I'm sick of feeling guilty.

D

DSCRAPRE

Guest
I just started playing drums last year. I had my kit set up in the basement and spent many an hour wailing away. Thankfully, my parents have, up until now, been very supportive. However I always feel bad when I'm drumming. As a result I am not playing as much as I want (I want to live behind the kit), and when I do, guilt pours over me. I want to create a sound proof drum room. I know that this is not easy, but I feel that it is neccisary. I would like to know a few things.

1. What materials to get.(approx.$$$)
2. What room I should use.


The basement mirrors the main floor (shown) and my kit is currently set in a very bad spot under the living area. Because of remodeling of the basement all of the bedrooms are up for grabs. I was thinking about using the bedroom closest to the foyer. Sorry for the vaugeness of my description and the crappy floor plan. I'm just horribly lost and confused in all of this. Thanks for wasting your time with this and any advice would be greatly appreciated.
 
Well, you can spend thousands on the latest soundproofing materials out there, or try the cheaper methods which are not as good but should be adequate for your needs. I would take the bedroom on the upper left corner if I understand that those are now for the taking. Then get some USB 4 X 8 sheets of wood. Cut them a couple inches wider than your windows. Then get some carpet remnants and fix them to the wood, don't want your neighbors against you. Next put some carpet on your door also. That's about it for the cheapo way out. To go the next step, you have to build a room inside of your room complete with another door and insulate the inside of the new rooms walls. That bumpy gray packing material would be relatively cheap. I also heard that egg cartons work pretty well. The professional soundproofing stuff is ridiculously priced. Then also line the outside wall on the inside as well. Don't forget both doors also. That way you trap most of the sound in the space between wall 1 and 2, and by the time the sound hits wall #2, it is pretty much dissipated by then. Luckily, my house has 2 floors plus a basement, and my kit is in an upstairs bedroom. Its not that loud through the floorboards, but you can definitely hear it. Good luck.
 
Well, you can spend thousands on the latest soundproofing materials out there,

Yeah, I don't feel guilty enough for that. Sounds like a plan, I've seen similar things on people's youtubes with the bumpy foam and carpeting and such. I guess I could probably go that route and see how people complain.
 
1. What materials to get.(approx.$$$)
2. What room I should use.


The basement mirrors the main floor (shown) and my kit is currently set in a very bad spot under the living area. Because of remodeling of the basement all of the bedrooms are up for grabs. I was thinking about using the bedroom closest to the foyer. Sorry for the vaugeness of my description and the crappy floor plan. I'm just horribly lost and confused in all of this. Thanks for wasting your time with this and any advice would be greatly appreciated.

FYI #1, bumpy foam and carpet isn't going to do squat. Nor egg crates. Those things all change the sound inside the room but they do very little to stop sound from transmitting through walls. It is one of the biggest perpetrated myths that they do. One of the things that leads to this myth continuing is that people tend to mistakenly associate sound brightness with sound volume. Carpeted walls make the sound less bright, which the brain interprets as "less loud," so the person who just spent all day hanging carpet on their walls hears dark tones and assumes success. Meanwhile, everyone within a mile can still hear you as if nothing has changed.

FYI #2, I disagree that you need to spend thousands to address this problem. First, let me confirm that you are still looking to stay in the basement but improve that situation by further isolating some section of it? I'll assume that is a yes for now.

So, the good news is that you are already in a basement and not some other part of the house. That cuts down drastically on the amount of materials and potential complexity involved.

As far as where in the basement, go with an area that is, A) farthest from the most commonly used or sensitive part of the house and, B) far from the weakest part of the basement itself: the stairs/doorway. You might have to pick one of those over the other, or you may find that you can split the difference. For my money, I would try to stay away from the stairs/doorway in order to cut back on build complexity.

As far as what materials to use, this will greatly depend on your design which tends to be driven by two factors:

  1. The dimensions of the usable area.
  2. Thickness of your wallet.

We can narrow this down further with a few more bits of info. We will want to know the largest area of contiguous space available for use within your chosen section of the basement. You also want to identify what you consider to the smallest usable room size and what your idea room size would be.

For instance, my kit won't fit inside a room smaller than w11 x d9 x h7 and I would prefer a room that was w12 x d20 x h16. The first size is my absolute minimum while the second is my ideal. Somewhere in the middle is what I'll actually end up with, but it is good know what to push for and when you might be giving up too much. Ceiling height is certainly going to be an area of compromise in your situation.

Also, you can cut down on costs by building something that conforms to standard material dimensions. For instance, drywall comes in 4x8 sheets. So, building a room that is 8x8x8 will be way more cost effective that building one that is 10x6x9.

