Recording/Mixing Roland V-Drums

cdog · 5th February 2004

Anyone working with these things?

To me, the TD-10 just sounds like a cheesy drum machine with a some gritty 16 bit reverb on it.

Somehow, I have to get a respectable drum sound out of it.

My plan right now is to use the 3 direct outs for Kick, Snare, and Toms, and use the Main Outs for the Overheads.

This way, I can replace each part with quality 24bit samples of my own creation using Drumagog.

Then, the drummer can have his vdum cake and I can actually swallow it too.

David R. · 5th February 2004

To me, the only reason to have an electronic drum set is MIDI. The drummer plays his part and goes home. THe producer can then tighten up the parts (if necessary) and replace (or augment) any or all the sounds. As long as the producer was not and idiot and did not quantize, you can have a great sounding kit.

MIDI is dead, long live MIDI.

heinz · 5th February 2004

Those TD8/TD10 cymbals are absolute hell. Maybe you can talk him into using real cymbals.

DavidR is spot on, capture the MIDI data and you'll have way more options.

cajonezzz · 6th February 2004

we sometime do a hybrid thing with the Vdrums.

Real Kick and snare and cymbals. Triggering the kick and snare with ddrum triggrs to Vdrum module. ( I pad the shit out of the kik and snare internally and sometimes print an un padded kik and snare as an option, just depends)

Real cymbals are key. And:

We also will often fire up the rehersal PA wedges behind the drummer (concert style) send the v drums through 'em and print various room mics.

This whole drill can suck or be amazing depending on what your going for.

I'll print midi as well and sometimes change sounds up. I'll usually have to do some midi nudging to get things right.

I think the vdrums are cool for the apt studio and sketching out tunes.
Maybe using some homegrown sounds and stiking to "efx" type drumming would be better use of them. I still rely alot on a Drumkat when needing to program MIDI drum/perc stuff.

el cochino · 6th February 2004

I use a Clavia Ddrum4 with pads and while it sounds better than the Roland V-Drum, I hardly ever use it as a sound module and only record the midi data into DAW to trigger drum samples on my software samplers. That works very good for rock and metal but I'd still recommend to record real hihats and ride cymbals afterwards. You could do it at the same time, but with this method you won't have the bleed from the drum pads coming through your microphones, which makes the midi editing alot easier.

Jay Kahrs · 8th February 2004

Ya gotta use real cymbals if there's any chance of getting something passable. At best the rest of the drums sound like recordings of real drums and lack the ambience that a real kit has. Things like playing the bass drum and hearing the toms ring and the snare buzz a bit.

I've managed to get some of that with mix tricks, reamping the snare, sending the snare and toms to a PA and miking that. The last time I mixed a V-Drum project I remember triggering a snare from the Purrfect drums library and I'm pretty sure we kept the stock V-drum toms after going through allmost all the sounds in there.

Oh yeah, print the midi data. You'll thank yourself later.

jazzius II · 8th February 2004

The new Roland V-Drums look (sound?) pretty interesting......that hi-hat looks pretty funky......

Critic · 8th February 2004

Depending on the style of muzak...Ive never heard remotely natural sounding drums from V drums. And I own a pintech set and have played with the TD10 a fair amount. There are just so many factors in that tiny fraction of a second when the stick hits the drum that have yet to be modeled convincingly.

I would be very careful with compression. I wouldnt do any fast attack comping and any verbs should be nonlinear. Maybe try some tape, saturation or reamping.
Also, selectively combining samples gets you closer to a natural sound as it makes things more dynamic. If you add a sample to the snare very, very subtley when its hit harder and passes a certain threshold, youll have a more dynamic sound and itll sound less canny. Same for kick. Basically the goal with electric drums is increasing the dynamics instead of controlling them as with acoustic drums.

jazzius II · 9th February 2004

Blimey!....have V-Drums come of age???

check out this quicktime movie of the new Roland V-Drums!

