Can someone school me on drums?

[Capt Hair]

Whats going on guys? New to the Gearslutz board! Loving the place, lots of great info!

OT: I'm what you would call a convert drummer. I'm a guitarist at heart, been playing for 11 years, but recently got into learning as many instruments as I can, so when I'm recording people I have some knowledge of what's actually going on with their instruments.

I've been playing for around a year and a half and just got a cheap used ludwig set and zbt cymbals to get a hang of things. I've really progressed and I'm looking to do a complete drum overhaul.

I'm looking into getting a set for my studio (and of course using it for my personal use). And I'm pretty clueless on where to start, it's like jumping into another world.

Details are always a must, just to name a budget we'll say around $1700, if there's something I like that's more, I'm willing to save and wait to get it. And I like playing blues rock, think The Black Crowes and Kenny Wayne Sheppard.

Shells: What are the main differences in tone that you get from the different woods? I always hear talk of "berch this, maple that? And I'm clueless. What should I be looking for here? Obviously there are higher quality woods to use, like in guitars.

Heads: Again, don't know the differences. Don't really have the extra money to dish out on tons of new heads to try them out. Clear, Battered, Coated, and a mixture of those? Again, tonal differences?

Cymbals: I would just like some suggestions here. I'm not that noobish to realize zbts are harsh and tonally just suck lol. Paiste 2002s, Zildian A's, and a drummer I use to play with swears by supernaturals and those are really the only brands I know of that are good and seem to be good quality.

A good ride is to most important to me personally, followed by hats, and crashes, maybe a china in there way down the road.

I have been looking at videos on youtube and basically just going through musiciansfriend and then going to youtube piece by piece and listening to everything, obviously that takes A LOT of time to get any where and there are other factors in the sound I'll hear, mics, pres, etc.

Would just like some opinions on kits and some knowledge for me brain so I can start piecing things together and find something that will suit me.

thanks for the help!

[joeq]

tonal differences in shell woods are subtle, you may be surprised at how subtle

shell thickness and construction, plies, hardware attachments, mounting, etc all factor in besides just the type of wood.

heads are the things that do most of the vibrating. They can make a huge difference and many types of heads are designed specifically to produce a particular effect. Heads wear out and have to be replaced. You can 'experiment' each time you replace them if you don't want to spend a lot of money buying many sets of heads at once.

Even before they HAVE to be replaced, I like a fresh set of heads for recording. New heads sound, well, "new".

Cymbals, IMO you have absolutely have to go to the cymbal in question and hit it with a stick before you buy it. I never bought a cymbal via reputation or a clip on the internet. Probably never will

For your budget you can certain get a very nice set of drums. If you are willing to look at used kits, you can get an awesome set of drums.

[chrisso]

^^ good advice ^^

[biggator6]

Great advice.. particularly the last bit. You can get a ton of kit for your money used.

Get a nice kit.. pick up a couple of different snares (hunt and find some good ones cheap!) and a REALLY good cymbal set.

With some sandpaper, good heads and tuning - you can make a half-decent kit sound very good. You can never make a crappy cymbal sound anything but crappy!

[Capt Hair]

Originally Posted by biggator6

Great advice.. particularly the last bit. You can get a ton of kit for your money used.

Get a nice kit.. pick up a couple of different snares (hunt and find some good ones cheap!) and a REALLY good cymbal set.

With some sandpaper, good heads and tuning - you can make a half-decent kit sound very good. You can never make a crappy cymbal sound anything but crappy!

I think that's somewhat part of the problem, I don't know what "good" ones are^^^. I know brand names for the most part, but the separate series' are what I don't know about. Price alone doesn't always justify quality, kind of wondering if there are certain things I should watch out for. If anything like guitars there are certain series within brands that still might be considered mid-high end, but are junk for the most part. Obviously a lot of it is personal taste, I'm just trying to narrow what I'm looking at.

I am planning on buying used though. Craigslist is my best friend lol, that's where I get a lot of my equipment from. That's what I was thinking around $1000 for the set, then use $700 to try to find some used cymbals, maybe buy one new, and replace the heads if need be. Then try to sell my current set for like $300 to get a little extra cash to play with.

[chrisso]

For Blues Rock, a 60's Ludwig would be great. Or 70's/80's Gretsch.
The best quality bang for buck is high end pro kits from past decades - Yamaha 9000 Recording Custom, Pearl MLX/BLX etc....
The best bang for buck in cymbals are 1970's or earlier A Zildjian. The post 70's versions can be a little loud and hard sounding. Modern Armand Zildjian and K Zildjian.
Paiste 2002, 602, Twenty?
1980's Sabian, especially the jazzier models HHX.

New heads are going to be a must I'm afraid.
Standard heads are white coated (any brand) or 2ply clear or coated (again, any brand).

[biggator6]

Originally Posted by chrisso

For Blues Rock, a 60's Ludwig would be great. Or 70's/80's Gretsch.
The best quality bang for buck is high end pro kits from past decades - Yamaha 9000 Recording Custom, Pearl MLX/BLX etc....
The best bang for buck in cymbals are 1970's or earlier A Zildjian. The post 70's versions can be a little loud and hard sounding. Modern Armand Zildjian and K Zildjian.
Paiste 2002, 602, Twenty?
1980's Sabian, especially the jazzier models HHX.

New heads are going to be a must I'm afraid.
Standard heads are white coated (any brand) or 2ply clear or coated (again, any brand).

