I'mma be tracking the first Garda single in the immediate future. Our drummer plays a four-piece Pearl custom shop kit, 24" kick, 8" deep snare, bigass toms. Two crashes, splash, china, bigass ride, hats, all nice Zildjians.

If all goes according to plan, I want to track the drums in an empty club downstairs from our studio. It was a bank vault once upon a time. It's big and empty and high ceilings and reverberant. There's a decent size stage.

Now, I'm thinking D112 in the kick, KSM27 on the snare but a fair bit back as per my preference, my NT5s for overheads, 57s... no, Beta 58As! Bigger and better mids and lows! on the toms.

I have ten channels straight into my 'puter. I have ribbon mics and PZMs available if I want them. And random middling condensers. What should I use for me trax? Suggest out-there things. This is Industrialized Snaxorawk. The kit is big and boomy and resonant and lovely and will be combined with things like 909 hits and distorted breakbeats. Give me stupid ideas, drum-recording folk. (Chris and Geoff, I'm looking at you. )

For one, i, less than you, have super limited materials available to me, so i am quite used to having to just get something down however it can be done, and "fixing" it later by hook or crook.

Anyhow.

Two overheads, two snare, two kick, two toms, one (or two) room. If one room, then consider a third snare.

IMO, mic the fuck out of the snare. Close-ish top, close-ish bottom, and then either a far top, or just don't cut too much low end out of the overheads. Or try Dan's technique of the crotch mic, which is one i haven't experimented with yet, as it doesn't really work with the way my drums are laid out.

I have just been closemic-ing my toms. I was experimenting with kind of "far close" placement like six+ inches off, but now i am back to "almost-touching-the-head" close mics. They are easier to gate, and i find them easier to work with for altering my okay tom mics(CAD TSM411, kind of SM57-ish maybe) to make the tomnoise i want from them.

I personally don't have access to great overheads, so i really have been using a bit less of them in the mix. If i could, i would probably go pair of LDCs as Glyn Johns-y style, as i liked the natural sounding separation that gives. As it is, i am using a standard overhead pair of spaced Shure dynamics, just for a little stereo flavor, more than anything else. Listening to those mics on their own is not terribly pretty though.

For the kick, is there a hole? Or two closed heads? If a hole, you can do one mic. If two heads, then you might want to mic both of them, boom on the front, attack on the beater side. Almost anything works for the beater side. A cardioid with its tail to the hihat/snare (or even a bit of jiggered something or other to physically separate the mic from them) will do the trick.

For the room, if you have two PZMs, you could try them back to back as a stereo setup. Or, depending on the room, you could try a spaced pair, XY, or ORTF sort of jiggery. As you are not doing quick metal shit, if you are tracking in a nice space, you can probably lean on the room mics pretty heavily for a nice effect. One thing that i have liked in the past, is cramming a mic way up in a far corner of the room, like pointed straight into the corner. It can give a very interestingly balanced room sound, almost regardless of the mic used. I have used SM57s and 58s for it, as well as a lot of really shitcheap dynamics.

OH. And consider bringing more than one snare. Unless the space is one that you are quite familiar with, it is very possible that a snare your drummer loves, might not record the way he wishes in the space. Also, depending on the drummer, you cannot always be sure, even after playback that the drummer is hearing the recording accurately in the moment. It is easy, as a drummer, to hear the characteristics that i like in my snare, even when, to a less biased listener, they are nearly being drowned out by other less desirable traits. This has been something i have wrassled with every single time i have been in a "proper" studio recording situation, both in doing too little, and too much, to make the snare work as i wished in recorded form. It is easy to think "this is a snare i like" and just assume that it is winding up "on tape" the way you think it is. But in an unfamiliar space, this is absolutely not guaranteed. Just something to be aware of going in.

Lastly, if you have the time, and if your drummer is tight enough: consider doubling the drum tracks. Like, one normal, and then one with the drums totally damped the fuck out, like 70s disco style, tea towels on the heads and shit. If you can work it, this technique works best if you can also set up dividers all around the drums to heavily stifle reflections and focus the sound into the mics within, in an interesting way. As you are industrial, it will give you lots to play with. A totally reverberant ringy thing, and a totally dry dense thing. You could go crazy with editing afterward if you were so inclined.

If the room is good definitely mic that shit in stereo.

