I’ve been fortunate to record several records with Joel. What you may not know is that he is an absolutely world class player. His drum sounds are always stellar.
In most studio scenarios, the inside mic is being used to pick up the attack and a mic is being used outside to capture the low end. Low end waves need time, distance and air to develop. Sure, you can use the proximity effect by having the mic close to the sound source, but then it's a touch too boomy and a pain to deal with.
In my opinion, not tuned high enough for a 24” drum. More tension on the batter head, slightly higher on the reso, will give you MUCH more tone, body and punch. It will work in recording situations as is with some tweaking but live, it would sound thin with all attack and no low end or thump.
mic placed inside past the hole or a couple of inches from the resonant head usually gives the best sound. doesnt matter how its dampened. pillow, blanket, foam etc.
In regards to the comment about dead bass strings. I play bass guitar (25 years) and drums (3 years). While I appreciate that I know jack squat about tuning a bass drum; which is why I'm watching in the first place; to get a good kick sound for the recordings I'm engineering,...I think that fresh strings on a bass sound amazing compared to dull strings. Obviously it depends on what you are after and the style of music you play. If I were after the James Jamerson Motown thud,...the deader the string the better; maybe even flatwounds. But for me nothing compares to the piano like tone you get from a fresh set of roundwounds on a bass guitar. That said; thank you for sharing your knowledge. I've always been hesitant to muffle my bass drum (using an import Gretsch CC rock set) but I think I will give it a go this time around. I've never been too stoked on the drum sound that I've that I've gotten on the recordings I've made. They have always seem lifeless and lacking in depth. I can't wait to try the techniques you've laid out in this vid.
Would coating the inside of your drums with Linseed oil cause the same results as this bass drum, you said the coating it has gives it a tighter sound of i heard it correctly.
The lacquer used to seal the wood on the inside of the drum creates a hard surface that doesn't absorb high frequencies as well as a softer texture, so the resulting tone will have more HF resonance. Anything you can do to provide a soft texture will give the high frequencies a place to go and reduce the HF resonance in the overall tone. I do believe using linseed oil instead of lacquer (if you are building a new drum) should produce softer HF content compared to lacquer. If the drum is already lacquered inside you could use sandpaper to rough up or remove the lacquer which will lower the HF content of the sound. I prefer a small piece of foam instead, because I can remove it and keep the HF content if I want to for a certain sound. Thanks for the question!
Great video. I just watched the snare tuning video and liked it as well. Keep up the good work. May I suggest that you do a video on tuning for different eras? like a 60's and 70's tuning tutorial. I can't quite get it right. I'd like to have more versatility in my tuning. Thanks, and again, great job!
Thanks for this..great technique ...simple and to the point .. Once the rest of the instruments come in, this would mix great.. Bummer that I need to search for a 24 now ...but that's a whole 'nother story.. haha
What kind of music? For combo/jazz little muffling, higher pitch (more resonance, less thump). For pop/rock/funk might want lower tuning with more muffling. Keeping top two lugs on the batter side (highest two adjacent lugs at the top of the drum) tuned lower creates more thump with less sustain. Higher tuned front head on an 18" is hit or miss (depending on if it is muffled) for pop music. I often like to leave the front head quite low (again, pop music) with very little muffling touching it (most of the muffling tends to be toward the batter side), which allows some resonance that can be exploited with an out front kick mic and some dynamics processing. I hope that is helpful.
I love instructional videos but this does not provide instruction on sound. The drum sounds terrible. I agree with the comment about a "click" sound. You are not mic'd for a bass sound but more for the impact of the pedal to the head. Without the head tightened more, no resonance is created thus a recorded slap sound. The mic should really be placed off the resonance head, either secondary head ring or muffler to help control overtone. 24" ludwig should have a deep bold warm sound...... this result seems more like a compressed dead drum not worth recording.
