Its electric (well the drums anyway)

[kac4him]

We been having problems with drums being to loud not loud enough and started looking into mic'ing the drums (realizing this would not solve the to loud issue totally but it a start and we didn't like the ideal of putting the drummer in a bubble) as we started to look into mic'ing the drums and the cost of mic's and all the electronics we would need to do it right one of the sales men comment why not just go digical with the drums. With they youth worship it would fit right in

First if anyone has any feedback on the negatives or positives of going digical (from the sound end as well as drummer end if anyone has such info they can share)

In talking to some of the youth drummers we might be able to get help with the purchase of a set so with that and a little help from the budget we looking at around $2000 is this a realistic figure

any recommendation's on equipment to buy in addition to the electronic drums (as well as drums if someone has some) right now we have a strait self powered sound board so anything else in addition that would be needed.

[JHVideoGuy]

Keith,
We've used digital drums in our sanctuary for years. We've also used an electric set in our junior high room and another set in the high school room. We replaced the high school set with an acoustic set, drum cage, mics, and gates for the channels. It does sound very good in that room but it's at a much louder level (105-110 db).

For the sanctuary we use the Roland V-drums. I've been very impressed with it. One of the previous worship leaders tried to put an acoustic kit in the sanctuary. It was way too loud. Our sanctuary seats 1200 and we typically run our sound at 92-95db.

For advice on equipment for acoustic drums I would get a cage, a drum mic set. We use shure's 5 piece kit in the youth room. And a gate for each mic. We use a berringher multi-gate pro.

For advice on electric kit. We have a roland v-drum kit with a new roland brain. Our drummers like the feel of the kit and I really like the sound of the new brain. We still run each group of triggers back to the sound board. (ex. kick, high hat, cymbols, snare, toms, and ride) that way we can mix for each drummers own style. Mainly those guys who love to ride the cymbols!!!

As far as price goes I think our acoustic set up, minus the drums cost us about $1,500 (800- drum shield, 400- drum mics, 300- 2 multi gates). I don't know what we paid for the electric kit but I know we recently replaced the brain for $1,200.

Hope this helps.
Dave

We use Roland v-drums and are pleased. Very consistent levels
great kick samples. We do use live cymbals and hats.
drummer likes the feel good ghost notes and we use a buttkicker on his throne.

[KeithM]

just a few random thoughts...

positives - being able to control the volume of teh drums from your sound board; not having the drums overpower the rest of the band (especially in a small room); some drummers actually prefer electric drums (really!!!)

negatives - some drummers HATE (with a passion) playing electric drums; some of the cheaper kits don't sound very good.


Your budget of $2000 will get you started, but won't go very far. Stay away from the Yamaha kits, I haven't good experiences with them. The middle and upper level of the Roland V-Drums are good. The best I've ever experienced was the ddrums. Once you have the kit, you'll need some monitoring for your drummer (I know that Roland makes one specifically for their V-Drums). The biggest difference (drummers tell me) is that they can't "feel" the drums the way they do an acoustic kit. A Buttkicker can help with that.

http://www.drumbalaya.com/ is a specialty store dedicated to electric drums. Their customer service is very good and they can probably help you out finding the right kit for your budget.

From a sound perspective - the best-case scenario is to have a separate channel for each pad on the kit (snare, kick, toms, cymbals, etc) at your sound board. Problem is, that eats up a lot of channels very quickly. If thats not an option, you can go one output from the drums to the sound board BUT, if you do this, make sure that the kit's "brain" enables the drummer to control the individual volumes of each pad quickly and easily on the fly.

[kac4him]

i do believe that the model he had quoted us was the The V-Drums® V-Tour™ Series TD-6S
with a Drumbalaya Upgrade -- Roland TD-8 for TD-6V (same controller that comes standard with the next step up)

their was some thron upgrade and kicker i don't remember exactly what but i do remember joking about the thron though

as far as inputs on the soundboard go we had thought of using a old soundboard as a sub for the drums when we were thinking of going with the mic's so that should still be a option if space is a issue (i think it has 4 outs from the controller)

he had told us about the next step up but with the contoler upgrade he said we should be just as happy (he is a drummer for a church praise band)

a lot of the site reviews show a very high customer rating but if anyone had any input would be weight much better

Hopefully next month ill be able to bring a drummer along with me to test it out and will see how he likes it.

[Mark Finley]

We use the mid line roland drums and are very happy with them. The drummer sometimes uses headphones, but not always. We have upgraded to a larger snare, and are using the old snare pad as a ride cymbal. Our module malfunctioned once and we have to get it serviced, but I am the only person that seems to have had that problem.

you can see and hear our drums on our church's video page. www.mesquitebible.org/video
Look for the music video, and pick the size of download you would like.

Mark

Say- do those electronic drum kits come with cowbell?

You can set every trigger to "Cowbell" if you like.

I'm a Pastor and drummer and have played on both electric and accoustic. Though I think most any drummer would prefer accoustic in the end, the benefits of electronic drums (sound control and mixing abilities) are a better trade-off in the end (in my opinion). I have played on the older "rubber" Roland pads and also on the newer V-drums. By far, the V-drum is better all the way around (from the capabilities and the drummer's standpoint). BUT...I've also played on a kit from a company called Hart Dynamics (http://www.hartdynamics.com/) which is just as good as the V-Drum set, and cost less in the end. You can see the kit I used at this link (http://www.hartdynamics.com/products...o64/index.html). I'm not getting paid-off by Hart...I just really liked the kit. We used the latest Roland V-Drum brain unit...really the best I've seen. The overall sound of what you get will deffinitely depend on the brain unit...so don't skimp there.

Carey

We had a set of v-drums and we were not pleased. The drummers did not like playing them and they sounded like we were using electric drums. For us building a cage and mic the drums was the best solution. Our youth uses them now and they work great for them. Different situations call for different solutions.

[[Admin] osborn4]

We ended up going digital in our sanctuary. Our main drummer really prefered/prefers his accoustics. But in our sanctuary that seats about 250, there really wasn't much choice.

That and the smaller footprint possible with the electronic set and the ability to move it much quicker led us to purchase an electronic kit. (Sorry, I don't know which one. It's black, if that helps. )

Our main problem is that, I swear, our drummer are deaf. They all want so much drum in thier monitor, that it washes (floods, actually) the house. We've just borrowed an IEM set from another church and we'll see if that might be a solution.

And who knows, maybe a Buttkicker,is what they need. I've never heard of them before (thanks again, churchmedia.net).

I just know that I've wanted to give several of our drummers a kick whilst trying to balance the sound. Perhaps it would be best to let the sound system do it for us.

If you go digital and choose Roland I would be willing to bet the farm that the drummer(s) would do anything to get the td8 and better pads over the td6 kit. It screws your budget up, as it has for us but I would not startout below the TD8 set-ups. Those mesh skins make a big difference to the sound dynamic of the drums over the rubber pad. Especially if brushes are ever to be used by the drummers.