First of all, I want to say that I'm not big on drum microphone packages. The idea of getting “everything you need” for recording drums seams like a sensible idea. However, it's a tad short sighted for lack of a better word.

There Is No Such Thing As A Drum Microphone

There! I've said it. There is no drum microphone. I've yet to encounter a microphone that could only “hear” drums. Microphones capture sound. It makes no difference whether you clap, scream, and hit round things really hard. If you make ruckus, a functional mic is going to pick it up. These drum packages imply that there is a “technically proper” microphone for every job. I guess there is, but 10 different pro audio engineers are going to give you 9 answers. The proper mic is the one that sounds the best on a given source, I guess. That's it. Good luck figuring out what “best” means.

In big boy land, the MD 421 by Sennheiser is kind of the “standard” tom mic. Again, 10 different engineers are going to give you 9 different answers but the two that agree are probably using MD 421s on their toms. It used to be the standard on kick drum 20 or so years ago. Somewhere in there some engineers tended to drift in other directions in terms of choosing the right kick drum mic. Every engineer worth his / her crappy paycheck could get a good sounding kick drum with a MD 421 (assuming the kick drum sounded good to begin with). So, the MD 421 is not a tom mic and it is not a kick drum mic. It's just a “sound” mic. It happens to typically work pretty well on the sources I mentioned.

Of course, the MD 421 is very popular on electric guitars, bass cabinets, and sometimes even vocals (I can't say that I have ever liked it for this application). My point is a mic is a mic. There are reasons that some mics sound better on certain instruments when going for a certain sound and it's your job as an audio engineer to find out why.

Why can't a person put the small diaphram condensers that often come in these drum packages on the toms? (I love Oktava MK012s on toms). What would happen if you put the mics labeled “tom” as the overheads? I'm not saying this is going to give you what you want, but if you are new to this it's your job to find out. If you haven't tried doing things “wrong”, you don't know what you are doing. Always break the rules to see what you end up with.

What About Other Instruments?

I've mentioned how the Sennheiser MD 421 is useful for toms, kick, guitars, bass, and sometimes even vocals. The MD 421 has a certain character that isn't perfect on everything, but it is often a useful character. The Oktava MK012 (a great budget small diaphram condenser) is also useful on a lot of things. The Shure SM 57 is useful, in my opinion, on just about everything.

You just don't hear experienced guys talking about the tom mic in X brand drum mic kit being useful on everything. I'm all for experimenting and would gladly try out a mic in a drum package on number of sources (if I could actually hook the mic to a stand....many tom mics have those clips built in). However, if a person can't try out a bunch of mics before buying, the best option is to stick with the known winners that work on other instruments. The focus should not be on “drum mics”. The focus should be on building a mic collection that lets you record great tones for every instrument. The focus should be on versatility. When choosing condenser overheads (if you need condensers or overheads at all) you should also be thinking of acoustic guitar and vocals (which are sometimes better served with dynamics). In fact, I'd try to find a solid vocal mic and use it has my overheads if the budget was that tight.

Is This How You Really Record Drums

Another reason I'm not huge on these packages is that they insinuate that you are supposed to record drums in X fashion. I just read an article in TapeOp about a guy who has worked with Eric Clapton and Ludacris. He said that he didn't like overheads. He said an overwhelming bulk of the sound of the drums comes from three condenser microphones placed 15' from the drums. Of course, this guy is robo pro and has world class room to record drums in. However, it illustrates a great point. The overall sound of your drums interacting with a room is what you should be trying to capture. This is the sound of drums as we know it. The room is as much a part of the sound of drums as is the distortion is in a Marshall guitar head. Without the room, the drums are not really “there” in my opinion. This is what makes drums come alive. Don't get me wrong. Your drums don't have to sound overly reverbed. That isn't what I'm saying. I'm saying that the average home recording guy loses the best thing about the drums when focusing on close mics and completely forgetting about room mics. There are exceptions to this, but I can't think of a time when I wouldn't want loud room mics on a drum kit except for when the room is horrendous.

Some of the most popular drum sounds in history were recorded with just a couple microphones. Both big and small sounds can be recorded with just a few mics. Now, the Slipknot fan is shaking his head. Well, do yourself a favor. Record just overheads and listen...a lot. You'll probably think the kick sounds weak and tubby. (For metal, I'd use blankets over the kick drum to reduce it's volume a tad in the overheads...or place the overheads in a way that the kick drum sounds pleasing). Note the good things the overheads have. Note the bad things (like the weak kick drum). Now, imagine you had none of that. Do the same thing with room mics. Now listen to the snare top and kick drum solo'd. It'll probably sound like you are in a room with padded walls where you need a straight jacket. All 3 of these things mentioned have their place. It's up to you to blend them in a pleasing, exciting way that adds to the music.

A lot of beginners seem to equate close micing with “modern” sounding. This is just not accurate. Granted, it doesn't hurt to have the close mics and even the dude in TapeOp said that he likes to have them there even if he doesn't use them that much. Yes, the Elvis drum sound did not involve close micing the drums. However, I guess I'm saying that you can expect to be disappointed the first time you pull up the kick and snare mics. It will sound boring. Even if you think your room sucks, I'd experiment with getting some natural room reflections in the drum sound. You'll be glad you did.

If I was just getting started, I'd ditch the close micing scheme in a hurry if I only had 8 mics to work with. Of course, I would take the time to make sure I was getting what I needed with the performances in terms of the drummer balancing his kit. If the snare wasn't loud enough, the drummer would just have to make it louder.