Thank you for covering this Bass drum tuning. It's very informative. Is there any way you could do a 4 Tom DW tuning clinic video? I can't find much info on how to tune them to a real fat low sound that could be used in a ballad. Years ago I heard Don Henley on some slow material & more recently Ginger Baker on the Royal Albert Crème Reunion that at times came through with all the low end tuning that sounded fabulous. Since they recorded over a few days the drum sound was slightly different from day to day but for the most part the Toms came through quite nicely. Another video I saw recently was Mick Fleetwood getting his new DW Cherry kit & I was blown away with how full & low the Toms tone was. I've never been able to come close to that & thought I might be overlooking something. I'm sure the DW choice of wood played an important part in the achieved sound but in the past I have heard the occasional recording where the Toms sounded similar to the DW Cherry Toms.Sure would be nice to hear some Toms that produce the Thud instead of the click that the stick produces. It seems that most of the current drums being played are used in the Metal genre but very little in the slow Ballad content.Thank you so much, & keep up the good work. Your videos are extremely helpful & you seem to come through with a very sensible approach to this important topic.
The drum in this video is a 14x24. I also have a 14x26, which, though only 2" bigger in diameter, has over 78 square inches greater surface area, and you can tell by playing it that a 26" kick requires a lot more heft to lay into (though it's fun! :) It is difficult, of course, to say what the 'best sound' is for a 26" drum as some people love light or no muffling, others heavy damping. Some prefer two heads with resonance, others a padded single head for short punch. I typically take a similar approach to miking a 26" drum that I do the 24" in this video (or smaller), preffering to let the drum breath with greater sustain (less muffling), but be aware that in all likelihood a 26" drum will have greater resonance (sustain) than a smaller drum, unless the muffling is significant, so a big drum can get out of hand if control is what you want. The bigness of this character is cool, IMO, and one of the reasons I enjoy my 26" drum. The same rules apply, however -- if the inside is a very hard surface put some soft cloth/towels in there to help absorb the HF content, and if you want a deader, less sustaining sound, pad it down with blankets or pillow to get the length of tone you're going for. For lower pitch tune the drum very low (just above wrinkles in the batter head) and/or put a weight (ankle weights, canvas bag of BBs, whatever) in the bottom of the drum to reduce the shell's ability to resonant (resonating shell dampens fundamental tone, so killing that resonance deepens/strengthens the fundamental (low) pitch of the drum, making it a larger part of the overall tone). Make sure to remove this weight, however, when not playing the drum, so it doesn't warp the shell, which I have seen happen with kicks on studios' 'house kits.'
No, a sealed reso will have more "boominess", if you will. Better for situations where you need a more sub-like, low-end sound. Great sound, if you know the right application. Ported resos don't have the same natural boom, but they are generally punchier and better for more intricate bass drum work. YMMV, of course, depending on the situation.
I don't like a hole on the front head. It just kills the sound of the drum. I also play with a 24" drum and I like the boom sound it gets and yes I am a rock drummer. Now for recording that's a different matter.I usually go with a smaller drum.
waynto much attack I tune my bass drum head 1 and a half on the batter and 1 on the resonant head and its a good phat drum sound with and easy to mic and play live or little to no mixing while recording
ya . most helpful of all the others I checked out... I hate booming bass drum.. I love the thud and low frequency . That sound does not get in the way of the bass guitar which starts at 80Hz anyway... thanks frequency fanatic hph
Put that mic just outside the port hole and it will be better. Beta 52's all have that phased out basketball thing going on inside the drum unless you muffle heavily
Thanks for your comment! When I mic the drum for real (not just for the video) I use an outside mic too. The two together make for a very complete and authoritative sound. Also, I generally don't place mics in the way of the hole itself (closely) as the large puff of air that comes out of it each time the drum is played does unpleasant things to the sound, IMO. I either put the mic(s) inside or outside, away from the hole.
It then gets too woofy from all the air being focusing out the 4 to 5" port and onto the capsule. The Beta 52 is a great mic, but there are many other options out there. In order to take out the basketball ping, I put a light t-shirt or towel, inside the drum, on the bottom to take it away. It doesn't change the feel of the drum and noticeably doesn't reduce resonance or sustain, but it definitely takes away the ping, which is just reverberation from the inside surface. I find drums treated with clear lacquers or extremely strong hardwoods inside exhibit this behaviour more than softer, more porous, woods.
These videos always have a $1000 drum and they sound like Bonzo's kick after 30 seconds of tuning. I'd like to see someone do one of these videos with a CB700 or Export from the 90's.