Yup.. spot on.

I only paid about $500 for my Premier Signia kit (new in mid-90's, about $3500). I've picked up most of my snares for $150 or less (at least 3 for under $100). Cymbals - I have more some 70's and older Zildjian, and MUCH newer Sabian HH - all purchased used for fair prices.

For the kind of music you mentioned.. I'd second Chris' recommendation on vintage (3-ply) Ludwig, old Slingerland, Gretsch or Rogers... My second kit is a '68 Rogers - and it sounds fantastic! Punchy as hell.

[Capt Hair]

Sounds good guys, I'm checking craigslist a few times a day waiting for things to pop up. Will definitely post any potential purchases in this thread.

thanks for the help.

[biggator6]

Originally Posted by Capt Hair

Sounds good guys, I'm checking craigslist a few times a day waiting for things to pop up. Will definitely post any potential purchases in this thread.

thanks for the help.

Where in SC are you? I troll CL a lot - I'll send you some stuff if I know where you are.

[Capt Hair]

Originally Posted by biggator6

Where in SC are you? I troll CL a lot - I'll send you some stuff if I know where you are.

Right outside Columbia. Appreciate it man!

[frott]

i've been using wide open, non-dampened aquarian modern vintage on tops and bottoms, and both sides of my kick drum with the felt on there i need literally zero dampening and it tunes up nice and low with a good texture to the head and not the crazy overtones that other textured heads give.

i play a ludwig classic maple set from 2007 in these dimensions, i picked it up with a supraphone small snare for ~$1,250 on ebay, great deal (i already had the ludwig classic maple snare which is what I typically use).
Ludwig Classic Maple Drum Set - Blue Sparkle - CM3PC22BS - YouTube

I love the sound for it, this youtube emphasizes things for that roomy sound but dampened a bit with close mics you can get it sounding modern rock-ish.

My cymbals are the set of paiste giant beats, i love the sound but you can't expect them to imitate the giant beats of old (apparently other paiste series sound more like those!)

15 hats Paiste 15" Giant Beat Hi Hat Cymbals 031909A - YouTube
18 crash Paiste 18" Giant Beat Crash Cymbal 031909B - YouTube
20 ride/crash: Paiste 20" Giant Beat Crash Ride Cymbal 031909C - YouTube
24 ride/crash: Paiste 24" Giant Beat Ride Cymbal 031909D - YouTube

I'm not affiliated with memphis in any way, i just like their video demos hah...

My only complaint, that you can see in the videos above, is that for whatever reason some of the giant beats have a nice green sheen to them and others are completely copper colored... my 20 is the copper one, the hats/18/24 are green!

Anyway, I really got this cymbal set up to tame things in my room. I love how light they are, they're also thin enough that I learned real quick to control cymbal bashing, and even if i do, they don't overwhelm. The hats will get lost in pedal work if you're in a rock/live setting because they are light.

The ride holds up surprisingly well for a 24. It is very thin and doesn't get much "wobble" with good sticking.

I paid around $1,300 for the cymbals. Oh wait, I have another complaint... paiste's 24" cymbal bag barely fits the giant beat 24! 1st world problems.

It was such a refreshing change of pace from heavier zildjian rock cymbals, though my favorite hihats are quickbeats, both those and the giant beats have their applications to me!

[Capt Hair]

Thanks for the post man!^^^ I've been watching those videos for hours now lol.

Actually found something cool today and couldn't pass it up on price. Some armand hi-hats, paid $130 at a pawn shop down in Charleston today. No cracks or key holing or anything, in pretty good condition.

Didn't even think about checking out pawn shops, I was just trying to kill some time between looking at apartments and walked in, kind of looked around and saw a whole array of cymbals over in a corner. Definitely going to have to check out the local ones now.

They wanted $180, I actually asked them if this was like "pawn stars" and I could negotiate a price hahaha had never bought anything from a pawn shop before

[biggator6]

Originally Posted by Capt Hair

Thanks for the post man!^^^ I've been watching those videos for hours now lol.

Actually found something cool today and couldn't pass it up on price. Some armand hi-hats, paid $130 at a pawn shop down in Charleston today. No cracks or key holing or anything, in pretty good condition.

Didn't even think about checking out pawn shops, I was just trying to kill some time between looking at apartments and walked in, kind of looked around and saw a whole array of cymbals over in a corner. Definitely going to have to check out the local ones now.

They wanted $180, I actually asked them if this was like "pawn stars" and I could negotiate a price hahaha had never bought anything from a pawn shop before

You'll love those.. nice deal, too. I like the Armand line. Pawn shops are weird, they used to be a GREAT place to score - but now they all typically know enough to scour ebay to price things. Rarely a deal.. but they're out there, apparently!

[chrisso]

Armand are very nice and that was a good price.
What other cymbals did they have???

[Capt Hair]

Originally Posted by chrisso

Armand are very nice and that was a good price.
What other cymbals did they have???

There were mostly lower end zildjians, zbt's, zxt's, etc. I gave them my number to give me a call when ever they get in any new guitar/drums/recording related. Hopefully they'll have some more good deals walk in.

[Capt Hair]

Got a pair of paiste 101 hi hats, I know shitty lol :p, but they were $10 at a yard sale and look to be right out of the box. Actually kind of like the sound, not compared to the armands, but comparatively to the zbt's there's a world of difference. Might just turn around and sell them myself since I got them so cheap.

Craigslist has been no help lately :( can't find anything good.