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Originally Posted by recky  Great that this thread has come up again. I have experimented with the early 70s sound for more than a year and have kind of perfected it. It has, in fact, caused me to sell all my digital gear and buy a Studer multitrack as well as a 1/4" Telefunken stereo R2R. However, this is just the icing on the cake - the sound is almost COMPLETELY in the instruments used and how they are played.
Experiment with sparse micing (e.g. mono OH, kick and snare, or for a mid-70s sound, reso heads off toms and kick and miced from just inside the shell), muffling (gaffer tape and tissue paper on Ambassador heads, thick blanket in kick), and it's also important to leave some distance between mics and drums.
A run-of-the-mill mic collection will suffice, but careful with the treble content when recording to digital - there is hardly anything in the "air" department on early 70s recordings.
Cheers,
Recky |
Hell yes!
I'm a 70's drum sound nut, and my experiences are similar, after using simpler/less mics and farther distancing placement, the drums just mix themselves. Dampening/compressing snare and kicks seems proper too.
Dito on the overall music recording style too, after getting a dryer drum sound, it's amazing at how easy just mic'ing guitar cabs and even direct bass makes making a record easy. If that's the sound you like that is, and for me it is! Just some subtle compression on a few things and light..light reverb maybe and your're done. Getting over Steelydan style production and welcoming more of a Kinks/late 6o's early 70's sound has started making music a blast again to create. Bring on the amp hiss!
I'll also add that taking the bottom heads of drum toms and front head off kick with towel helps tremendously.
I also play a Fibes drum set, and well, it really just sounds 70's to begin with.
Steelyfan