What da ya mean bass drum tuning not as important as tom toms? Of coarse it is! People listen to Buddy Rich, early Ian Paice, Mitch Mitchell, these guys tuned (with out air hole) and had great tone. What this guy showed you doesn't compare. DO YOU SEE TOM TOMS WITH A HOLE IN THE BOTTOM HEAD? NO! Two headed drums capture the tone along with the wood of the shell.
When you hit the drum at the end it did not sound very good. Especially for a Ludwig 24 inch kick it should sound killer. Not sure why it sounded that way but I would have to guess that you way over simplified the whole tuning process.
No you're the twit because apparently my statement went right over your head. I didn't say I don't know how to tune a bass drum; on the contrary I said this bass drum sounds like shit so the person playing it doesn't know how to tune it.
Not so much tuning but more just randomly tightening two skins up haphazardly that will " do for 90% of the time". I knew its just pomp and ceremony when guys use measuring tools and different tightening sequences and leaving a couple of pegs loose etc etc, its all just unnecessary showboating.
As soon as he put the sponge muffling inside I knew that he hasn't got a clue about good bass drum sounds. .. He's strangled the drum sound until it sounds like he's hitting a plastic bag full of wet mud. .. It's basically the sound 90s American heavy metal drummers were using. ...I don't mean I want a ringing jazz bass drum but it just doesn't sound like a drum or in any way a musical instrument
I don't get it. With a 24x14 Ludwig Keystone, and the same exact heads you have there my bass drum sounds absolutely nothing like this. You have it mic'd so you must have done some studio doctoring to get that sound. What would that drum sound like without being mic'd? The only mic should be the one used to record the sounds, that's what I want to hear. So I can sleep at night not running a million "what ifs" through my head and causing me to dream that I am being chased by cactus people into a volcano. I see a lot of comments by guys pretending to be esoteric connoisseurs of "pure drum sounds" criticizing the sound you are getting.... like they are prodigies of percussion. But in the real world, that is the sound you hear on most recorded music since the 70's, and is perfect for rock/pop covers in clubs etc. It's the sound I want without dragging my Roland controller and trigger out every time I play out. Especially in small venues where you don't need a crazy amount of PA stuff for the whole band to play through and don't need the extra volume. ( Like in the 80's when the goal was to cause skulls to burst and ears to melt.)
I didn't use any processing for the mic'd drum sound, just a Shure Beta52 through a Rascal Audio mic preamp set to basic (clean-ish) setting. The RA preamps can do a lot of tailoring of the sound based on how you drive it, but that wouldn't be helpful for this video. Most of the criticism I seem to get on this video is a result of the fact that I didn't try to place the mic in a special or ideal placement (as I would when actually tracking a kick drum) but rather I stuck it more or less in the middle of the drum's interior for a 'not ideal' sound... just to get a basic idea of the drum itself, not so much to discuss the effect of placement, etc. This is always a touchy issue (how to best represent a sound in a useful manner in an instructional video -- where the viewers aren't in the room with the drum itself to hear it). There will always be folks who feel they must come down on people for less than perfected (in their minds) drum sounds, but the idea of this video was to get people in the ballpark with general tuning without respect to the strengths and/or weaknesses of any particular kick drum or to factor in things like mic selection and placement, processing, etc. As for why you are not getting the same result, I cannot know, unfortunately, without being there, with you and your drum, I am sorry. But no, there was no processing used for this video. Just the drum, the foam I inserted later in the video, the mic and the preamp. If I were tracking this for an actual project I would have optimized tuning, placement and added processing as needed to get the sound I wanted for the given track, but that is a series of many other videos. This was only intended to be a primer. I'm sorry I can't be more helpful specifically for you. If you can describe the sound you're getting (same mic?), then I may be able to give you some pointers. Also, FWIW, each drum is unique, so even same model/era/dimensions of drum can sound different. This is a late 70's, die-mold (HEAVY), thick 6-ply Ludwig kick, 24"x14" in its original red sparkle wrap. The batter is a powerstroke III and the front is single ply (medium or heavy, I don't remember which off the top of my head) Ludwig head.