I've tried Dan's Mic The Drummer's Junk technique, and it actually worked pretty well. It was on a large double kick metal kit doing some quick one-off demos. I used a LDC for that purpose and compressed it to hell and gone. Like a charm. It may or may not be practical with the smaller kit configuration, though; it was easy to set up when I could just stick the thing between two kick drums.

I like the Glyn Johns OH setup quite a bit myself, and I've gotten good results with it in the past, even using a sorta fudged version with SDCs versus LDCs. I can get my hands on a pair of ribbons to try this with, though they may be too dark?

The kick's a big 24", hole in the front head, no muffling at all. I like outside kick mics in general... Though the thought struck me after listening to your clips, Chris, of multi-micing the thing with an Audix D6 for click-boom and a 57 for midrange attack. Pastabilities.

Even tracking in the Snaxodrome proper, the room is pretty decent sounding. I've used room mics on drums and guitars there for various things both to good effect. If I can track in The Vault, it's Epic Reverb. Sounds pretty nice. And yes, pair of PZMs, which are always fun as room mics. I've stuck them on the floor, the ceiling, the wall, taped to mic stands, pretty much wherever, and they always seem to work. I've had limited success with mid/side when I've tried it; it worked better in theory than in practice.

Having recorded, halfassedly, that snare in a very familiar space, it goes "to tape" pretty well there. It's deep and almost drum machine-y sounding, though he's since re-skinned it and tuned it a bit higher... which I like more; I like having more ring. A spare snare is always a good idea, and luckily our drummer comes prepared and has another on hand at all times. The thought strikes me as I'm typing this as per my above idea re: the kick to throw a 57 on the snare for the closer mic and mercilessly beat on it with a compressor and use the big condenser for the farther top mic (as I'm wont to do anyway, put the thing a foot back) to get something that more resembles a snare drum versus an ear up against a drum head.

I like the doubling the drums idea. That could actually work. The two takes could be cobbled together in some very interesting ways. There's some quick hi-hat and ride work that could prove tricky, but given the context, I don't think it matters.

If I'm really nuts, I could actually go "to tape" with the thing and use the Yamaha 01V for the extra mic pres. I'm not sure if I want to deal with that, but it's something to think about. I hate moving that fucking tape machine though.

Mid/side is interesting, but i have never been able to try it because i don't have access to any mics with a proper figure eight pattern to them.

What didn't you like about it?

I liked how it sounded solo-ed, but it seemed to get lost in the mix unless the room mics were pushed to overwhelming levels. Admittedly, that might have as much to do with mic placement or the density of the mix as anything else.

I used a cheapy Nady ribbon for the figure-8 bit, for whatever it's worth.

Did you play with cloning and polarity reversing the Side mic and messing with the relative levels/stereo spread of the pile?

Oh, and as to one of the other things you mentioned, I believe that Dan had mentioned a pair of ribbons that he was liking for overheads.

I just went looking for it in my emails but couldn't find it though, so maybe i am mis-remembering.

As per instructions. *nods* Like I said, it may have just been a context thing, or where the mics were in the room relative to the kit. It's probably an idea worth revisiting at some point.

I remember Dan saying he found the Cascade Fatheads too dark for OHs, but IIRC he's picked up some other ribbons since then. I know he has a pair of modded MXL LDCs that he was quite fond of for OHs last I remember.

Yeah, he definitely was into those V67Gs for overheads. I do like the MXL 2001 i have already - it gives a good sound for next to no money - so i will probably follow his advice to pick up a pair of the V67s at some point.

I forget what the mod he did was, but it was stupid-simple. I think it was just removing the internal windscreen, which really opened up the sound of the mic. The Nady RSM-4 I use on occasion had that done to it as well, and it does sound quite good for not too many rubles. Definitely on the dark side sound-wise, but in a good way. Thick and fat.

Yeah, from what he said, that was all it was, just pulling the finer mesh interior windscreen out.

I don't mean to intrude, but I was definitely wondering about the same thing in a context of metalz.
One of my biggest vices with modern metal production is complete lack of clarity with cymbals.
I have no idea if this is a result of close-micing or what.
However, on the shitty demo of my band's we got a really awesome, punchy cymbal sound.
Mind you, this version of the recording is compressed to all hell because of youtube and Geoff's additional compression on top of the already compressed as balls recording.



