Terry Manning, on recording Led Zeppelin:

"He didn't want lots of mics. He wanted one mic if possible, two mics if you had to, three mics if you could wring it out of him by begging."

I think they 'ghosted' some of the stereo imagining...on tom rolls and the like...by panning. That's an assumption on faulty memory, though. I'm pretty frickin' exhausted.

rayj wrote:Terry Manning, on recording Led Zeppelin:

"He didn't want lots of mics. He wanted one mic if possible, two mics if you had to, three mics if you could wring it out of him by begging."

I think they 'ghosted' some of the stereo imagining...on tom rolls and the like...by panning. That's an assumption on faulty memory, though. I'm pretty frickin' exhausted.

Yeah, I've always wondered how they got the tight stereo placement on the tom rolls in 'Dyermaker'? Maybe they spot miked and brought them up just for the roll. If so, then so much for the minimal mic setup idea . And apparently, so much for the engineer's personal safety too !

rayj wrote:Lately, in my crap practice space recordings, I have been relying more and more on a single microphone for everything except the kick. If I had a better microphone, and a real room, I would probably drop the kick as well.

Yeah you can make great drum recordings with one microphone, but if I have the resources I'll always throw up a bunch. Why not? It's alot easier to mute however many in mixdown then turn 1 into several.

m.koren wrote:
I don't know about ONE microphone Rayj. I've never heard a Zep track with mono drums.

Go back and listen to led zeppelin I. I like the mono drums cause it opened up all the room on the guitars out on the outside.

Tape Op #39, Jan/Feb 2004 - interview with Andy Johns: "When The Levee Breaks" was 2 M160's, one of which was up on a staircase like 20 yards away, the other a little close to the kick. Sounds like they two are panned about 10&2.

wiggins wrote:

m.koren wrote:
I don't know about ONE microphone Rayj. I've never heard a Zep track with mono drums.

Go back and listen to led zeppelin I. I like the mono drums cause it opened up all the room on the guitars out on the outside.

Tape Op #39, Jan/Feb 2004 - interview with Andy Johns: "When The Levee Breaks" was 2 M160's, one of which was up on a staircase like 20 yards away, the other a little close to the kick. Sounds like they two are panned about 10&2.

That's weird, because Andy said in another interview that they hung TWO mics on the staircase . Jimmy Page said in a Guitar Player interview that the room acoustics were such that they didn't need to worry about the kick for 'Levee'. Jimmy also mentioned something about panning everything around during the mix. Of course , it's wasn't just the musicians that did a lot of drugs in the seventies, so why take their distant memories as 'The Word' . Not that I'm knockin' drug taking in the seventies or anything...

Oh yeah, Zep 1... Glyn John's mic setup probably ? Bass and drums to two tracks on a 1 inch eight track perhaps ? Wiggins, are you just going by the sound of it , or do you know for sure the drums are mono ? I don't have a copy of that album right now but, I do recall some stereo tom fills that do not sound like panning moves. Let me know.

This is one good reason to record the drums in such a way that you can make the call as to how big the drums are during mix down. Get a great "close up" sound with separately tracked room ambiance that can be added to taste if the track dictates.

If you mic the drums with only the "big" sound in mind, you run the risk of having direct sounds that sound weak when the ambiance is removed. I know this is a mistake I've made in the past...

But I recommend tracking the room ambiance no matter what. If you need it later, the mic-ed ambiance is likely to be more convincing than any artificial ambiance you might have available.