@@recordingdotpizza Thanks for your reply... I have a thing for larger bass drums. Probably because I'm over 6 feet tall and I always have to extend tom mounts to their limit to get a comfortable setup. Or maybe it's because I'm just weird, either way, it's not really a sound thing, but a feel thing. Your'e a drummer, so I imagine you get it. Anyway, I have always had 24"s, 26"s and now I even have a 28"X 20" I built because I got a great deal on a Keller shell and just had to make that happen. But, just like 16" floor toms, I have always had a bit of trouble getting my idea of perfect drum sounds out of 24" bass drums. Everything else is a snap. Just those two evil sizes. I know you would have to be physically present with my drum and myself to have someplace to go with my problem, if you want to call it that. I just wanted to eliminate the idea of production manipulation of what I hear in the video as part of troubleshooting. I will keep digging, but your video did give me some things to work with. Meanwhile, I have always used work-arounds to get the sound I want out of the two evil sizes. I just don't want to have to use production or complicated muffling and tuning. It's a nuisance.
very good sound
I actually redid this video (much better explanation) on my drum channel: ua-cam.com/video/oPj-CjO5wOw/v-deo.html. Thanks.
Just bought a new drum and wasn't sure how to tune the bass drum till I saw this great video. Now I am confident of doing it myself. Awesome video.
I’ve been fortunate to record several records with Joel. What you may not know is that he is an absolutely world class player. His drum sounds are always stellar.
Ha, ha what Stella Artois
Alternate title: "How to make a 24" bass drum sound like a click track."
In most studio scenarios, the inside mic is being used to pick up the attack and a mic is being used outside to capture the low end. Low end waves need time, distance and air to develop. Sure, you can use the proximity effect by having the mic close to the sound source, but then it's a touch too boomy and a pain to deal with.
said the inexperienced sound "engineer" lol
Great tips Joel, and excellent justification for your procedure. Bravo!
The bass really is too 'clicky' for me. No boom to it at all. I use a ludwig 26x14 and it actually makes people ill with bottom end🤘
138boris a bass drum Ludwig should sound booming open tones vintage or modern
Great looking drum...there's nothing like good old red sparkle.
In my opinion, not tuned high enough for a 24” drum. More tension on the batter head, slightly higher on the reso, will give you MUCH more tone, body and punch. It will work in recording situations as is with some tweaking but live, it would sound thin with all attack and no low end or thump.
I agree. It sounds a little flat...
Joel, thank you so much. You helped me a lot to set up my daughter's drum set.
mic placed inside past the hole or a couple of inches from the resonant head usually
gives the best sound. doesnt matter how its dampened. pillow, blanket, foam etc.
good explanation, nice looking bass drum
Just a one ply with a felt on the kicker side maybe old school style and the front as well one ply with Ludwig logo
In regards to the comment about dead bass strings. I play bass guitar (25 years) and drums (3 years). While I appreciate that I know jack squat about tuning a bass drum; which is why I'm watching in the first place; to get a good kick sound for the recordings I'm engineering,...I think that fresh strings on a bass sound amazing compared to dull strings. Obviously it depends on what you are after and the style of music you play. If I were after the James Jamerson Motown thud,...the deader the string the better; maybe even flatwounds. But for me nothing compares to the piano like tone you get from a fresh set of roundwounds on a bass guitar.
That said; thank you for sharing your knowledge. I've always been hesitant to muffle my bass drum (using an import Gretsch CC rock set) but I think I will give it a go this time around. I've never been too stoked on the drum sound that I've that I've gotten on the recordings I've made. They have always seem lifeless and lacking in depth.
I can't wait to try the techniques you've laid out in this vid.
Beuatiful bass drum!
Beautiful Ludwig Red Sparkle bass drum you got there. I like the T Rods..very handy.
Yes, those are Ludwig T-rods, original with that drum (late 1970's early 80's... heavy shell!) Thanks for your comment!
Would coating the inside of your drums with Linseed oil cause the same results as this bass drum, you said the coating it has gives it a tighter sound of i heard it correctly.
