic but alas. The room I have here at home is nothing great to hear anyway... it's just got lots of shit on the walls to minimize any reverberation.

I might record the drums and then blast them in the garage (with cars removed from said garage) out of some large speakers and record THAT echo. I've done it before with programmed drums and the effect was... interesting... it sounded like my garage.

Yip-yip-yahoo~! As soon as guitars are recorded for this band who thinks my recordings are worth money (ha WELL go ahead and think that you n00bs) I will be all up in this bitch.

Cool!

At the very least you can use it as a dry run for the studio. A good chance to make sure your feet are where they need to be and all that.

I have moastly stopped using room mics these days. In my space, i found that they were just not doing anything terribly useful for me. I often run a room mic of some sort, but lately i have just been winding up muting the thing when i do mixes.

I think my feets are gonna be good enough for it. Once I get the Drumagog in there with zero dynamic range. I mean I'll do it over and over again until it's right... orrr I'll copy and paste a bar of tight double bass over a bar of sloppy double bass! Wait, no, I would never do that...


I am a big fan of the room mic. But the shit part is, you need a good room too.

I think if you remember to add a category I don't have to approve. I saw that Snaxie's didn't need approval, and I set it up so that you guys don't need approval, but if it's not in a category it seems to like my approval.

Ah, forgiveyness, prease... You probably told me that but I overlooked it.

I have not been the most diligent Maplitonian lately.

no problem. If it doesn't show up quickly that is why, unless I fucked up something else, which could happen. I too have been preoccupied, so...

I'd use a room mic before I'd use a bottom snare mic. I'd use an outside kick mic before I'd use a bottom snare mic, too. Yes, for metal. Or I'd double- mic the snare with a condenser and a 57.

If it was a total crap small room, I'd use the room mic for something wonky. I'd hang it high over the kit or back against the far wall and compress the hell out of it for explode-o-verb. Or something like that.

I'd pull the snare mic back off the head a fair bit to actually get the sound of the drum versus the sound of the top head, which invariably sounds like bollocks on its own. IMO, a foot off the snare is not unreasonable, unless- and I doubt you're going for this- you're going for that silly modern metal sound where they try to get rid of the snare in the overheads? Sense, that makes none. That's why they're trying to rely on under-snare mics and all that trickery to get what they could get- the crack of the snare- in the overheads to begin with.

I endorse this.

IMO, the bottom snare mic is crucial for blastbeats.

You need to be able to bring out the definition and attack of the fast hits, but without the cymbals getting all up in the works.

Overheads as snare mics, IME, does not work that well for fast snare playing/quickyquick blastbeats. Unless, you are either going for that oldschool hardcore sound, or are propping the snare up with a trigger on it (or drummagog) for sample mixing.

Part of this is also, that i am pretty picky about how the snare sounds. In fact, i might go so far as to say, it is the most important sound of the kit to capture for me.

Agreed on the snare being the most critical element of the kit. Absolutely. I see the snare in a way as being the drummer's "signature" sound.

I've just never gotten a whole lot of mileage out of micing the bottom of the snare.

That being said, both you guys probably have a better idea of how you want your drums to sound than I do, so I'll leave this one alone.

That is kind of funny how you and i are reversed on the roommic vs. undersnaremic.

I wasn't able to get "the" snare sound i was looking for, until i added that under snare mic.

In contrast, i have generally found that as far as the room mic is concerned, if i find myself wanting one and not having one recorded, i have generally been able to get something workable out of cloning one of the other mics's tracks and messing with it.

My drum kit is kind of funky though. I am anti-dampening and everything on it rings like crazy. I often find that the "extra space" that a room mic adds, tends to mud up what is already there for me.

We're totally reversed on the room vs. under-snare mic. The room is cool, where the bottom snare mic... I'd rather pull the top mic farther away from the head and get the crack that way.

I prefer kits wide open and unmuffled, too, and I don't like to gate stuff. Expanders I've taken to liking for the heavy stuff though. It sounds more natural than a gate to my ears.

...could be that I'm being contradictory unintentionally as per usual though.