Do These Drum Packages Sound Good?

I've never heard anyone rave about their drum sound they captured with these drum mic packages...EVER! The kid recording metal (where I would normally want a lot of close mics) is going to think that he MUST have mics on the toms to make them sound HUGE is going to be in for a surprise when he realizes that the close mics don't sound huge, but sound boomy, flat, or boring without other mics to compliment them. Again, no matter what style of music, if I only had 8 mics, I'd have at least one, but maybe 3 mics that are distant from the drums. So the notion of a close mic'd floor tom sounding huge is quickly thrown out the window in exchange for the entire drum kit having balls and excitement.

Price

First of all, drum microphone packages are not inexpensive. You can pay serious money and end up with less than serious microphones. As I stated before, many of the tom mics won't even fit on a real stand. How is a person supposed to mic a guitar cabinet with a clip mic? Granted, it can be done, but this alone shows the short sightedness of many of the “tom” mic designs. The clip method is useful in live situations but that's the extent of it.

Assuming that it is not practical to use the tom mics for micing guitars, you'll need to buy another mic. So by the time you factor in mics for other instruments, you've spent a lot more money on a lot more mics that you had originally planned. In other words, none of your mics should be specialized for the drums.

Let's say you pick up a Shure SM 57 for electric guitar. My gut tells me that the SM 57 is going to be better for your snare than whatever your drum mic package came with anyway. (Maybe not, but I bet you the 57 is more versatile than the “snare” mic in your package. At least the 57 can be attached to the mic stand and just happens to be one of the most popular electric guitar mics of all time).

Now let's say you need a condenser for your acoustic guitar sounds. (You may not need a condenser, I've used a 57 on acoustic guitars in dense mixes although I wouldn't like it if the acoustic guitar was prominent). You could (and should) try out the condensers that came with your drum mic package, but it's going to be hit or miss. If you don't like the sound of the included condensers, you'll be buying new ones anyway. Of course, if you buy new condensers, what happens if you like the sound of the new condensers better than the condensers included in your drum mic package? Your drum mic package is getting less and less useful for recording and more and more useful for collecting dust.

Of course, there is something else we haven't mentioned....resale value! If you buy a used Shure SM57 (I have 6 used Shure SM 57s and they all sound extremely similar) for $80, you can always sell it for $81. I know of no person who has sold a drum mic kit for what he/she paid for it.

My Recommendations

If I didn't have $50k to blow on recording equipment, I'd start recording drums with the following rig. Feel free to substitute whatever for your situation. I want to add that the mic used is not nearly as important as where you put it. I don't necessarily mean that you should get out the protractor and ruler to move the mic 1/4”. Although, there are a couple of times when that sort of thing is necessary. I mean that putting a 57 8' from the snare on one side and another 57 8' from the snare on the other side may sound drastically better (or worse) than using the convention close micing strategy. So try different approaches to recording drum. You can get more ideal mics for this later when you realize what it is you don't like about X mic and what “more ideal” means.

Package of 4 SM57s – If there isn't a package of 4 Shure SM 57s on Ebay for $240 right now, wait a week. There will be! This is the best value you are ever going to find in your drum micing life. The SM 57 is about as versatile as it gets. It's not always perfect, but it's seldom a bad choice. You can use the SM 57s as kick, snare, tom, overheads, and even room mics (but be careful with the high end / upper mids). Of course, you also use these for vocals, bass, and especially electric guitar. The great news. You could sell these individually for $80 all day long on Ebay. You can probably make a profit buying and selling your SM 57s.

1 Oktava MK012 – Snag one of these for $150 or less. It can be a great overhead, probably a little bright for a room mic (maybe too much cymbal). It's great on toms. You could try it on just about anything just to see what happens. It has a very pronounced proximity effect. It can be used for vocals, but it's very sensitive to plosives.

1 $100 Large Diaphram Condenser - I'd get one $100 condenser. What brand? Who cares! Just make sure it doesn't have too much high end. I'm thinking maybe the Kel HM-1 would be a good choice based off recommendations from my peers. Just about anything that isn't too bright is going to work out okay.

1 $100 Large Diaphram Condenser – I'd get one $100 condenser. What brand? Who cares!....as long as it's different from the other $100 condenser. We are looking for different flavors and sounds here. The concept perfect stereo matched pairs is crap in my opinion.

Okay, so my drum mic package may cost a little more than X package from Shure, Audio Technica or AKG. However it can handle just about anything. Whether you need to record metal drums, a tuba, a rock singer, a cannon, or classic rock guitars you should be able to find a mic that works well for every application. All of these mics hold their value fairly well so you'll never be out that much cash.

You may notice that there is no dedicated kick drum mic. Why? Why not? This is the fun part, you could get to choose which mic to put on the kick drum and where. I'd probably start with one of the LDCs...if the kick drum needs a mic at all.

Conclusion

There a billion possibilities when it comes to recording. You need flexibility when your gear to be able to recording whatever it is you are recording. Getting dedicated mics is not a bad choice if you already have a selection of mics to choose from, but this is assuming that the difference between mics is that big of deal. A lot of times the difference from one mic to another is not what you may expect. You may want to check out Microphones Don't Make THAT Much Difference.

The important thing is the music. The much less significant part is the “tactics” you choose to record your music with. It's important to be able to try recording drums with a single mic 10 feet away. It's important to try out 3 mics that are 6 feet away. It's important to try out the typical close micing setup. Unfortunately, the drum mic kits often leave with you more or less stuck with the last method with mics that you'll probably end up replacing anyway.