The lacquer used to seal the wood on the inside of the drum creates a hard surface that doesn't absorb high frequencies as well as a softer texture, so the resulting tone will have more HF resonance. Anything you can do to provide a soft texture will give the high frequencies a place to go and reduce the HF resonance in the overall tone. I do believe using linseed oil instead of lacquer (if you are building a new drum) should produce softer HF content compared to lacquer. If the drum is already lacquered inside you could use sandpaper to rough up or remove the lacquer which will lower the HF content of the sound. I prefer a small piece of foam instead, because I can remove it and keep the HF content if I want to for a certain sound. Thanks for the question!
Thanks for the response 👍
Great video. I just watched the snare tuning video and liked it as well. Keep up the good work. May I suggest that you do a video on tuning for different eras? like a 60's and 70's tuning tutorial. I can't quite get it right. I'd like to have more versatility in my tuning. Thanks, and again, great job!
Bassic Bass drum tuning, bassically.
Thanks for this..great technique ...simple and to the point ..
Once the rest of the instruments come in, this would mix great..
Bummer that I need to search for a 24 now ...but that's a whole 'nother story.. haha
Huge help. Thank you!
Informative, practical and helpful. Thanks.
I have some question about tuning kick 18x14 , what a great tension between beater & reso head... thanks
What kind of music? For combo/jazz little muffling, higher pitch (more resonance, less thump). For pop/rock/funk might want lower tuning with more muffling. Keeping top two lugs on the batter side (highest two adjacent lugs at the top of the drum) tuned lower creates more thump with less sustain. Higher tuned front head on an 18" is hit or miss (depending on if it is muffled) for pop music. I often like to leave the front head quite low (again, pop music) with very little muffling touching it (most of the muffling tends to be toward the batter side), which allows some resonance that can be exploited with an out front kick mic and some dynamics processing. I hope that is helpful.
Without the pad inside I called that the basketball sound
Can you please do toms???
Love the wrinkle tunning..nice n low😊
I love instructional videos but this does not provide instruction on sound. The drum sounds terrible. I agree with the comment about a "click" sound. You are not mic'd for a bass sound but more for the impact of the pedal to the head. Without the head tightened more, no resonance is created thus a recorded slap sound. The mic should really be placed off the resonance head, either secondary head ring or muffler to help control overtone. 24" ludwig should have a deep bold warm sound...... this result seems more like a compressed dead drum not worth recording.
Thank you for covering this Bass drum tuning. It's very informative. Is there any way you could do a 4 Tom DW tuning clinic video? I can't find much info on how to tune them to a real fat low sound that could be used in a ballad. Years ago I heard Don Henley on some slow material & more recently Ginger Baker on the Royal Albert Crème Reunion that at times came through with all the low end tuning that sounded fabulous. Since they recorded over a few days the drum sound was slightly different from day to day but for the most part the Toms came through quite nicely. Another video I saw recently was Mick Fleetwood getting his new DW Cherry kit & I was blown away with how full & low the Toms tone was. I've never been able to come close to that & thought I might be overlooking something. I'm sure the DW choice of wood played an important part in the achieved sound but in the past I have heard the occasional recording where the Toms sounded similar to the DW Cherry Toms.Sure would be nice to hear some Toms that produce the Thud instead of the click that the stick produces. It seems that most of the current drums being played are used in the Metal genre but very little in the slow Ballad content.Thank you so much, & keep up the good work. Your videos are extremely helpful & you seem to come through with a very sensible approach to this important topic.
Thank you.
Thank you!
Joel what advice do you have for getting the best sound out of a 15x26 bass drum.
The drum in this video is a 14x24. I also have a 14x26, which, though only 2" bigger in diameter, has over 78 square inches greater surface area, and you can tell by playing it that a 26" kick requires a lot more heft to lay into (though it's fun! :) It is difficult, of course, to say what the 'best sound' is for a 26" drum as some people love light or no muffling, others heavy damping. Some prefer two heads with resonance, others a padded single head for short punch. I typically take a similar approach to miking a 26" drum that I do the 24" in this video (or smaller), preffering to let the drum breath with greater sustain (less muffling), but be aware that in all likelihood a 26" drum will have greater resonance (sustain) than a smaller drum, unless the muffling is significant, so a big drum can get out of hand if control is what you want. The bigness of this character is cool, IMO, and one of the reasons I enjoy my 26" drum. The same rules apply, however -- if the inside is a very hard surface put some soft cloth/towels in there to help absorb the HF content, and if you want a deader, less sustaining sound, pad it down with blankets or pillow to get the length of tone you're going for. For lower pitch tune the drum very low (just above wrinkles in the batter head) and/or put a weight (ankle weights, canvas bag of BBs, whatever) in the bottom of the drum to reduce the shell's ability to resonant (resonating shell dampens fundamental tone, so killing that resonance deepens/strengthens the fundamental (low) pitch of the drum, making it a larger part of the overall tone). Make sure to remove this weight, however, when not playing the drum, so it doesn't warp the shell, which I have seen happen with kicks on studios' 'house kits.'
