To mic or not to mic...

picasso_13 · Newbie Alert Joined: 19 Jan 2004 Posts: 4

I am going to be playing set at a camp this summer. We'll have two guitars and a keyboard player besides the drums. The venue isn't huge, but I'm trying to decide whether to mic the drums because of their possible placement. Since it's a camp setting the band is not set center stage. In fact, at this location the two guitars and keyboard will definitely be on stage but off to the side. I may be on stage as well, but there is a good chance I'll be just off the stage on the main floor. While the folks right in front of me will get lots of drums, those on the other side will get a weaker sound. I was thinking of miking the drums in order to get a balanced sound with the other instruments.

Any suggestions or thoughts would be great! Thanks. Very Happy

bytor · Admin Joined: 12 Aug 2003 Posts: 5306 Location: Kansas

I am assuming you will be playing indoors, correct? I think a lot of this has to do with the building itself. Even in big rooms (up to around 150 feet long), drums can often go unmiked easily depending on the building shape and the materials in it (and the volume of the guitars and keyboard, heh).

If the room is long and rectangular (say, 100' X 40') with hardwood or tile flooring, with the band on one end, then the sound should resound well down through the room, probably to the point of bouncing off the back walls. In rooms of this type, snare drums, in particular, rarely need a mic. In fact, they usually echo off the walls and sound huge. Wood and tile floors really increase the natural volume of your drums, as well. The only thing that might need a mic in this type of room would be the bass drum, and even then this isn't necessarily so.

In addition to the actual room, this question also depends on how you have your drums tuned. Drums with open, higher-pitched tunings probably wouldn't need any amplification, but highly muffled toms and thuddy bass drums very well might.

I recommend standing in the back of the room yourself while someone else plays each drum of your kit just to give you an idea of what drums are really coming through in that particular room. It will be much easier to determine the neccessity of mics when you yourself hear your drums from the audience's perpective. Hope this helps.

picasso_13 · Newbie Alert Joined: 19 Jan 2004 Posts: 4

Unfortunately I won't be able to test the room till we arrive. I'm in FL and it's in NC. The room is long (it seats about 250-300). It is an old building; wooden chairs, carpet down the isles. My drums have a low sound, but muffling is minimal. I have egg crate lining the bottom of my bass and Zero rings on the toms and snare. It's a Ludwig Rocker set that was bought in the late 80's new. I recently changed out the heads to Pinstripes.

That would be definitely be cheaper if I didn't need to mic the drums.

bytor · Admin Joined: 12 Aug 2003 Posts: 5306 Location: Kansas

Hmm, I don't know. It could go either way. The bass drum is what would concern me the most. Getting only the stuff you need to mic your kick wouldn't be too terribly expensive. You might want to go for that. I think I probably would. As for the other drums, they should be okay, but it wouldn't hurt to open up their tunings a little. You might want to take off the zero rings and let those Ludwigs sing! Assuming the other band members aren't going to crank their amps, I think you'll be okay, especially if you play kinda' heavily. Having your kick miked can often create the illusion that the rest of the drums are miked, too. It really helps to have that low end punch of a miked bass drum.

picasso_13 · Newbie Alert Joined: 19 Jan 2004 Posts: 4

Thanks for the help. I will look into getting a mike for the bass drum. I put the zero rings on my toms because they have too much ring without them. Are they any mikes I should look at, or avoid?

bytor · Admin Joined: 12 Aug 2003 Posts: 5306 Location: Kansas

zaragemca · Posted: Fri Feb 06, 2004 11:24 am Post subject:

better set up that finding youself trying to kill the drums,in the heat of the gigs,everybody could crank it up,and you are stuck with killing youself banging.
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holycow · Posted: Thu Mar 25, 2004 2:25 pm Post subject:

flystudios · Posted: Thu Jul 08, 2004 10:06 pm Post subject: More suggestions

Everyone is right in sugesting the Kick.
Now i'm not a drummer but i am an audio engineer so i do know that the most important things to be micked up are the kick and snare.
If the music is cranking you want that snare to give a good sense of time.
Even if as the last reply said, as a safety thing, having the mics just a little bit through the PA.
I know it can be expensive but maybe there is a place that you can rent the mics?
I don't know of any places in the States because i live in Australia, but that is what most musos do here if they don't already have their own sound guy who has all the mics...
Just a suggestion to keep in mind.
But definitly the Beta 52 and the SM57 or Beta 57 are the most common applications on the Kick and Snare.
Hope this helps.
Chris Cool

Brownson · Posted: Thu Jul 29, 2004 8:10 pm Post subject:

its odd that everyone is suggestion SM57's and Betas, around here (Ontario Canada) the AKG D112 kick mic is club standard for live sound. Most clubs use SM 57s on most of the other drums, but ALWAYS ALWAYS a D112 on the kick.
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chetatkinsdiet · Ferret Joined: 26 Jul 2004 Posts: 107

Whatever mic is available will be fine for the kick....58, 57 or obviously one of the mics specifically designed for kick drums would be great. Doesn't AT or AKG have that ?25 mic that's about $50? That might be a cheap alternative here to get by. I don't think that Picasso's ready to plop down $200+ on a kick mic.

I'm more concerned with his zero ring usage on the toms. Why do you think the toms ring too much? This is what drummers strive for. That "ring" is what the audience heres as the tone of your drums. If you kill that off, you've only got the sound of the stick hitting the head and then nothing. I did similar stuff when I was just starting out, but if you take anything from this thread, try this.....get those pinstripes off the toms. Put back on something like Evans G1 or G2 on top and G1 on bottom. If you're a Remo man, use Ambassadors or Emperors on top and Ambassadors on bottom. Learn to tune the drums properly. There are a few great VHS and DVD's out there that really show how to do it properly. This is not a knock on you. Most drummers struggle with this always. Even most of your favorite drummers will bring in a tuning professional to help them in the studio, tune their kits. Once you do this, those toms will sound great and really start to cut through better in live settings.
If you wanted to take this a step further, you could probably really help your bass drum sound out by putting something like a Powerstroke 3 head on the batter side of the kick. Again, Evans makes a similar head too, but what this has is a sort of zero ring built into the backside of the head. So, if you think about it...what happens is you hit the head with the beater and the zero ring flys off the back of the head...this allows the drum to sing for just a bit. Then, when the zero ring comes back in contact with the head, it mutes it back down. Again, with the proper tuning, your bass drum will be powerful and sound great.
I'd think that spending money on getting the kit sounding it's best would be more beneficial than you spending money on a dedicated kick mic that you might or might not need to use again at this time. I'm sure the venue where you're playing will have some sort of mic you can use in your kick if you find you need it.
Good luck at camp....
later,
m

Premier · Posted: Sat Aug 07, 2004 6:02 pm Post subject:

I guess things are different today from when I was playing out. I always had my kit mic'ed. No matter what the room size was. The sound tech was responsible for getting a good mix. I always had a mic on each drum, the hi-hat, ride, and two overhead mic's. I feel the entire kit should be mic'ed so every thing you play can be heard.