Blending Electronic Drum Kits

[elmkid]

hi..
i just wanna have your opinions on this. about 60% of the time i record young bands 'first demos', which usually we all can expect the drummer is still in the learning process to hit the drums. so im planning to buy a cheap electronic drumkits.
i dont know much about programming to make like real ones, so im gonna use the electronic kits for everything (MIDI triggering) except real hi-hat, maybe snare. will it do the trick nicely?
thanks

[heartofantares]

Originally Posted by elmkid

hi..
i just wanna have your opinions on this. about 60% of the time i record young bands 'first demos', which usually we all can expect the drummer is still in the learning process to hit the drums. so im planning to buy a cheap electronic drumkits.
i dont know much about programming to make like real ones, so im gonna use the electronic kits for everything (MIDI triggering) except real hi-hat, maybe snare. will it do the trick nicely?
thanks

If you really want to buy an electronic drum kit, most of the nicer ones are quite expensive. Maybe you should just check out drumagog and sample/adjust the drums instead its only $200ish.

[Snatchman]

I use an electronic Roland set. (early Td-5 modules) Even though they don't sound like "real" drums, it'll serve the purpose you're after! ( IMHO) I try to treat them like a "real" set. I send the kik/snare to individual outputs, into two DI's ( pair of Dittos) and the rest of the "set" into two DI's( VTB-1's, stereo pair) This helps you to get a smoother drum track ( especially if the drummer is in-experienced) comes mix time by using compression,limiting, etc. This works for me and I think if the drummer plays the electronic set for what they are, and realize their limitations, they can get the job done!.. thumbsup

Actually ended up using this application on a project a not long ago that was released on the final product!... They didn't want to risk losing the "vibe" the drummer had got with the electronic set and lose it trying to do it on the "real "set! (IMHO)..a sample is a sample ( some, like everything else, recorded worse or better than others.. ). A good drummer, on an electronic set works better ( for me ) than a bad drummer on a "real" set any day! (YMMV)

[kenm]

It might be better to buy drum triggers instead. That way the kid can bang the crap out of his own kit instead of having to get used to playing on yours. Let me tell you, playing an electric kit is very different from playing an acoustic kit.


Ken

[stixsmith]

I agree with the previous post about using drum replacing (perhaps with triggers, but with drum mics will do just fine).

How about looking at the Raven dRT for £35 (about $65 USD)
Available from www.digital-black.net

Add a CD ROM with a nice selection of WAV files, and you are sorted.

An electronic kit will probably throw the novice drummer, and you want to try and get the best performance you can from them - even if the sound is less than ideal?

The end result will better this way...

You might want to consider buying a few cymbals? Something fairly reasonable and heavy duty? Maybe Sabian B8 Pros? The ride and hats sound fine - and the crashes are okay too - if not too subtle...

[elmkid]

hi there..
to be honest ive never done this before. the aim is to get the sound as realistic as posibble. by triggering kick n snare (and other minors-toms n cymbals) as midi, i hope i can control of their velocities-thus creating more consistant drumming. i wish i could go all midi, but we all know how hard it is to get the real sounding hi-hat using midi. so for hi-hats, im gonna record the real one.
one more, i think this way is more cost-effective. i wouldnt want to spend my money buying cheap dynamics and thin sounding pres.
what do you think?

[Farview]

It might be cheaper to buy triggers and record the signal from the triggers. Then replace the trigger signal with drumagog.

[elmkid]

triggers? how? can you show product of this kind? and how does it work?
thanks

[Farview]

These are the best http://www.musiciansfriend.com/srs7/...se_pid/440025/

you clamp these on to the drummers drums, plug the mic cable into them and record as normal. The advantage to having triggers instead of mics is that there is no (or extremely little) bleed. This gives a clear signal for Drumagog ( www.drumagog.com) to trigger from.

[elmkid]

one last question..
the output that comes out from the trigger needs to be DI'ed first, right?
what kind of signal does the trigger generate? if audio, then let say i put the trigger at the tom, does it sound like a tom?
thanks.

[Snatchman]

Yeah, but if you get triggers, you still have to use a module/program of some sort. Then the sounds are still depended on the quality of the samples or am I missing something? I agree that the triggers on "real"drums have it's advantage over electronic pads. Henceforth my saying that the drummer had to have "skills" to get good results!... thumbsup..There are limitations to the electronic drumkits ( even though the newer kits addresses some of these issues) that has to be dealt with per si' ,snare rolls that'll sound like a machine gun... ! But straight ahead grooves turns out decent.(YMMV)

[elmkid]

the combination of triggers and drumagog seems cheaper and pretty affective.
thanks dude.

[Farview]

It outputs audio, but it doesn't sound good. Imagine puting a mic diaphragm right on the head of a drum, that's what it sounds like. These Ddrum triggers have xlr outputs so you can just use mic cables to get them to the board and record as normal. They do make cheaper triggers, but they don't work as well and they have 1/4 TS jacks, so you would have to get adapters to make it work. While you are recording, it will sound bad, but once you throw Drumagog on it it will be wonderful.