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Post by watchtower on Apr 7, 2015 20:30:06 GMT -6
First of all, I can't stand the sound of bottom snare mics on their own (on my stock, 14"x5" PDP snare, at least). It's such a ratty, cheap sound, but they're a necessary evil. If you don't mix the bottom mic way below the top mic, it pokes out and ruins the entire snare sound, but if you don't use one, the snare is too dull. Turns out I was using the wrong mic(s). I recently heard good things about the C414 under the snare, and realized I had never tried an LDC down there, and knew that a C12 would be fairly similar. This is easily the best under snare mic I've used. The C12 doesn't have that nasty harshness that every other mic I've tried on bottom snare does. Here's a really short clip... Beware, I like my snares dry and fat. dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1579861/Snare%20Miking%20Shootout.mp3This is snare mics only; the rest of the kit you hear is just bleed. I was experimenting all night with different mics and positions on snare. Anyway, no effects; just SM57 on top and C12 about 6dB lower on the bottom. Probably not everyone's ideal snare sound, but I like this style. Probably getting a Black Beauty this year. |
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Post by kcatthedog on Apr 8, 2015 4:05:37 GMT -6
Well there's some sound objective advice : good one Tim  |
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Post by svart on Apr 8, 2015 6:48:33 GMT -6
Uh, yeah. Probably my least favorite snare drum sound... Anyway, I've tried LDCs and SDCs and ribbons on snare top and bottom over the years. Frequency response aside, the problem with condensor mics to me has always been their sensitivity. Too much pickup, too much bleed and this just causes frequency issues later in mixing. I've gone back to using an SM57 under the snare simply because I only need a tiny bit of the snare wires in the mix. |
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Post by jcoutu1 on Apr 8, 2015 7:43:32 GMT -6
First of all, I can't stand the sound of bottom snare mics on their own (on my stock, 14"x5" PDP snare, at least). It's such a ratty, cheap sound, but they're a necessary evil. If you don't mix the bottom mic way below the top mic, it pokes out and ruins the entire snare sound, but if you don't use one, the snare is too dull. Turns out I was using the wrong mic(s). I recently heard good things about the C414 under the snare, and realized I had never tried an LDC down there, and knew that a C12 would be fairly similar. This is easily the best under snare mic I've used. The C12 doesn't have that nasty harshness that every other mic I've tried on bottom snare does. Here's a really short clip... Beware, I like my snares dry and fat. dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1579861/Snare%20Miking%20Shootout.mp3This is snare mics only; the rest of the kit you hear is just bleed. I was experimenting all night with different mics and positions on snare. Anyway, no effects; just SM57 on top and C12 about 6dB lower on the bottom. Probably not everyone's ideal snare sound, but I like this style. Probably getting a Black Beauty this year. That is fat man. Sounds good. Not the type of snare sound I would expect from a metal guy. Sounds like it would be boss for folk. |
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Post by tonycamphd on Apr 8, 2015 8:49:19 GMT -6
This is a perfectly useable sound.
As far as condensers on a snare? It depends how u place the mic, I've gotten great snare sounds using my old AKG 414TL2 in the 90's, but always at angle on top, snare sound usuall comes down to tuning and the drummers technique in striking the snare anyway IMO, the vast majority bash through a drum, and do not know how to pull the tone out of a drum with a strike, and no mic will save u from that.
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Post by svart on Apr 8, 2015 9:01:49 GMT -6
The best "snare wires" sound is from the air hole on the side, not necessarily from the bottom.
No joke.
Take your mic, point it at a 45deg angle towards the air hole about 1" back and 1" to the side. That way the air blast doesn't hit it. The small hole prefilters the tone to only higher frequencies. You'll also get some shell tone too.
