Drums...arrghh!

[Daniel_Isaiah]

I'm doing an 8 mic job on my drummers kit. The over heads im using for cymbals are picking up the rest of the kit better than their respective mics!!! I just want them to pic up mostly cymbals. I know I can gate them....but weird cut off effects keep happening. How do "seperate" the kit like the big boys do??? I want the kit to sound less "lo-fi"

[Ben Jenssen]

The "big boys" dont separate the cymbals as far as I know. Its almost an impossible task.

I would recommend you do the opposite:
Try to get a good sound from just the overheads, experiment w/mic placement, if you do that well enough, its almost sufficient.
And after that you pull up the close mics slowly to complement the OHs.

If you have good condenser OHs, this works!

I would also recommend that you use the overheads on the left and right of the set, and not in a X/Y configuration in the center, as you get a better, wider image. You can always narrow it later.

If you are strugling with already recorded stuff, then the only way to take out the drums from the OHs is EQ, and that wont get you very far.

Maybe a sidechained gate...?

Good luck.

[where02190]

Except for the (obvious) effect it creates, gated overheads are not used.

Overheads are the key to a good overall drum sound, not jsut cymbals. Most engineers (including myself) always start getting sounds with the overheads. reposition mics to get a good kit sound, including toms, snare, kick. Often, with the right position, and of course depending on the type of musis, this may be all the drums you need.

I generally track toms, but rarely use them when mixing. Most of my drums consist of overheads, room mics, kick and sometimes snare.

Concentrate on capturing the sound of the kit as a whole with overheads and room mics. A drum set is not a snare, kick, cymbals, but the sum of all these parts.

Hope this is helpful.

[dpasch]

I agree with above.
I try to be complete w/ Kik and OHs only.
Then use others for taste.
If you must continue down current road then use a high pass filter not a gate.

D

[Hank5]

I also like to use my overheads in and Upside down V. Within close proximity to one another that seems to give me a better stereo image of the kit. I'd have to say amen to all of the above. Because believe me live drum recording is all about experimentation from song to song, gig to gig.

[Joz]

I also agree... get the sound you want out of the OH's, and then compliment with the close mics (extra punch etc). You are gonna have to experiment a lot with the position of the OH's.. so what you want is less cymbals... cause you can always have more cymbals by compressing. sometimes a mic behind the drumer(placed really low) and a mic right on top of the drummer, gets the most natural sounding kit. And dont have the OH's panned hard left and right, 60% to 80% on each side gives you a tighter sound. you need to compress the OH's with a slow attack and fast release, to get a punchy sound.
Remember most of the sound from big records is coming from the OH's!!!