Recording Drums With Only One Microphone

Our latest two State Cows singles were recorded with only one microphone for the whole drum kit. The motivation behind this minimalist approach was mainly educational. We wanted to see if it was possible to achieve a great quality, clear, phase-coherent and punchy drum recording with only one microphone. We were also very short on time and wanted to spend as much effort as possible getting a good take rather than setting up mikes. So, was it possible to get a good sound this way? Yes and no.

We started out with a ribbon mic (which is figure-eight by design) trying to find a sweet spot, that is the placement where the balance between different drums as well as the individual drum sounds are optimal. The sweet spot will vary with rooms, microphones, drums and drummers. In our case the sweet spot turned out to be just beside the drummer above the floor tom with a slight angle towards the kick drum.

Needless to say, any position you find will be a compromise. Using only one mic, it's virtually impossible to optimize the sound of every drum since their respective projection areas and angles will all be different in relation to the mic. Most important is to get the drum sounds used the MOST (typically kick and snare) right.

A problem for us was the poor acoustics of the recording room. Poor acoustics can usually be somewhat remedied by close-miking but this option was obviously not available. Another trick to remove ambience is to gate the drums but this also turned out to be tricky since kick and snare share the same mic as cymbals. I ended up using a transient designer to remove some sustain and thereby reducing some of the ambience of the room.

The most successful track was Hard Goodbye where the slightly ambient and distant sound benefited the track as a whole.

The other track - Center of the Sun - called for a much drier and snappier sound and the distant sound didn't flatter the drums as much.

Equalizing turned out to be very difficult since all drums shared the same track. For example, I needed to cut some low mid frequencies out of the kick drum but doing so would also cut low mid out of the snare drum which was unnecessary. I had to compromise and cut only some low mid leaving a bit too much low mid on the kick drum and removing a bit too much from the snare drum. The ribbon mic was quite dark and needed a lot of hi boost. There is a limit though as to how much hi boost can be done before starting to sound unnatural. I would've liked to brighten the snare more but it was not possible without ruining the cymbal sounds.

In conclusion, the overall drum sound came out slightly dull (the ribbon mic is dark) and a bit boxy because of poor acoustics but with some punch and quite good balance. In a great acoustic room, this approach could work better. Still I'd probably add at least one additional mic on the kick and use the main mic as overhead thereby being able to have some control over the sound of the kick and the rest of the kit separately.