Anyways, this was just a regular, what I remember being a condenser?, budget mic behind Ian's (our drummer) back.
The hi-hats are loud as hell (which I actually really dig) which might turn you off but I think it's a good drum sound.
It's not hurting any that Ian's kit rapes shit (listen to that goddamn ride cymbal ) but I think this sounds WAY better than any shit I hear on modern metal recordings when you take into account the fact that it's one mic and how poorly mastered the original recording was to begin with.

So, is that shitty, white noise cymbal characteristic due to exclusive close micing or is it a formality of the mastering?

I was sort of thinking 1 snare mic, 2 (fairly distant) overheads, 1 snare, 2 bass drum, and a couple tom mics right on the heads.
AFAIK, we will only have access to an interface with 8 mic inputs.
If it was 12, I would be doing room micing, most likely one mic in front of the kit, one mic in the back, for the sake of a little bit of room ambience and space for the cymbals to breathe rather than just hitting the mic real close up.

I've just realized that this was one long, pointless rant.
Oh well, I've been gone for a week or so and had to get the music nerd out of me.

More than likely a heard lack of cymbal clarity, might have something to do with trying to get things to fit in a dense mix.

Modern metal beats the hell out of cymbals with EQs and stuff. All of the low end gets sliced out so that the kicks can get edited to shit without showing up on the overheads. Then the high end gets notched all over so that it doesn't get in the way of the guitar pick attack or snare. Much of modern metal production is about removing the cymbals from whatever part of the equation. As a result, what you generally get to hear, is more what is left, than what was recorded.

Lastly, in modern metal, usually the kicks are, by far, the loudest part of the mix. In the CTS demo, the kicks are actually pretty quiet. Clicky as fuck, but lower in the mix than kicks often are. If they were louder they would more than likely be all up in the cymbals business though.

It is always going to be difficult to compare a more lo-fi recording anyhow. A lot of the punch that i am hearing in the cymbals though, is pumping compression. Which is a thing that i love, but also a thing which doesn't generally work so well on cleaner recordings.

...now what to use the ribbon for, now that I have one?

Vox, geetars...

For the drums, you need to make sure yo aren't putting the ribbon anywhere where it will be getting moar dB than it is designed to handle. Depending on the ribbon, they can be easily broken with too much sound pressure.

I actually don't know what i would put a ribbon on on a drumkit. I generally aim to get as much brightness as possible from everything. Can always remove it with EQ, much more difficult to add high end to a microphone that doesn't provide it.

I would probably do something noveltynoisey with it. Maybe mount it inside an extra floortom and use it as some kind of fucked up wubbly room mic. Just be sure to tune the heads to a pitch that equates somewhat to the notes that will be hit on the bass frequencies that would cause them to sympathetically vibrate...

Otherwise, i don't know what i would do with one. If i only had eight channels for drums, i probably wouldn't wind up using it at all actually.

I love it on guitars- that with a big condenser much farther back in the room is one of my favorite mic combinations I've recorded. It's pretty spiffy on a bass cab as well- very smooth, full low end. Vocals... I find it a bit dark for my voice. I like the girth it provides though.

The RSM-4 can take a beating dB-wise; I'd be more concerned with the thing being hit with a stick. If I used it on drums, it would probably wind up in the room somewhere, yeah. I've used one as the figure-8 mic when I've tampered with M/S.

I have ten channels for drums straight into the 'puter. The thought strikes me I could always chain my bassist's MOTU in if I wanted/needed more.

For general knowledge, you should totally see how many tracks you can do before you get glitching/miswritten data with your setup.

If you have extra tracks, i would maybe do something weird with the ribbon. Accentuate and capture a funky room resonance, that sort of thing.

I know I can get 10 in at 24/88.2 without an issue. I've done it before on drums. It's chaining another interface in there that's a potential embuggerance.

Hmmm..
I suppose that does indeed complicate things..
I DON'T LIKE THAT MUCH.

Is there a way of getting around this?
Such as;
Saying fuck kick quantization?
Designating certain frequencies for the cymbals and kick and guitars and all that shit?
A2M/GAPE?

The clicky-as-fuckness is Ian's trigger monitors being heard in the single drum mic.

There would be no bass drum otherwise.