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Post by tonycamphd on Apr 8, 2015 9:33:29 GMT -6
The best "snare wires" sound is from the air hole on the side, not necessarily from the bottom. No joke. Take your mic, point it at a 45deg angle towards the air hole about 1" back and 1" to the side. That way the air blast doesn't hit it. The small hole prefilters the tone to only higher frequencies. You'll also get some shell tone too. I don't think i've ever tried this? thanx for the tip! |
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Post by donr on Apr 8, 2015 9:53:28 GMT -6
The best "snare wires" sound is from the air hole on the side, not necessarily from the bottom. No joke. Take your mic, point it at a 45deg angle towards the air hole about 1" back and 1" to the side. That way the air blast doesn't hit it. The small hole prefilters the tone to only higher frequencies. You'll also get some shell tone too. Good tip. A cardioid perpendicular to the snare just off axis to the air hole, or just the snare shell a couple inches back works well. Corky Stasiak [ www.discogs.com/artist/390254-Corky-Stasiak ] engineer at the NY Record Plant when we were there, taught me that. A 57 looking at the top head of a snare drum is fairly useless by itself as a snare sound. The snare sound has to come from someplace else. No idea why it's the conventional recording wisdom. Maybe someone can 'splain it to me. |
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Post by svart on Apr 8, 2015 9:57:07 GMT -6
The best "snare wires" sound is from the air hole on the side, not necessarily from the bottom. No joke. Take your mic, point it at a 45deg angle towards the air hole about 1" back and 1" to the side. That way the air blast doesn't hit it. The small hole prefilters the tone to only higher frequencies. You'll also get some shell tone too. I don't think i've ever tried this? thanx for the tip! I found it by accident one day. I put in my earbuds and literally just held a mic in my hand and moved it around the snare while hitting it just to see what kinds of strange tones I could find on the drum! Mostly you just find modes/nodes where certain frequencies jump in and out of the spectrum. You'd be surprised what you find doing these kinds of things. Mostly you find that traditional setups work best, but every now and then you find something like this "one trick pony" type of thing. |
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Post by svart on Apr 8, 2015 10:00:27 GMT -6
The best "snare wires" sound is from the air hole on the side, not necessarily from the bottom. No joke. Take your mic, point it at a 45deg angle towards the air hole about 1" back and 1" to the side. That way the air blast doesn't hit it. The small hole prefilters the tone to only higher frequencies. You'll also get some shell tone too. Good tip. A cardioid perpendicular to the snare just off axis to the air hole, or just the snare shell a couple inches back works well. Corky Stasiak [ www.discogs.com/artist/390254-Corky-Stasiak ] engineer at the NY Record Plant when we were there, taught me that. A 57 looking at the top head of a snare drum is fairly useless by itself as a snare sound. The snare sound has to come from someplace else. No idea why it's the conventional recording wisdom. Maybe someone can 'splain it to me. Interesting, I found it completely by accident! A 57 can work, but you have to pull it back from the drum, usually so that the diaphragm is about 1" back from the rim, to allow some of the tone of the snare to develop. It makes bleed harder to deal with, but good positioning can always be found. I've gone back to the Audix I5 again on snare and it's working much better for me. |
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Post by watchtower on Apr 8, 2015 10:20:30 GMT -6
Hey Watchtower, I posted this response to your post over on groupdiy. You don't mention what capsule you are using. A CK12 capsule isn't center terminated and when exposed to high pressure the membrane hits the backplate. After repairing hundreds of CK12 capsules that have been used to mic guitar cabinets or close mic drums I'd say that using a CK12 capsule on loud sources almost guarantees destroying the membranes over time. If it's a cheap chinese capsule perhaps it's worth the tradeoff. If it's my capsule please use a pop filter and move it further away. If it's another manufacturer's please continue using it on loud source so that in the future if it fails you can replace it with mine ;D Hi Tim, THANK YOU for the warning! It's your CT12 in there. I did have a big pop filter over the C12 (I was actually more concerned about dust/drum stick debris flying into the headbasket than the SPL), but I'd rather not risk anything in the future. That's too bad, because it sounds MUCH better than all my other mics on bottom snare. I didn't hear any distortion in the C12 mic. If the membrane was hitting the backplate, would there be a distorted sound? I had a different SDC mic during the test that was distorting all over the place (the mic itself, not my recording chain), but the C12 sounded clean. |
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Post by watchtower on Apr 8, 2015 10:27:36 GMT -6
That is fat man. Sounds good. Not the type of snare sound I would expect from a metal guy. Sounds like it would be boss for folk. Yeah, I much prefer deep snares. I guess a lot of metal and hard rock guys like higher-pitched, ringy snares, and I can't stand those haha The best "snare wires" sound is from the air hole on the side, not necessarily from the bottom. No joke. Take your mic, point it at a 45deg angle towards the air hole about 1" back and 1" to the side. That way the air blast doesn't hit it. The small hole prefilters the tone to only higher frequencies. You'll also get some shell tone too. Great idea. I've tried the side/shell mic before, and didn't really like it, but I was using it as a single replacement for a top/bottom setup. I wasn't thinking of it as a bottom replacement. I think top/side could work just fine. The reason i didn't like the side mic was it was hard/impossible to bring out the attack the way you can with a top mic, and it was just too crunchy sounding. But again, I was using it as an entire snare miking replacement, not as a supplement. |
