KickPort, anyone saw/heard/tried it?? Usefull in a recording situation?

[Andl]

A great tool to have around, for both live and recording. Sometimes it works, sometimes it's better without. Good to have the choice.

[Padje]

Have one, selling it. pm if you're interested (europe)

For me it's not working. tried it on several kicks. Have the impression that it's working better on deeper drums. I have a 22"x14". It boosted the "wrong frequenties. Tried it on a 20"x15". The result was better but not good enough to justify the purchase. Maybe on really deep drums (18") it will work.

just my thought

[Sean327]

Originally Posted by S.Filpansick

Well, my kit already had one installed in it when I bought it, so I can't say how it compares to NOT having the KP; but I definitely love the sound of my kick on recordings, and it sounds amazing live.

FWIW, I'm using an Audix D6 in the drum, and a "home made" sub kick on the outside.

See, THIS is the only way it would make sense in a studio. Live - small venue - unmic'd, sure, I reckon it would sound better because of the low frequencies, but most kick drum mics roll off anything below 60hz, which is where the sub-bass frequencies created by the kickport are. The only way i can see it working is by doing what our friend S.Filpansick has done and use a "Sub-Kick" type speaker-mic to capture all those LOW frequencies created by the kick port.

Having said that, most engineers would be wary about these sub-bass frequencies (below 60hz) because they can get in the way of the frequencies created by the bass guitar and 'muddy up' the low end. I guess you could roll of some of the low frequencies from the bass guitar so it doesn't conflict with the sub-kick, but then the bottom end could sound hollow, as kick-drum hits tend to be more sporadic than a bassline, and therefore the low's wouldn't be sustained. Just my thoughts. I'd be interested to know how the frequencies sit in your mixes. =)

[girlthatdrums]

I've just put one on my main kick. It did slightly enhance the low end, but I've not tried it yet for recording.

I think where most people will see improvement is there is a foam ring around the port where it attaches to the front head. Those who have no additional dampening on the front head will see some resonance kill, which will work better for recording, IMO. I already had a pre-muffled front head so perhaps that's why my low end enhancement wasn't as pronounced.

That said, it DOES do what it says it does. I'll post back when I get around to trying it for recording.

All else aside, aesthetically, it looks much better than the standard ring and has less of a chance of getting buggered up by sloppy soundmen!

[audioboffin]

I have what I think is a late 60's mahogany 24" x 14" kick drum which has had the bearing edges cut at 45 degrees and a 30 degree counter cut, at the moment it has a Remo Powerstroke P4 on the batter head and a Remo Renaissance (no hole) on the resonant side. The kit is solely used for recording and so far the best results have come from an M88 on the beater and a FET 47 on the resonant side, but I have a fair selection of kick mics to compare with. Previously when the drum had a 7" hole dead centre of the front head the best internal mic I found was an RE 20.

Recently I have been damping with a pair of 2" wide felt strips one behind the back head and one behind the front head, acting as "mechanical gates" .. kinda, and no hole in the front head. Looking for a slightly tighter sound but still retaining as much fullness as possible, so have just bought a Kickport.

I have to go away for a week, but when I get back I'm putting a new pair of hoops on the drum and a lighter front head. The kickport guys advised me that they found the best hole position is closer to the centre than the hoop so that's where I will cut the port's hole..

I'll report back on the before and after comparisons when I have some time in a couple weeks. Meanwhile I am very interested to hear about what bass drum setup people are using who have used and moved on from the kickport.

[ArnieInTheSky]

I tried one only a couple days ago. Used on an Ayotte 22x16. We tried it on different heads, Coated Ambassadors - Powerstroke 3 Resos. The result on all the drum heads were similar.

It claims to be more resonant which it isn't. This heavy piece of plastic restricts the heads freedom movement there by making it less resonant. This leads to...

"Fatter!" which again failed. It might be perceived as warmer or fatter because less of the high frequencies are apparent because they are muted by the restricting of the head, but an actual increase in warmth and bottom end was not apparent to me or my colleague. Just sounded closed more than anything.

Finally, (the selling feature) was the only real tone increase was the sound of the kickport itself. From a distance, the drum sounded as I described. More staccato with more focus but as we crept nearer to the bass drum and stuck our ears up to it, the bonking pitch of the plastic was apparent. Didn't sound sonically engineered or harmonious, just sounded like a piece of plastic bonking. This can be viewed two ways to me. 1.) takes an existing bass drum sound and intrudes on it or, 2.) Sounds neat. I didn't bother miking it up because I like to make the best sound I can then mic it and since neither of us didn't enjoy it, we removed it and went back to an un-ported head altogether.

I could see this having some useful effects though. I know live guys love isolation and it wouldn't surprise me if this helped that area, giving them more freedom at the board to manipulate it. And also, like I said, it could sound 'neat' in some recordings. I guess I was disappointed in the fact that it did nothing it claimed but I can see why some people would like it... actually, no I can't.

[Imago]

The kickport has it's uses for live situations, but not for everybody. I tried working with it on a few projects in the studio, and could not find a use for it. It made the resonant head heavy so that it wouldn't allow the drum to resonate correctly and had a very negative impact on the sound when close miced.

[audioboffin]

Tested the kick port last week in a live situation. The drum was a 24" x 18" Yamaha maple. With the kick port installed (a very tight squeeze into a 5" hole) the drum seemed if anything to decrease in volume and "tighten up", with the exception of a couple of feet in front of the the drum, where it sounded fantastic. Unfortunately that spot isn't a valid microphone position option in a live context, quite apart from the amount of bass guitar and low end of guitars "bloom" it would get the hell kicked out of the mic before the first chorus.

Mics used were a Shure Beta 91 plate style mic on a folded bar towel inside the drum, and an Audix D6 at the port. Both microphones became more useable when we removed the kick port. A lot of 40 to 60 Hz boost was needed on both channels to make the kick have as much weight as normal.

I'd be interested to hear one in a recording situation with a large diaphragm condenser mic at the focal point of low end, perhaps 2 feet in front of the drum, but for now I won't be trying it again at a gig.

[Aaron Miller]

I recorded a session drummer about three weeks ago. He had a very nice custom 18"x22" kick by TJS (?). No muffling or pillows at all and it sounded great. Very little EQ needed.

[MikeRL]

i recorded a kit with one recently. It was the first time i had recorded this particular drum, and first time with this drummer. I had a Atm25 in, and a 414 out.. rock band, kiss/guns type...

the tracks i have sound OK, certainly not the best drum sound i have ever gotten, there is a little to be desired. But hey, that may have nothing to do with the kickport... it was a hectic day at the studio, and time was tight, so i got a usable sound, and will live with it, or beef it up with a sample.

Mike

[sameal]

digging up this thread.

me and a friend ran some tests through wavelab, and didn't get the same charts as specified on the product. nothing close.

he's sending me the screenshots and what not.

personally in my experience with what we did in our environment and the mics we used the kickport made the drum sound worse.