Hi Gavin,
I have been trying to record the drums since the last time I asked about the mics thing.
There are 2 clips I recorded yesterday,it's glad if you could have a listen and give some comments on the sound.because Im not a drummer,I don't know if it sounds good to a real drummer's ears.
There were 4 mics to be used.kick,snare top,floor tom and one overhead.I tried to mix it to the best sounding as I can get.
by the way,I ordered a new pair of OH mics,they are coming soon.so I can try stereo OH this week later!
If I may be so free to post some remarks about this:
Have you used artificial reverb (in other words, not a natural reverb that comes from the room, like Gavin creates in his drumroom)? I hear a very long reverb in the back (which makes it a bit strange).
I think that the balance of the stereo imaging is more on the left side. Is the ride on the left side or on the right side? If it is on the right, then I would place it on the right during mixdown.
I would suggest:
Toms: panned over the stereo field. Highest pitch left, lowest pitch right. Equally panned.
Snare: somewhere in the middle, maybe slightly off center to the right.
Hihat: somewhere more to the left
Ride: depending on actual placement. In case of a normal setup, on the right
Crashes: depending on actual placement.
Kick: in the center
The above is of course a pretty standard placement, from a right handed drummers perspective. Its not a guideline, feel free to experiment but I think there is much more going on in the left side of the stereo image then on the right side which makes it feel a bit out of balance.
The drumsounds itself (the individual sounds) sound pretty good!
Of course, the sound of recorded drums all depends on context. Listen close to gavin's drums. They never sound the same on any track. It just depends on what other stuff is playing at that time (drums can be eq'ed more to fit better in the mix), the kind of character that is needed for the song (let's sleep forever has a lot of ambient room while fear of a blank planet sounds pretty dry and straightforward) and the kind of drums used (dark snares, light snares, metallic snares etc.)