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Post by tonycamphd on Apr 8, 2015 10:40:50 GMT -6
The best "snare wires" sound is from the air hole on the side, not necessarily from the bottom. No joke. Take your mic, point it at a 45deg angle towards the air hole about 1" back and 1" to the side. That way the air blast doesn't hit it. The small hole prefilters the tone to only higher frequencies. You'll also get some shell tone too. Good tip. A cardioid perpendicular to the snare just off axis to the air hole, or just the snare shell a couple inches back works well. Corky Stasiak [ www.discogs.com/artist/390254-Corky-Stasiak ] engineer at the NY Record Plant when we were there, taught me that. A 57 looking at the top head of a snare drum is fairly useless by itself as a snare sound. The snare sound has to come from someplace else. No idea why it's the conventional recording wisdom. Maybe someone can 'splain it to me. Cool D! Thanx, check this out! 8) and then back it up and watch from the beginning, this guy is one of my top 3 favs of all time, just a crushing groove!! and hilarious to boot! I absolutely love the tuning as well, doesn't translate well on the vid mic, but would sound amazing in the context of a band IMO 4:28 pretty much says it all 8) |
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Post by watchtower on Apr 8, 2015 11:09:23 GMT -6
I used an under snare mic for many years. Eventually I ended up using an M88 compressed, gated, sent out through a tube screamer into a Fender bassman and returned, EQ'ed and brought up under the top snare mic. It certainly added a lot of whack. These days I strap an SM57 and an AKG D19 together and place them at whatever sweet spot I can find on the drum without the help of an under snare mic. Forget what I said about being careful with my capsule. Destroy it and have me re-membrane it or better yet, buy another. A man's gotta eat Haha! Well I do have a second, unused CT12 just sitting here waiting to be popped in mid drum session  On a serious note, though, I appreciate the warning. I record drums very infrequently, but I'd rather not damage the CT12, no matter how great it sounds on snare. |
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Post by Ward on Apr 8, 2015 11:34:48 GMT -6
BOTTOM SNARE MIC?
Come on, folks. The de-facto standard for this application is a Sennheiser 441. Set to M (full bandwidth) with the presence switch engaged. 2" from the bottom head, pointed at a 30º angle from the edge to the center point of the snare wires.
Mix it: Direct mic at '0' on your console (or if two direct mics, condenser at -3, dynamic at -5) and the bottom mic at -9.1
If you have never done this, or have never been schooled in the tradition, just try it. It works. Every single frickin' time.
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Post by baquin on Apr 8, 2015 11:46:15 GMT -6
Purdie is one of my favs too! His shuffle groove is so tight and those ghost notes...
I've used a Sennheiser 441 with success under the snare with a SM7 on top. *Edit: Just saw ward's post, never done it with that surgical precision, but will do it.
Thanks Svart and donr, gonna place the 441 in that position.
I really like that fat snare sound watchtower. You should grab that Black Beauty, they're pretty good.
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Post by watchtower on Apr 8, 2015 12:13:16 GMT -6
BOTTOM SNARE MIC? Come on, folks. The de-facto standard for this application is a Sennheiser 441. Set to M (full bandwidth) with the presence switch engaged. 2" from the bottom head, pointed at a 30º angle from the edge to the center point of the snare wires. Mix it: Direct mic at '0' on your console (or if two direct mics, condenser at -3, dynamic at -5) and the bottom mic at -9.1 If you have never done this, or have never been schooled in the tradition, just try it. It works. Every single frickin' time. How different is the 441 from a 421? I tried the 421 on bottom and HATED it. I also tried it on top and didn't like it. Much prefer the SM57 |
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Post by Ward on Apr 8, 2015 21:50:02 GMT -6
BOTTOM SNARE MIC? Come on, folks. The de-facto standard for this application is a Sennheiser 441. Set to M (full bandwidth) with the presence switch engaged. 2" from the bottom head, pointed at a 30º angle from the edge to the center point of the snare wires. Mix it: Direct mic at '0' on your console (or if two direct mics, condenser at -3, dynamic at -5) and the bottom mic at -9.1 If you have never done this, or have never been schooled in the tradition, just try it. It works. Every single frickin' time. How different is the 441 from a 421? I tried the 421 on bottom and HATED it. I also tried it on top and didn't like it. Much prefer the SM57 Couldn't be more different. There's no explaining how it sounds besides 'perfect'. Try the positioning I mentioned. |
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Post by watchtower on Apr 8, 2015 22:37:36 GMT -6
How different is the 441 from a 421? I tried the 421 on bottom and HATED it. I also tried it on top and didn't like it. Much prefer the SM57 Couldn't be more different. There's no explaining how it sounds besides 'perfect'. Try the positioning I mentioned. Haha. Well if I ever get a 441, I'll know where to stick it. Thanks for the tip I should probably also mention my three 421s are the MKII |
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Post by ragan on Apr 9, 2015 0:23:22 GMT -6
The 441 is my favorite mic for a lot of things. Anything snare is one of them. It might be the mic I'd pick if I could just have one.
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