how to get a tight, powerful, drum sound

hey everyone, pretty soon i will be recording my bands next cd, and since i just want to focus on the drums first, im looking at getting a nice tight drum sound ala john theodore of the mars volta. if you listen to his drum sounds, the kick doesnt really have alot of low end, but its really in your face and very well defined, the tom and floor tom, panned hard left/right are punchy and very very tight and in your face as well as the snare, and the overheads are just kind of in the background and the cymbals dont really jump out--there really compressed, but they're still there. i pretty much understand exactly what sound im going for, i just have a few problems. the last time we had a practice session to do some demo drum recordings, this is what i noticed: -my kick and snare sounds just need alittle bit more tightness to them -the tom was miked with a 57 [and the floor with a seinheiser kick mic..btw should i be using a kick mic or another 57]--they were both rattling during the songs and they werent damp enough, and there was too much bleed to be able to add that hi-end to get punch -my biggest problem: the overheads. i always get too much cymbal when im recording, and it leaves me at a lack of options during mixing, because if he smacks the cymbals they sound very weird, whereas with the mars volta they dont really 'jump out' at you like mine do but they sound alot more well defined. how can i calm down the cymbals so there pretty much the same level as every thing else? whenever i compress my overheads my cymbals always sound horrible, there more of this smack then this washy sound, and im looking for that cymbal sound that sounds like theres a sidechain compressor with the kick drums signal on them to get rid of that weird treblyish smack in the beginning. whats the best way to set up the overheads for that sound, and what are some good sidechain compression settings? if anyone has any advice, please post here; theres never enough 'drum sound' topics out there thanks, steve

ok this isnt fully mixed or anything its still work in progress its a project im working on but tell me if this is kinda what u mean and if there is anything u like i can give u some tips for with what i did

ok the server went down it should be back up in a few

Not bad, your close enough. heheh.

Heres a really cool thread on recording drums basically its: - one overhead directly over the center of the snare at 2 drumsticks length pointing straight down - one overhead over the drummers right shoulder 2 drumsticks in length away from the center of the snare pointing at the center of the snare - both mics are equal distance from the kick drum I've been experimenting with this technique recently and it focuses more on the snare and toms than the cymbals (but there is still plenty of cymbals) and is a less 'roomy' sound due to the oh's being close to the kit and pointing straight down and almost straight down.

on the snare i just have a sm57 on the top and the bottom then i eqed the top of the snare i took alot of the low end away and kept it bright it doesnt sound too good when its solo-ed then the bottom i eqed more mid lows and blended the bottom with the top then even though the top of the snare didnt sound that good solo-ed when its mixed with the overheads it sounds really good plus the kid had it tuned really good(he's a really good drummer for only being a freshman in highschool) on the rack tom i had an Audix Fusion F10(tom mic) and on the floor tom i had an Audix Fusion F12(kick drum mic) then i eqed them by setting the Q to the narrowest it goes turned up the gain all the way then swept through the frequencies to find what sounded good i did the mid highs first then the mid lows then i just rolled off the lows a little and i didnt touch the highs at all o and also it wasnt recorded in any sounding live room at all its just in my bedroom witch is really dead then i added room2 reverb to just the overheads but u cant hear the reverb as much in this clip i have a clip from onother song witch i can hear it more but its still not too much

actually i dont think u need killer pre amps or mics im not saying it wont help but all i used was MXL 603s overheads 2 SM57s on the snare Beta 52 Kick Audix F10 Rack Tom Audix F12 Floor tom then i put the overheads into inputs 1 and 2 on my 001 then everything else got pluged directly into the 1/4" inputs using XLR - 1/4" cables and i dont think the drums sound bad at all for what i used

A mic 2 sticklengths over a snare will get hit every time. You cannnot connect mics into the 1/4" line inputs of the 001, you need mic preamps to boost the level of the mic output to line level first. Empirical Labs makes the Distressor, it's a hardware unit. Best compressor there is IMHO.