Dude that bass drum sounds killer. Mic placement is key I guess?
will a sealed reso head sound the same?
No, a sealed reso will have more "boominess", if you will. Better for situations where you need a more sub-like, low-end sound. Great sound, if you know the right application. Ported resos don't have the same natural boom, but they are generally punchier and better for more intricate bass drum work. YMMV, of course, depending on the situation.
I don't like a hole on the front head. It just kills the sound of the drum. I also play with a 24" drum and I like the boom sound it gets and yes I am a rock drummer. Now for recording that's a different matter.I usually go with a smaller drum.
Thank you for your response Joel ,I would like to see your technique for toms .
waynto much attack I tune my bass drum head 1 and a half on the batter and 1 on the resonant head and its a good phat drum sound with and easy to mic and play live or little to no mixing while recording
ya . most helpful of all the others I checked out... I hate booming bass drum.. I love the thud and low frequency . That sound does not get in the way of the bass guitar which starts at 80Hz anyway... thanks frequency fanatic hph
👍
Put that mic just outside the port hole and it will be better. Beta 52's all have that phased out basketball thing going on inside the drum unless you muffle heavily
Thanks for your comment! When I mic the drum for real (not just for the video) I use an outside mic too. The two together make for a very complete and authoritative sound. Also, I generally don't place mics in the way of the hole itself (closely) as the large puff of air that comes out of it each time the drum is played does unpleasant things to the sound, IMO. I either put the mic(s) inside or outside, away from the hole.
My heads are old. I have no bass drum hole.
It then gets too woofy from all the air being focusing out the 4 to 5" port and onto the capsule. The Beta 52 is a great mic, but there are many other options out there. In order to take out the basketball ping, I put a light t-shirt or towel, inside the drum, on the bottom to take it away. It doesn't change the feel of the drum and noticeably doesn't reduce resonance or sustain, but it definitely takes away the ping, which is just reverberation from the inside surface. I find drums treated with clear lacquers or extremely strong hardwoods inside exhibit this behaviour more than softer, more porous, woods.
that drum sounds SICK
These videos always have a $1000 drum and they sound like Bonzo's kick after 30 seconds of tuning. I'd like to see someone do one of these videos with a CB700 or Export from the 90's.
I realy like the video but its bizarre i did the same thing and the sound is realy far of that ?
What da ya mean bass drum tuning not as important as tom toms? Of coarse it is! People listen to Buddy Rich, early Ian Paice, Mitch Mitchell, these guys tuned (with out air hole) and had great tone. What this guy showed you doesn't compare. DO YOU SEE TOM TOMS WITH A HOLE IN THE BOTTOM HEAD? NO! Two headed drums capture the tone along with the wood of the shell.
When you hit the drum at the end it did not sound very good. Especially for a Ludwig 24 inch kick it should sound killer. Not sure why it sounded that way but I would have to guess that you way over simplified the whole tuning process.
No you're the twit because apparently my statement went right over your head. I didn't say I don't know how to tune a bass drum; on the contrary I said this bass drum sounds like shit so the person playing it doesn't know how to tune it.
toms pleaseeee
"Basic bass drum tuning basically"😳
No port hole
Ludwig Jess.
its dead, no color but I guess that's what they go for these days. killing a nice big bass drum.
Not so much tuning but more just randomly tightening two skins up haphazardly that will " do for 90% of the time". I knew its just pomp and ceremony when guys use measuring tools and different tightening sequences and leaving a couple of pegs loose etc etc, its all just unnecessary showboating.
As soon as he put the sponge muffling inside I knew that he hasn't got a clue about good bass drum sounds. ..