Lastly, Wolvie56 states that "The professional soundproofing stuff is ridiculously priced." But this depends on exactly what professional stuff you use. For instance, the most commonly used professional materials are plain old drywall and wood studs, which is pretty cheap stuff. Double 5/8 drywall on two sides of an 8x8x8 frame should doable for well under $500.00* and will beat the snot out of egg crates and carpet. Yes, there area other materials that you can employ that do cost a lot of money, but there is a lot that you can do in the way of a professional approach without involving those things (or limiting their use).

*quick forecast of 8x8x8 material costs based on pricing from Lowes:
Drywall: 20 sheets of 5/8 @ $5.98 per sheet = $119.60.
32 count of 2x4x96 studs @ $2.13 per = $68.16.
8 count of 2x6x8 joists @ $2.85 per = $22.80.

Basic materials = $210.56 for a 50-55STC wall.
 
This subject can be handled a couple ways. This is my story...

I have a neighbor who I refer to as b*tchmuffin, he has been called this name for the last 5 years now and I've actually forgotten his real name. He's a 24 year old failure unemployed and living with his parents, and recently his mother told my mother she was upset his girlfriend left him because she "Thought she would be the one to make a man out of him." You can't live a life like that without being spiteful. I don't like to be judgmental, but if someone tries to get between me and my drumming its a grudge I can't get around, and I won't ignore the obvious even if I don't say anything out loud to this guy.


This was made clear to me by having him pound on my garage door 15 minutes into all of my practice sessions. I couldn't figure out what this guys beef was, I would practice after school everyday, and despite how much I would muffle my kick drums they would "rattle his (parents) house" I actually barely played at home for my 2nd and 3rd year as a player because of how shy I would get when I wanted to practice.

He never stopped, but I have the pleasure of having my playing in part support for my new life because of how I handled his complaints.

So when I started playing with serious bands, I started to rent a practice room. This has been the best thing I have ever done for my playing. It gave me 24 hour access to my drums, to be played at any dynamic my practice routines called for. No one could bother me. I started practicing the 4+ hours a day that I'd always wanted to, and got a million times better very quickly.

Why the rant about my neighbor? Because as a drummer, you don't have to feel bad about annoying some people. In fact, you can be an indirect deliverance of karma. Never let anyone elses discomfort restrict your passion to play.
 
Why the rant about my neighbor? Because as a drummer, you don't have to feel bad about annoying some people. In fact, you can be an indirect deliverance of karma. Never let anyone elses discomfort restrict your passion to play.

Ferret, I laughed my butt off at the story about b*tchmuffin!

But based on the part of you post that I quoted I would like to add that living next to each other should be a matter of giving and taking. You're right: your passion to play is important and should be preserved. But not at all costs. Don't forget: your playing might restrict other people's passion (or job) for e.g. reading, studying, or generally just relaxing and basking in silence, which some people (even drummers) really need from time to time.

I handle neighbours and housemates by reminding them that I don't want to be (too much of) a pain in the butt and I will restrict my practise hours for them. If necessary, I also remind them that drumming is my passion, and living next to each other is - like I said - a matter of giving and taking. I will be accomodating to them, but I also expect them to be accomodating to me.
 
So basically guys, one of these jobs would just be an excercise in futility?

 
Man, I have no ideá. I used to have an extra small house when i lived with my mother, and even that made an ruccus.
So I would make freinds with the neighbours an folks, run arrends help out around the house n stuff. That sort ov made me feel like I had the right to play, I don't know if it's any help but thats the only advice I can give:)

Hope you will work somethin out!
 
"So basically guys, one of these jobs would just be an excercise in futility?"

This would change the sound in the room, but would not stop sound from leaving the room.
 
I feel the same guilt some times...

I'm not worried about my neighbors - they make their own noise.

However I'm married w/ 3 kids (who are also musicians) and they need their study time & down time, and the drums just don't work for that.

My solution is 2 part;

1) when people are home I use Soundoff's on the drums & cymbals and/or a practice pad. These things a are great but I hate the feel. Actually the Soundoffs are pretty good for saving your hearing...
2) when the house is empty I play the kit w/out the Soundoffs.

Me being cool w/ the "noise" lets me have jam night every friday at my place... it's a give a take thing when it comes to playing the drums.
 
I have used soundoffs and also just dish towel on the heads.
Your a much better rebound artist, after playing on towels covering your heads for a year....ask me, I know.
 
So basically guys, one of these jobs would just be an excercise in futility?


