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[John W]

if i were to stick a microphone in the middle of the room just to record the drums, bass, guitars, etc. How would you go about it to get as clear a sound from each and what's a good suggestion on a microphone?

We reckon we will end up doing the inst separate so we can mix them, but that still l eaves the problem with only 1 mic to the whole drum kit, what's a good mic to use?

[Adam Easy Wishes]

AKG C414 ftw.

[Pint_paul]

i would personally try as hard as possable to stay away from this route, personally a multi channel firewaire interface is the way to go with this, if you have the money.

something like the m-audio profire 2626 is a great quality piece of kit, this is what i use and with the right mics its realy does do an excellent job

[Original Spies]

Stick a Talkboy in the middle of the room and play as loud as you can. release it on tape. It will be mint.

[black_matter]

Save the fuck up and go to a studio. Mark nicol does good deals and good quality recordings.

[Dan G]

I'm with others here I'm afraid John... it is only ever going to sound horrific this way.

Having the drums on one mic is terrible for a number of reasons, 2 main ones being:

1) having only one track means it will effectively be mono. There will be no option to pan toms or overheads.

2) more importantly, you will not be able to "mix" the drums. The most important part of a recording (after well played tracks) is EQ. Now, in a mix, the various elements of the drumkit have their important frequencies. For example: You really don't need anything below 500Hz from the cymbals. Whereas the weight in the kick drum lies around 80-150Hz.

My point being you could never improve one part of it without screwing something else up.



I would definitely go to someone else to record if you're even vaguely thinking of using this to promote your band.

[Adam Easy Wishes]

It depends if your intention is for putting this on Myspace and the like as a recording for folk to hear, or simply using the recordings yourselves as a tool to help with arrangement.

[toiletbag]

Originally Posted by Dan G

I'm with others here I'm afraid John... it is only ever going to sound horrific this way.

Having the drums on one mic is terrible for a number of reasons, 2 main ones being:

1) having only one track means it will effectively be mono. There will be no option to pan toms or overheads.

2) more importantly, you will not be able to "mix" the drums. The most important part of a recording (after well played tracks) is EQ. Now, in a mix, the various elements of the drumkit have their important frequencies. For example: You really don't need anything below 500Hz from the cymbals. Whereas the weight in the kick drum lies around 80-150Hz.

My point being you could never improve one part of it without screwing something else up.



I would definitely go to someone else to record if you're even vaguely thinking of using this to promote your band.

It's easy to obtain an excellent sound with one or two mics on the kit providing:

A: the drummer can play
B: the room is up to the task

Good drummers mix themselves - fact. Having a mono overhead can sound great actually, and it's obviously entirely phase coherent. The 'recorderman' technique for drums is a total winner as well; it's a variation on the Glyn Johns method, and you only need two mics on the kit. It's very much a 'here's what the drummer is hearing' sort of sound, and it's easy to setup.

A setup like this for a live recording will probably sound horrendous unless the mic is very, very well placed, and even then it'd be in mono. If you are going to multi-mic, you'd be wise to put up some screens to try and reduce bleed, or even arrange the mics so that the pickup patterns do the job for you. There's loads of things you can do with very few mics. As someone said above, it depends on what you want to do with the recording; if it's for reference, just batter it down on one mic.

[John W]

Originally Posted by Adam Easy Wishes

It depends if your intention is for putting this on Myspace and the like as a recording for folk to hear, or simply using the recordings yourselves as a tool to help with arrangement.

I'm doing guitar and vocals, the recording are at the most to send to a venue. The intention is so that i can listen over the tracks to work out the vocals really. To help progress the song a little. But it's not to stick on Myspace or to promote the band really.

[Sam L4]

Surely you can do budget live recording in Toms, or maybe a sound production student at Aberdeen college would do it for you.

If you just want to hear your arrangements and like, just get any old mic and plug it into a Tascam 4-track or something. It will sound dreadful but you'll be able to get the just of the songs.