Drums: Tutorial for best triggering live sound

[victor_propaganda]

First, hi all, sorry for my english, I´m spanish.
I'm the drummer of Propaganda. Since more than 10 years, I´m using a special configuration of electronics playing drums live. I have checked and tryed a lot of electronic equipment to have the sound cleaned and punched, and for me, the best solution is:
- 1 x Yamaha DT20 (trigger for each kick drum) (stroke to Alesis milivolts)
- 1 x Alesis D4 (DM5, etc) - trigger module (milivolts from trigger to midi port)
- 1 x Akai S3000XL (the most important part) - Sound Sampler (midi port to sound system in separated outputs)
This is our live video with this configuration, emulating ddrum kick sound:



If anyone is interested in it, I could continue next day...

This is the layout:




and the components:

 

[sixstringhotshot88]

looks cool. but all that gear just for a kick drum?

my drummer just used to use a 1 kick with a dt20 and dm5. the triggered sample was just a nice punch around the 6kish range if i remember. mix that with a good quality mic'd bass drum and a good drummer and it sounds awesome.

sometimes didn't even need the trigger depending on the venue.

 

[victor_propaganda]

For me yes, only for the kick drum, because Ddrum bass drum quality is better than dm5; anyway you could use this for the toms and the snare, with midi velocity layers; in all the cases the drum sounds better than the mics, the most part of the referent bands use Ddrum Brain because is more practical, with this gear, you are going to sound better than the bands that playing with mics, clean and powerfull. When you are going to play in a venue, you have a little time to check the mics and to try it, but with triggers, your sound is perfect in all the cases.

Akai sampler is for upload in it the kick drum sound from Superior Drummer or another kick wav that you like, snare wav and toms wav, ... and, each one, with an isolated audio output to the gear sound of the venue.

 

[victor_propaganda]

For the kick drum, I use Yamaha DT20 trigger (a sensor that converts pressure or strokes in milivolts for the Alesis D4 module). The best way to paste the trigger to the head, is with a double-sided adhesive tape for carpet; clean the head and the trigger with alcohol as well as possible, and paste the tape between them in the top of the head.



Why I don't use DDRUM trigger: I have had a lot of problems with it, because the sponge deteriorates and off...

Connect the trigger to the Alesis D4 input 1 (with a mono cable)
Next day, I will post the configuration of the Alesis D4 to avoid the crosstalk, etc..

For now, very simple...

 

[LBTM]

Sounds good bro! Why don't you use it on toms too?

How reliable are these DT20? Have you broke any?

 

[xFkx]

I'd propably switch to a 2box module, for reasons of weight alone