Hi hat mic or bottom snare mic?

[Uladyne]

Hello all. I've got a chance to record some drums soon, and since I have only 8 inputs to work with and a 5 piece kit, I'm wondering what I should use for the 8th input.

Inputs 1-7 will obviously be used for drums and overheads, but I'm not sure if I should go with a hi hat mic or a bottom snare mic for the remaining input. Normally I'd go with a hi hat mic since I'd be replacing the drum hits anyway, but the drummer I'll be recording has a few areas where he likes to do some dynamic double stroke snare rolls and stuff, which might get lost or hard to recreate with samples if I use only a top mic on the snare. What do you guys think? To hell with the hi hat mic?

 

[Lasse Lammert]

omit the hats

 

[Metaltastic]

I guess it really depends on whether he's gonna do any Portnoy/Peart style hi-hat wizardry; if not, definitely ditch it in favor of Snare bottom IMO!

 

[Zack Uidl]

+1 to that. Most the session dudes that I record need a hat mic because of their playing style. But if it is only going to be used in a really straightforward way, then bottom snare mic for sure

 

[Lasse Lammert]

if you ditch the second snare mic make sure to pull that sm57 more out.
I mean not that far over the skin, but more "next to" the snare pointing at the rim, that way you get a bit more crack

 

[Jaymz]

Or if you sample the snare use the input for another ambient mic or something

 

[alan1990]

mix the toms down to a stereo channel and mic both the snare bottom and hi hats. if you pan one tom hard left the next center and the next far right it should be easy enough to cut them out latter on in the session and pan them where you want.

 

[beyond dead]

def. the bottom snare mic! I never record without one!

 

[John_C]

it depends what the snare sounds like and what you want it to sound like
someimes i find myself omitting the bottom snare mic altogether during mixing, as the top mic seems to have picked up enough of the sound of the springs
but i'd def choose it over hats, although if you read oz's drum guide there's some cool stuff you can do with phase cancelling and a HH mic in order to reduce bleed

 

[ahjteam]

Depends really on the style of music. If its some superfast and technical metal, I would closemic the drums and the hihat and ditch the snare bottom mic and then sample replace the snare for the bottom sound. But if its for example hardrock where the drummer uses mainly just kick+snare+hihat/ride with just random cymbal and tomhits, I would rather concetrate on what he plays the most and ditch the close miced toms and set the mics 1 kick 2-3 snare 4-5 oh 6 hh 7 ride 8 ambience

 

[John_C]

what sort of band is it gonna be?

 

[robfromthedeep]

Record a load of samples of the snare with 2 mics then you can mic up the hi-hat and just use the samples you made earlier for snare?

 

[Uladyne]

They're kinda modern pop-metalish with a hint of screamo thrown in. They aren't as bad as that description sounds, but they aren't really my cup of tea, either. Kinda like 36 crazyfists. The drummer seems to do more intricate stuff on the snare than on the hats, which is why I'm leaning towards using a bottom snare mic. He also keeps his snares pretty loose to get that sizzle, which normally I hate, but would be hard to replicate with samples alone, so I'm thinking it might be a good idea to get that snare sizzle on tape, so I don't have a facepalm moment later trying to recreate those little roll things. You know those parts where it's almost like a snare roll at a circus before someone does some crazy shit with a few louder hits placed here and there? That kind of stuff. I might use samples for the loud hits but keep the bottom track in there to keep that sizzle intact.

 

[Uladyne]

Record a load of samples of the snare with 2 mics then you can mic up the hi-hat and just use the samples you made earlier for snare?

Yea I was thinking of doing that, but I fully expect a nightmare trying to trigger samples off of the little double stroke rolls. Hell on earth, really. So I want to try to keep as much of the actual bottom mic performance in as possible, and use samples just for the louder hits.

 

[devouredremains]

Yea I was thinking of doing that, but I fully expect a nightmare trying to trigger samples off of the little double stroke rolls. Hell on earth, really. So I want to try to keep as much of the actual bottom mic performance in as possible, and use samples just for the louder hits.

If you decide to try replacing the snare and don't plan on blending the snare samples with the original track you could just chop out everything between the snare hits. It will give you much more control over the sensitivity control in your replacement software.

I use drumagog so I would then also sample quite a few articulations with as many velocities as possible in order to set up as many dynamic groups as the drummers style dictates.

It's fairly easy to achieve convincing results with this method.

 

[Uladyne]

I need to get me some drumagog. I've been using KTdrumtrigger to convert audio to midi and then triggering either DFH or samples in battery. But still, removing space between hits on rolls like that = hell on earth. I'll do it if it's absolutely necessary, but I'm hoping it doesn't come down to that.

 

[Morgan C]

One option (although this might not work), would be to sample the top snare and then just use the bottom snare mic. Should be less bleed and easier to trigger off it (the bottom has sharper transients), so you can just use sample replacement to put the top of the snare back on. In this case I'd probly use a room mic (unless the hats are too quiet, but usually the opposite is the case). If this doesn't work then I'd go with the bottom snare mic.

 

[Metaltastic]

I need to get me some drumagog. I've been using KTdrumtrigger to convert audio to midi and then triggering either DFH or samples in battery. But still, removing space between hits on rolls like that = hell on earth. I'll do it if it's absolutely necessary, but I'm hoping it doesn't come down to that.

Psshh, APTrigga Nukka!