5th February 2004	#1
cdog Lives for gear Joined: Dec 2003 Location: Brooklyn Posts: 3,559 Thread Starter 3 Reviews written	Recording/Mixing Roland V-Drums Anyone working with these things? To me, the TD-10 just sounds like a cheesy drum machine with a some gritty 16 bit reverb on it. Somehow, I have to get a respectable drum sound out of it. My plan right now is to use the 3 direct outs for Kick, Snare, and Toms, and use the Main Outs for the Overheads. This way, I can replace each part with quality 24bit samples of my own creation using Drumagog. Then, the drummer can have his vdum cake and I can actually swallow it too.

5th February 2004	#2
David R. Lives for gear Joined: Jun 2002 Location: I left my heart, in... Posts: 1,881	To me, the only reason to have an electronic drum set is MIDI. The drummer plays his part and goes home. THe producer can then tighten up the parts (if necessary) and replace (or augment) any or all the sounds. As long as the producer was not and idiot and did not quantize, you can have a great sounding kit. MIDI is dead, long live MIDI. __________________ -David R. "An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way." - C. Bukowski

6th February 2004	#4
cajonezzz Lives for gear Joined: Jun 2002 Location: Carlsbad Ca. Posts: 1,765	we sometime do a hybrid thing with the Vdrums. Real Kick and snare and cymbals. Triggering the kick and snare with ddrum triggrs to Vdrum module. ( I pad the shit out of the kik and snare internally and sometimes print an un padded kik and snare as an option, just depends) Real cymbals are key. And: We also will often fire up the rehersal PA wedges behind the drummer (concert style) send the v drums through 'em and print various room mics. This whole drill can suck or be amazing depending on what your going for. I'll print midi as well and sometimes change sounds up. I'll usually have to do some midi nudging to get things right. I think the vdrums are cool for the apt studio and sketching out tunes. Maybe using some homegrown sounds and stiking to "efx" type drumming would be better use of them. I still rely alot on a Drumkat when needing to program MIDI drum/perc stuff. __________________ http://recordingdrummerproducer.com http://socaldrumsociety.com http://ProCraftMedia.com ----------------------------------------------------------------- Watch your thoughts, for they become words. Watch your words, for they become actions. Watch your actions, for they become habits. Watch your habits, for they become character. Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny.

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5th February 2004	#3
heinz Lives for gear Joined: Mar 2003 Location: chicago Posts: 1,025	Those TD8/TD10 cymbals are absolute hell. Maybe you can talk him into using real cymbals. DavidR is spot on, capture the MIDI data and you'll have way more options.

6th February 2004	#5
el cochino Lives for gear Joined: Jul 2003 Location: Austria Posts: 942	I use a Clavia Ddrum4 with pads and while it sounds better than the Roland V-Drum, I hardly ever use it as a sound module and only record the midi data into DAW to trigger drum samples on my software samplers. That works very good for rock and metal but I'd still recommend to record real hihats and ride cymbals afterwards. You could do it at the same time, but with this method you won't have the bleed from the drum pads coming through your microphones, which makes the midi editing alot easier.

8th February 2004	#7
jazzius II Lives for gear Joined: Sep 2003 Posts: 1,002	The new Roland V-Drums look (sound?) pretty interesting......that hi-hat looks pretty funky......

8th February 2004	#8
Critic Gear nut Joined: Sep 2003 Location: NYC Posts: 78	Depending on the style of muzak...Ive never heard remotely natural sounding drums from V drums. And I own a pintech set and have played with the TD10 a fair amount. There are just so many factors in that tiny fraction of a second when the stick hits the drum that have yet to be modeled convincingly. I would be very careful with compression. I wouldnt do any fast attack comping and any verbs should be nonlinear. Maybe try some tape, saturation or reamping. Also, selectively combining samples gets you closer to a natural sound as it makes things more dynamic. If you add a sample to the snare very, very subtley when its hit harder and passes a certain threshold, youll have a more dynamic sound and itll sound less canny. Same for kick. Basically the goal with electric drums is increasing the dynamics instead of controlling them as with acoustic drums.

9th February 2004	#9
jazzius II Lives for gear Joined: Sep 2003 Posts: 1,002	Blimey!....have V-Drums come of age??? check out this quicktime movie of the new Roland V-Drums!