A truck load of cymbals is essential.
I'm an endorsee of a make of cymbals. I carry 4 bags full to every session. Even before they get into my bag they have been hand picked by me and the cymbal rep.
Every studio drummer should be an endorser IMO. To be fair the cymbal companies seem to pick kids up fairly young and the companies have huge long lists of drummers. I couldn't bare the thought of going to a store and paying for cymbals. Stores have limited stock, it's often hard to decide if a cymbal sounds good or not and cymbals are expensive:eek:
I usually change cymbals for every song depending on the vibe I want to achieve. What cymbals I choose doesn't really matter a whole lot. There are obvious no no's: very short bright cymbals often don't work for alt rock and big long cymbals don't often work for r&b or funk. Obviously there are exceptions - use common sense.
As for cymbal height, at a very early stage of my career I positioned my cymbals (and the rest of the drums for that matter) in such a way that enabled good studio micing.
Cymbals too low and you are killing the toms, too high and that's all the over heads hear. The over heads are often the key to the kit sound so I take my cymbal height lead from the recording engineer.
I only ever use 13" hats. I believe it is down to taste and an individuals style. Whenever I try 14" the producer oftens says it's either too loud or mushy or both. Again, it depends on the song. 13" isn't so great for hard rock or for anything swishy (retro-Beatles). I actually prefer the sound of 14".