He's strangled the drum sound until it sounds like he's hitting a plastic bag full of wet mud. ..
It's basically the sound 90s American heavy metal drummers were using. ...I don't mean I want a ringing jazz bass drum but it just doesn't sound like a drum or in any way a musical instrument
I don't get it. With a 24x14 Ludwig Keystone, and the same exact heads you have there my bass drum sounds absolutely nothing like this. You have it mic'd so you must have done some studio doctoring to get that sound. What would that drum sound like without being mic'd? The only mic should be the one used to record the sounds, that's what I want to hear. So I can sleep at night not running a million "what ifs" through my head and causing me to dream that I am being chased by cactus people into a volcano. I see a lot of comments by guys pretending to be esoteric connoisseurs of "pure drum sounds" criticizing the sound you are getting.... like they are prodigies of percussion. But in the real world, that is the sound you hear on most recorded music since the 70's, and is perfect for rock/pop covers in clubs etc. It's the sound I want without dragging my Roland controller and trigger out every time I play out. Especially in small venues where you don't need a crazy amount of PA stuff for the whole band to play through and don't need the extra volume. ( Like in the 80's when the goal was to cause skulls to burst and ears to melt.)
I didn't use any processing for the mic'd drum sound, just a Shure Beta52 through a Rascal Audio mic preamp set to basic (clean-ish) setting. The RA preamps can do a lot of tailoring of the sound based on how you drive it, but that wouldn't be helpful for this video. Most of the criticism I seem to get on this video is a result of the fact that I didn't try to place the mic in a special or ideal placement (as I would when actually tracking a kick drum) but rather I stuck it more or less in the middle of the drum's interior for a 'not ideal' sound... just to get a basic idea of the drum itself, not so much to discuss the effect of placement, etc.
This is always a touchy issue (how to best represent a sound in a useful manner in an instructional video -- where the viewers aren't in the room with the drum itself to hear it). There will always be folks who feel they must come down on people for less than perfected (in their minds) drum sounds, but the idea of this video was to get people in the ballpark with general tuning without respect to the strengths and/or weaknesses of any particular kick drum or to factor in things like mic selection and placement, processing, etc. As for why you are not getting the same result, I cannot know, unfortunately, without being there, with you and your drum, I am sorry. But no, there was no processing used for this video. Just the drum, the foam I inserted later in the video, the mic and the preamp.
If I were tracking this for an actual project I would have optimized tuning, placement and added processing as needed to get the sound I wanted for the given track, but that is a series of many other videos. This was only intended to be a primer. I'm sorry I can't be more helpful specifically for you. If you can describe the sound you're getting (same mic?), then I may be able to give you some pointers. Also, FWIW, each drum is unique, so even same model/era/dimensions of drum can sound different. This is a late 70's, die-mold (HEAVY), thick 6-ply Ludwig kick, 24"x14" in its original red sparkle wrap. The batter is a powerstroke III and the front is single ply (medium or heavy, I don't remember which off the top of my head) Ludwig head.
@@recordingdotpizza Thanks for your reply... I have a thing for larger bass drums. Probably because I'm over 6 feet tall and I always have to extend tom mounts to their limit to get a comfortable setup. Or maybe it's because I'm just weird, either way, it's not really a sound thing, but a feel thing. Your'e a drummer, so I imagine you get it. Anyway, I have always had 24"s, 26"s and now I even have a 28"X 20" I built because I got a great deal on a Keller shell and just had to make that happen. But, just like 16" floor toms, I have always had a bit of trouble getting my idea of perfect drum sounds out of 24" bass drums. Everything else is a snap. Just those two evil sizes. I know you would have to be physically present with my drum and myself to have someplace to go with my problem, if you want to call it that. I just wanted to eliminate the idea of production manipulation of what I hear in the video as part of troubleshooting. I will keep digging, but your video did give me some things to work with. Meanwhile, I have always used work-arounds to get the sound I want out of the two evil sizes. I just don't want to have to use production or complicated muffling and tuning. It's a nuisance.
W/o muffling it sounds like a basketball xd
Bad mic placing and editing
Tap tap wtf
Sounds like hitting a tin can.
Sounds dreadful !