Kick drum heads.
Kick drum heads.
Sure it's a silly question on the recording forum. But I need a new kick head for our rock kit and was wanting to hear some opinions as to what the preferred batter side head for pure rock fury is.
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Ok, so first the annoying questions: What kind of kit and what size is the drum?
Now, with that out of the way, here's what I would probably say regardless of your answers: Remo Powerstroke III
I love that head, but I always put them on my old ludwig vistalite kit, which are kinda unique-sounding kits. People have brought in Aquarian and Evans heads that were cool, but I love the Powerstroke.
It has great built-in dampening, too. I love putting one on either side with no hole. Tons of resonance, not too much ring.
My $0.02
Now, with that out of the way, here's what I would probably say regardless of your answers: Remo Powerstroke III
I love that head, but I always put them on my old ludwig vistalite kit, which are kinda unique-sounding kits. People have brought in Aquarian and Evans heads that were cool, but I love the Powerstroke.
It has great built-in dampening, too. I love putting one on either side with no hole. Tons of resonance, not too much ring.
My $0.02
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- gimme a little kick & snare
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I also like the power stroke III. I prefer not to have the little pad over where the beater hits the head. It messes with the attack, but obviously then the heads don't last as long. I like the remo ebony ambassador heads for the front. The ebony are easier for me to dampen, thicker maybe? I hate anything with the foam ring inserts. Just makes the whole thing dead for me.
- oldguitars
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thud= Powerstroke and smooth white ambassador with 8" hole, small towel touching both heads (all my 22" work great like this)
boom thud= coated emperor and smooth white small towel touching both heads and no hole. (my 60's ludwig 20" is a cannon like this)
Big Boom= Fiberskyn BD both sides, towel or no towel, depending on drum. My 28" will make your ass rumble like this, with small towel...
boom thud= coated emperor and smooth white small towel touching both heads and no hole. (my 60's ludwig 20" is a cannon like this)
Big Boom= Fiberskyn BD both sides, towel or no towel, depending on drum. My 28" will make your ass rumble like this, with small towel...
Oh, excuse me! Do you mind if I date yer punkin?
- digitaldrummer
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I was always a plain coated ambassador or emperor type guy, usually with a felt strip running across somewhere, but I had to put all new heads on an old ludwig kit recently and I was in a family-run drum shop with a good vibe and I felt like widening my horizons a bit so I decided to ask the shop owner what I should use on the bass drum. He recommended the smooth white powerstroke 3. My first internal inclination (as a jazz snob by upbringing) was, "what? not coated?!?! and aren't powerstrokes for frizzy haired rockers who don't know how to tune or dampen a drum right?" I decided to take his recommendation anyway, though (being the open minded guy that I am), and I have to say it kicks ass. all over the place.
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- zen recordist
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but if you CAN tune a drum, the superkick2 batter with an evans eq-whatever on the front yields a pretty damn good 'rock' kick drum that doesn't really need any eq to sound 'finished'. and that's nice.mattwhritenour wrote:I find the Aqurian Superkick to be for people that can't tune a bass drum so let's just dampen the F*** out of it. It has no life.
agreed about the fiberskyn big boom. if you tune it as low as it'll go and really dial in the note, it's a pretty great sound. can really fill up a room, so you can play really sparse beats. which is good if you're lazy like i am.
i like the powerstroke 3 as well, and that's probably as close to a standard as anything, i'd think.
off topic but on the subject of heads, have you guys tried the fiberskyn powerstroke on snare? kind of cool. pretty muffled and not much at all in the way of harmonics, but what's cool is that the fundamental still sustains...in a way that's much different from how a drum sustains (or doesn't) with any amount of moongel on it...
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For a modern-ish rock sound with a small hole in the front head, I really like the Evans coated EQ3s, although the clear ones will do in a pinch. For more low-frequency information and less attack, I like the Aquarian Super Kick I. For ultimate 70s rock power, coated Ambassador. Fiberskyns are also extremely useful.
Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC
Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC
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