Best guess for kick drum?

Making plans for recital I'm recording on Thursday.  I think I have everything covered except the kick drum - haven't recorded one of them before.

I expect the music to be light jazz or perhaps poppish.  I'll put a pair of small condensors XY overhead.  I have an SM57 I can put on the snare.  Figure the kick is the only other piece I need.

Mics in the kit that aren't already claimed are:
Oktava MK-012 (Omni, Card, Hyper)
Beyer M300 (SM58-type dynamic, but more bass presence)
SM58

Everything else I have is already taken.  I'm figuring the Beyer would be my first bet - what would you try first?

[boooom]

Sure, use the Beyer.  If you're mixing these live, you should try to get your hands on a gate if you don't own one.  The kick sustain will come through on the overheads, but the sustain you normally get from a close-miked kick drum are a bit undesireable, unless you're going for that rap boooom...

Do you know whether the kik drum is open headed with a sandbag inside to deaden the sound, or on the other extreme double headed without a port?  

If it's the double headed kind then an extra mic/channel helps a lot.  You can put a single large diaphram condenser about a foot or two out from the top of the kik drum pointing straight at the kik or kik and toms.  It can add an accurate but meaty sound to the kik [and toms] that the overheads and close-mics can't alone, and fill in the 'hole in the middle' that can occur.  If it needs any added thump or click the close-mic is always there.

My friend/consultant suggests to get a nady dmk7 - $179 - he claims its one of the best sounding 7 mic drum kits hes used... and hes used a lot more expensive ones... Just a suggestion (i might pick these up soon)

RonC

I think I am pretty good at making drums sound good in my recordings. If you want Zelmin, maybe you can show me what you drum tracks sound like after you are done, and I can give you some tips. Or if you need some mic placement tips, be sure to PM me.

Why PM ? I'd like to know too  

Well, I usually gate and compress the kick and snare. This is to solo out the background noise you hear from the mic.

What outboard gear do you use for a gate? Compressor? What settings? Thanks. You do get good drums. Must be something in that Texas air!!

Zemlin, if you can get your hands on the AKG D112 "egg" mic for the kick, I think you'd be happy with it.  In the past, I've placed this mic inside the kick, about 4 inches from the front head.  This gives a pretty good pickup of the hammer smack, as well as the obvious low end inside the drum itself.  FWIW...

Your miking of the drum kit sounds pretty similar to the way I've done things in the past.

From the choices stated, I'd go with the Beyer poking into the front of the kick.  However, if you have a spare channel, I might put the Oktava in Cardioid mode pointing straight at the beater.  In the past I've found that this can add a bit of extra definition to the kick sound...thump from the Beyer and a bit of "edge" from hearing the beater.

Bob

Using the SM-58 type would be my guess; definitely use a gate to tighten up the sound for control during the show (you can always bypass it).

Watch your placement- may pick up some foot traffic on some risers if you can't put the mike on a pillow in the drum itself.

For mixing down, you'll have more space to work with the gated kick sound. I found the freeware AnalogX gate to work wonders for the band I've been working with lately.

tim

When you guys record drums, do you use any outboard compressor/gates, or do you go into Audition totally dry, and put the gates on then?  I normally like to record everything as dry as possible, so as not to paint myself into a corner.

I also follow the dry philosophy, but hardware peek limitting on the drum track analog inputs can prevent ugly digital clipping while staying out of the way otherwise.  

I'm looking at an eight channel mic. preamp with built in limitting.  Now with 20-24 bit recording though, digital clipping while recording is a bit less of a problem, since you can provide a bit more headroom.

When you guys record drums, do you use any outboard compressor/gates, or do you go into Audition totally dry, and put the gates on then?  I normally like to record everything as dry as possible, so as not to paint myself into a corner.

I record dry mixes on everything- then add in what I think is needed. I'll play with different things on the mixdown to get a drum sound that we like, usually using a gate, reverb, and dynamics processor (in that order) to make it happen.

I record dry mixes on everything- then add in what I think is needed. I'll play with different things on the mixdown to get a drum sound that we like, usually using a gate, reverb, and dynamics processor (in that order) to make it happen.

That's exactly what I do!