How to get 70's funk drum sound?

Cheap wooden snare, cranked up, lots of muffling.
 
Oh, right, the old "drop lug" tuning! And use a lot of muffling-- tissue and duct tape; and by a lot, I mean "some." Don't overdo it, especially if you're playing unmiked. Try Remo CS Black Dots on your toms, and maybe take the bottom heads off-- or find yourself a sweet concert tom set. A. Zildjian New Beats, Medium ride, Medium-Thin crashes. For recording, I would just tell my engineer I want to sound like John Guerin circa 1973 and let him do his thing.
 
1).Just cut right to the chase....3M duct tape.Apply liberally,even to the reso heads,and apply across the snare wires.Or..(recomended) remove reso head completely.This will also save money on duct tape.

Keep applying tape,till the requisite,non resonant "cardboard box" sound is achieved.

2).Go out and buy,a case of Aquanet hair spray.This is required in both funk (think Parlament Funkadelic),and Glam Rock (think David Bowie) bands.Apply liberally and,.....rock on..... dude!

3).Repeat the above as necessary,and don't forget the "intense drumming facial expressions",for maximum effect.Buying a personal smoke machine,will also enhance the effect of completely lifeless drum sound,that the audience could care less about.:)

4).Pick up pay check,and party like it's 1999.

Steve B
 
Oh, right, the old "drop lug" tuning! And use a lot of muffling-- tissue and duct tape; and by a lot, I mean "some." Don't overdo it, especially if you're playing unmiked. Try Remo CS Black Dots on your toms, and maybe take the bottom heads off-- or find yourself a sweet concert tom set. A. Zildjian New Beats, Medium ride, Medium-Thin crashes. For recording, I would just tell my engineer I want to sound like John Guerin circa 1973 and let him do his thing.

John Guerin.Great drummer,with Tom Scott and the L.A. Express.That's also John on the original Hawiai 50 theme,which I think he co-wrote.:) He and Hal Blaine were kings of the concert toms.

Steve B
 
Agree with most all of these. While you crank the wooden snare's batter head up, go ahead tape your wallet down onto the head. Remove the bass drum's reso head and stuff an old moving cloth in there, and you ought to be good to go.
 
....lots of muffling.

I believe this to be true. I used to cut strips of 2" wide white terrycloth towel and run it under the batter heads at a 45 degree angle about 20% across the drum. It works great and gives that dry sound.
 
1) Go out and buy,a case of Aquanet hair spray.This is required in both funk (think Parlament Funkadelic),and Glam Rock (think David Bowie) bands.Apply liberally and,.....rock on..... dude!

3).Repeat the above as necessary,and don't forget the "intense drumming facial expressions",for maximum effect.Buying a personal smoke machine,will also enhance the effect of completely lifeless drum sound,that the audience could care less about.:)

Apply spray to ... drums or hair? :)
 
Back in the seventies a big sub was a Cerwin Vega W horn cab. And they didn't really go that low. So kick drums were dead and tuned up quite a bit from current practice. My favorite was stretching a t-shirt across the entire head. At least my old shirts would go across my 20" bass drum of the day. Fairly dead snare too.

All this renders the kit fairly useless for anything else, but if you're in a '70s funk tribute band it would be authentic. Mahogany kit with rounded edges, center spot heads with extra dampiing and no resos.

Most of the songs linked don't have many fills so a wallet or a few moongels on a looser tuned snare and blanket in the kick would do for a quick cover. Maybe a moongel or two on the toms in case to do put some fill in there.
 
Apply spray to ... drums or hair? :)

Follow manufacturers directions carefully.Wear protective eyewear,and keep away from open flames or sparks.Do not inhale fumes.

Use remaining excess to power potato gun,built from PVC pipe.Buy 10 pound bag of potato,and enjoy.:):)

That was WAY OT.:)

Steve B
 
For toms Evans make the Hydraulic heads specifically for that purpose; they are ridiculously easy to tune and you won't need to bother with tape etc. I keep a few around in black for the occasional jam and they Thunk the Funk very well..
 
John Guerin.Great drummer,with Tom Scott and the L.A. Express.That's also John on the original Hawiai 50 theme,which I think he co-wrote.:) He and Hal Blaine were kings of the concert toms.

Steve B

Tom Scott said in an interview that 'Steve Gadd was the best drummer he ever played with no offense to John Guerin' but.. the best album Tom Scott ever put out was 'Tom Cat' with John Guerin on drums.. he made that record sing!
 
In terms of tuning, I always liked that dry, crisp sound that Earth, Wind and Fire got.. or T.O.P. or the Doobies or Harvey Mason on Chameleon. To get it dry without choking the sound is not easy.. and probably had quality snares to get it. I did read that the Doobies used the drop-lug tuning on the snare to get that sound.
 
In terms of tuning, I always liked that dry, crisp sound that Earth, Wind and Fire got.. or T.O.P. or the Doobies or Harvey Mason on Chameleon. To get it dry without choking the sound is not easy.. and probably had quality snares to get it. I did read that the Doobies used the drop-lug tuning on the snare to get that sound.

I wouldn't put early Garibaldi sound in with early Harvey Mason recordings. They killed the drums on those old CTI and other things Harvey did. TOP was tight and crisp but not dead. EWF wasn't as dead as Ohio Players and others of the era. In fact outside of some folks like Carl Palmer playing a completely open snare on ELP records, I would think of TOP and EWF as having the most natural drums sounds of the era (other than jazz records of course).

I do have an old 70s Sheffield Dave Grusin direct disk with Harvey's drums really well recorded. Still might have been hydraulic heads but there is tone there.
 
I was with in the same search of getting that phat old sound. All the recomendations above are, basically, all the stuff that you will hear. As an additional, I´ve found a lot of great recording tips as well as actually see while they were recording it in the "Standing in the Shadows of Motown" doccumentary, which is available for watch online in Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO9_CjUgThI
 
I agree with the muffling suggestions but room sound is key too. If you play/record in a relatively dead room it will help you get that muffled, articulated sound.
 
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