/agree with dpf. That guy spent some cash and I'll bet the room sounds.. well pretty dead, but also pretty well controlled too. But all that foam won't have any effect on the transmission through those walls.

The good news is that for half what he paid, you could build a simple enclosure that would do a lot to cut down the volume outside the room.
 
What about some of the audimute stuff? I've seen it on youtube, and it looks easy to use and relativly cheap, and it seemed to have worked pretty well. Or at least the Audimute Peacemakers. Has anyone tryed them out? Thanks. Heres the link www.audimutesoundproofing.com
 
Really great advice so far (specifically I have really enjoyed following Brundlefly's story.... definitely worth checking out for anyone looking to build a home studio).

My story is a little different in that I wanted to treat the room from an acoustics standpoint and not a soundproofing one. I used about $300 worth of Auralex studio foam (1ft x 1ftx 2" tiles/panels) on the bottom portion of the room and 3 bass traps up in the corners.... I basically treated 3 of the 4 walls in the room as the closet takes up 1 wall. I used some left over panels to make diamond shape patterns on the front and back walls..... all was purchased at my local GC for a pretty good package deal and no tax (since I bought it at the same time as the Apogee Duet and Monitors). I first mounted cardboard (about $10 worth of large boxes from Home Depot) to the wall with screws and then mounted the foam to the cardboard with spray adhesive - so not to damage my walls for future removal. I had researched the various ways to go about mounting the foam and came up with this one as the others that I found did not suit my taste. I must say, I first ordered a 12 pack of Foam by Mail .com 2" wedge to sample their foam and it just wasn't enough for me - it had a terrible odor (chemical) that wouldn't really go away and it was not nearly as dense and good looking as the Auralex. However, I probably would have been happy with it if I didn't take it to GC to test/compare it against the Auralex. Looks aside, the performance was clearly superior in the Auralex. With that said, the Foam by Mail is about half the price and would still serve some benefit and even look better than nothing.

The foam is in NO WAY used to soundproof the room, rather, it drastically improves the acoustics within the room for recording or listening purposes. While it does help with sound absorption (therefore, naturally reducing noise spillage a bit), it is mainly for helping with reflections and eliminating echoing while playing acoustic drums. Before using the foam I could talk or clap and hear quite a bit of echo and it just sounded "hollow". Now, having used the foam it sounds completely quiet and the drums sound PHENOMENAL..... clean, crisp, clear, deep, thumpy and dream-like. Think of it as using moongel, rings, or tape on your room acoustics rather than your drums. So now, I can have my drums wide open without muffling rings or bass drum pillows and I don't have any unwanted ringing or resonating sounds (again, only within the studio itself). It really makes a HUGE improvement.... I'd imagine you could make a cheap drumset sound pretty good in a treated room like this - and at the same time you can make a high end expensive kit sound pretty crappy in a hollow garage. I do not attempt to soundproof the room... only to make the acoustics better sounding within the room.

As you can probably tell, this is a bedroom within my home that I converted to a studio. Hope this helps!
 

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Last pics cont...

BigSteve - I saw your post about building a studio in your garage - I will be following your updates as well... let me know if you need any help as I live nearby in Roseville.
 

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Thanks Sopranos,

Nice to kinda meet somebody local. Nice looking room you have there! I'll have to check out some of the Auralex products. I will want to treat how the room sounds inside once I stop some of the sound from going outside. Did I see some bass traps in your photo? How did those work out sound wise?

Love the I Mac...I have one just like it!
 
What about some of the audimute stuff? I've seen it on youtube, and it looks easy to use and relativly cheap, and it seemed to have worked pretty well. Or at least the Audimute Peacemakers. Has anyone tryed them out? Thanks. Heres the link www.audimutesoundproofing.com

The only thing that they sell on that site that appears to be for sound proofing is their Peacemaker product. It's not a bad product in terms of its stated performance relative to its price, but it also isn't exactly all that awesome either. MLV, Homasote and even plain old 1/4" drywall each handily out perform it (and drywall is cheaper than Peacemaker).

It's best use seems to be as a decent sub for MLV when you can't afford MLV, and as a superior replacement to standard underlayment for flooring. but given that to use it correctly means ripping your drywall off your walls, installing this stuff and replace the old drywall with new, you are far better off simply doubling up on the newly installed drywall.

Aside from that, most everything else they sell falls in the sound control category. While I wouldn't go so far as to call them blatantly misleading, they are definitely doing things that can lead to cases of consumer confusion. And that is enough for me to stop short of recommending them. There are plenty of other places that sell sound proofing and sound control products that do a much better job of distinguishing between the two.
 
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