John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

I don't Record in a Purposebuild Drumroom. In fact I Record in a Glorified Brick Tunnel where the space between my Overheads and the ceiling is only about 30 Centimeters. So before Buying Acoustic Treatment I Wanted to check if putting Bookshelfs around the Kit and something like a Blanket up top would work. All help appreciatd.

you can try it and see. the books and the shelves will likely act to absorb and scatter, and a blanket across will likely temper some of the higher frequencies off the ceiling.

Drums like a lively room but small is unlikely to sound great. Try the microphones at the ceiling, amost touching, or pressed against a think foam layer. PZ M style. This will remove the destructive ceiling reflections from your overheads.

I've just tried putting them up against the wall. But there's a weird Distortion going on in the snare and toms.
What causes this? I'd like to give you an example but the forum does not allow me to post wav.

Anton E. wrote:I've just tried putting them up against the wall. But there's a weird Distortion going on in the snare and toms.
What causes this? I'd like to give you an example but the forum does not allow me to post wav.

Had to do it in MP3

chances are you don't even need the overhead. as a general guide, the overhead should be high enough that the phase relationship between (say) the snare mic is kept in phase or 180 out - anything else means phase issues... given the small space, maybe put the "overhead" mic just above and behind your shoulder (say ear level) aimed between the toms, and a kick mic. maybe an under-snare mic. see what you get from those 2 or 3 mics.

I work in a Metal context. will that mic setup work with that?

it's only 3 mics, so experimenting shouldn't take long it worked for Led Zepplin and i think they have decent drum sounds... and i used it to record a 12 drum (plus probably that many cymbals) heavy rock drummer back in the 90's. also sounded good.

Ok I'll Try!