Week 8 - AA1 - Drum Set Miking

Miking a drum set is an exciting one to do. You get to use a lot of mics. The first setting we used basically used quite a lot of mics.

2 U87s as overhead stereo mics, SM57 for top and bottom snare, NT5 for hi-hat, beta52s inside and outside the kick drum, MD421 for hi and mid tom and beta56 on low tom. On top of that, we used the AKG as the room mic.

The overall sound of it it pretty rich. The bass sounds powerful and the close miking is effective. One notable thing is the room mic. Even the room mic is played by itself produces quite a powerful sound. And when the room mic is not added, the recording sounds really dry. A little touch of room mic made quite a big difference.

Here's the file.

The second setting only uses three mics. One U87 on omni above the drum set, one SM57 slightly away from the snare, one beta 52 slightly away from the kick drum and an AKG behind a gobo as a room mic.

The setting is pretty amazing for what 4 mics can do. If not much time is available, I reckon this setting is pretty great. However, the mix does sound slightly mixed up. The concentration on each parts of the drums set is not that great and it's less bright than the first setting. It still does sound great though.

Here's the second file.