Thoughts on drum mics for recording

[xpac3000]

Alright I have a live hip hop band called the squid kids and were looking to get some drum mics for the first time.

We have recorded one song but our drummer used a drum machine to do it. The studio has the capability of doing

guitars and vocals and were looking to do drums now. We are kinda tight on cash so some good mics that would give

good sound would be dope. So if anyone could help us our that would be sweet. We also need advice on cords too...

[DNAstudios]

what is your budget??

[xpac3000]

About $100-$300 we want good quaility for a cheap price we were looking at the

CAD DMTP7 7-Piece Drum Microphone Touring Package
Seven-piece drum mic touring pack.
Contains three TM211s,
two CM217s,
one SN210, and
one KM212 in protective travel case.

for about $159 but we werent to sure on it yet

[Farview]

The cad mic pack sucks.

Snare: shure sm57
kick: Shure Beta 52, AKG D112 or audix D6
toms: Sennheiser 604

For overheads, depending on what you use for guitar and vocals, you might have what you need. (or half of what you need)

[apadua]

Man... for 3 billz I would consider going to a professional studio for like 8 hours..

I am not sure what studios are charging in Colorado but there are a couple places is SD that are around 300-400 for an eight hour block... Pretty crazy...

But if you are set on picking up some mics..look on craigslist for:

SM57's (snare)
AKG D112 (Kick)
A pair of SC for overheads - Oktava Mc012, Rode I forget what their SDC are called.
More SM57's or 58's

$300 for drums is a real tight budget.. Might want do a search for 2-3 mic technique.. One of the members has it on their sig....but I forget who...

[Twiggy]

My vote goes for going some other place to do it.

Or renting some mics for a day. That way you get to learn and save some cash in the process.

[Big Tim]

One of the members has it on their sig....but I forget who...

See sig.

I agree with the above - $300 is barely enough to get some below-average mics to do the 2/3 mic techniques as it is, let alone to drop on a full set of mics. You'll just end up replacing them as quickly as you can.

Hire a studio or double (or preferably triple) your budget. Drum mics actually don't have to cost a lot but you're looking at >$100 per mic for most models (SM57, e604) and you'll need around 6-8 mics as a minimum before you even get to the "nice to have" bonus mics.

[Blue Bear Sound]

About $100-$300 we want good quaility for a cheap price

There's no such thing......... and if you don't already know audio engineering well, you're simply not going to get good results on your own - as people already suggested, take the money and book a few hours at a professional facility.

[Farview]

It would be money better spent to go to a facility that has the right mics and a good room (which is really important with drums).

But the best way to get bang for the buck is to buy used. Most used mics sell for about half of new ones, so that will get you out of the super low end budget gear. Good drum mics really aren't that expensive. Most of the popular ones have been made for 20-30 years, so there are a ton of used ones floating around.

[xpac3000]

Dope that really helps out I had a feeling that $300 was way too low of a budget
the [deleted] thing is only two of us out of 4 have jobs and bills on top of that

so its tough achieving what we want to do with limited funds at our disposal

I know I place that does $35 an hour so we'll check it out.

We just really wanted drum mics so we could record for free and at our liesure but you guys opened my
eyes to the reality of it and its definetly a goal to shoot for in the future when moneyis good

[Farview]

I just had a bunch of guys in last week recording drums and then taking the tracks home to record everything else. It's pretty common.

YOu can record almost everything with two mics and two mic inputs. With drums, I will normally use 9 to 14 mics on a 5 piece kit. Obviously I could get away with less, but if you are stuck with 4 mic inputs and a crummy room, it's going to be a little half-assed.

[apadua]

That is the approach I am starting to take as well..

Be sure they have a nice drum/live room.. I think that be will 80% of the equation... Assuming the engineers have good techniques and the standard mic locker..

It would also be helpful to tell them what type of sound you are going for before hand so that they can dial it in as close as possible.

We are tracking drums here in next month and I told the engineer that the rest of the tracks will be done at my humble project studio. He suggested that get drums sounds as close as possible to final so that by the time I get the tracks in my daw all I have to do is push up the faders.