Minimum mic'ing

[Genius Gone Insane]

1) I don't see any way you can get a lot of clarity in metal music using such few mics on the drums.

2) It is, however, possible to accurately trigger your snare/kick toms from these mics afterward. You don't want to do it this way, with all the filtering/editing but it is possible.

 

[Ice_T's_Bobblehat]

There's only 2 reasons in my opinion why so few mic's were used on Led Zep records etc... 1. Physical track number limitation, and 2. a decent mic probably cost the same as a house back then so I doubt studio's would have had the barrage of gear we would expect them to have nowadays.

I'd say mic everything you physically can within the limitations of your budget/hardware (obviously using some common sense...don't go mic'ing up the stands, the drummer's girlfriend etc)
Better to have too much that you can turn down or delete if you don't want it rather than thinking "mmm, I wish there were more cowbell in the mix"

 

[stringy_]

how many of you just use overheads and a kick mic and maybe a snare mic for recording drums? i am having an argument with a guy in another forum and he insist that the less the better. this guy is old school and he keeps refering to led zepelins sound as being the best sounding drums for rock, i keep telling him... yeah for that time peroid but for todays metal it doesnt work....am i wrong or do some of you use only three mics or four at the most?

Hehe, the reason Zep had the best drums for rock and roll was because Bonzo was banging around on them. Not the mic'ing.

I'm fairly certain you could have miced that guy with a single Radioshack mic and he'd sound amazing.

 

[Nebulous]

budget/hardware (obviously using some common sense...don't go mic'ing up the drummer's girlfriend etc)

Duno, sometimes that might sound better than the band you're recording

 

[scorpio01169]

i agree, with metal you need to almost mic everything to get that close up sound