OH yeah, my childhood started out making street drum kits, as they call it. If you ever listen to street drummers on YouTUbe, they all tend to do exactly this. 5 gallon buckets, 10 gallon buckets, pots, pans, heck, my kick drum was a box I'd kick literally. lol.
As to answer questions, Yes, shell material, rim material, and head type all play a role in the tone of the drum. I'll break it all down for you though
This will be a slightly long read, so keep that in mind please.
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Drum shells
There are commonly two types of drum shells mainly in production, Maple and Birch. Although, there is also Mahogany, they don't use this as much anymore unless it's just a cheap drum kit or poplar wood.
Maple shells tend to have a strong resonance and very vibrant tone with a balance of attack and resonance.
Birch shells have less resonance and more attack presence.
Mahogany shells are more warmer and darker toned with less resonance in general.
The other uncommon shell type are Fiberglass and Acrylic, buth have different properties, and are more for visuals than performance. Fiberglass drums are more common in the 70's with Tama, and Acrylic are more along the lines of DIY or if you do find a genuine maker, it's mostly for visual arts. They don't have much in the way of resonance but they are decent with tonal balance and have less chance of warping than wooden shells, so, it's kind of a trade off, but not one enough to justify, honestly.
There is also the way the drums are made. Cheaper kits use wrapped wood, and what I mean by this is, the shell is a piece of flat wood that they treated with heat and steam to basically warp it into the shell of the drum, and there's a meeting point in the shell somewhere.
Higher-end kits have actual hollow cut pieces of wood with no junction point where the shell meets, since there is no actual wrapping, it's made naturally. Additionally, most top model kits are also cut from the same tree or very similar in the same area.
My DW kit uses maple. It's an older model Collector's series from the mid 90's but still sounds great.
There are several different types of metals used to make some snare drums, but they have different properties as well. Steel is commonly used, as is Nickel.
DW does make a concrete snare, and have never tried it though.
Drum Heads
There are two main materials when it comes to actual drum heads. Mylar, and animal hide, also known as fiber skin.
Mylar heads are the most common, and that's what you will most likely run into on a drum kit.
Fiber Skin heads are generally used on auxiliary percussion stuff like congas, bongos, and Djembe drums There aren't many different types of heads for this category, largely because they are what they are, but they have different thickness levels..
Mylar heads come in various forms. The main three are Clear, Coated and Ebony, with the two main features being optional: Pinstripe or Dotted. There are also multiple ply heads, no thicker than 3 or 4, but generally used is 2-ply for batter and 1-ply for resonance.
Clear drum heads have a brighter sound with more attack and longer resonance.
Coated heads have a warmer sound with dampened resonance, and less attack.
Ebony heads are thicker and therefore have a darker tone and are good for small drums with big sound.
Pinstripe heads apply to the three above mentioned heads and tend to have less resonance due to their infrastructure.
Dotted heads have a big dot in the middle of the head, which tends to dampen the overall resonance and gives the drum a flatter sound.
Hydraulic heads only appear in heads 2-ply or thicker that are Mylar. They just tend to keep the layers working in unison. Think of it like thermal paste for your CPU, where the paste ensures full contact between the two surfaces.
Drum Rims
There are commonly two types of drum rims, or hoops. Metal and Wood.
Metal rims are stronger and more common.
Wooden hoops are lighter, less durable, but bring a unique tone to the drum and help with resonance.
Tuning
My tuning method is somewhat tedious but has given happy results.
I start with resonant heads on snare and toms, and batter head on kick. Reason for this is because the kick has a pillow or a muffler in it, and I need to tune the head with the pillow not present, which you cannot do with the resonant head on.
Before doing any actual tuning, I seat the heads by putting them on and tightening them extremely tight, and letting them set for about 10 minutes, with the resonant head on the floor of a carpeted surface, and a towel on the batter head. You will hear the head crackle sometimes, but that's because it's "breaking in" and this helps prevent tonal loss over time. It also prevents the drums from sounding like paper. After the 10 minutes is up, I remove the heads.
Tuning the Snare
I have no set way for tuning my snare. I actually change the tone of it depending on the genre of music I am playing. My snare is my signature sound.
I put the resonant head on. Tighten all the tension rods hand tight, then with a key give them all a quarter turn, or until I am happy, keeping the tuning balanced across the drum head. I do this by holding my finger in the center of the drum, and tapping lightly with a drum stick about an inch away from the tension rod locations. so if there's 8 tension rods, I tap 8 places on the drum. I listen for a warbling sound or a "chorus like effect" and tune the head accordingly and tend to have my resonant head tight on my snare for better snappy response.
IF this is a wooden shell snare, I will not tension the resonant head very tight.
After tuning the resonant head, I will flip the drum over, placing the shell on a carpeted surface, muffling the resonant head, and do the same for the batter head, but for me, I light a firm snare head, so I tend to have the head a few turns tight, but balanced using the finger and tap method mentioned above.
My snare wires are pressed against the resonant head with enough tightness to make it very snappy.
Tuning the toms
I don't have a set tone or pitch for my toms. I just tune them to where they all have their own characteristic. However one rule of thumb is, I will not let the drums pitch be an octave from each other. in any case. and no more than three toms in an octave range.
For example. My tom sizes are 8, 10, 12, 14, and 16 inches. if My 8 inch tom is tuned to a G, then my 14" tom has to be tuned lower than a G an octave lower, but the 10 and 12 must be above that lower G. This way the toms are nicely spread out and give the drums a full range of tones.
My most common method for tuning my toms is placing the resonant head on first, and hand tightening all the tension rods, then giving them a quarter turn, then if it's a smaller tom, I will adjust the others to the higher pitched frequency or the tighetest lug after the quarter turn, of course placing my finger in the middle of the drum and tapping an inch away from each tension rod, until the warble is gone.
I then flip the drum over, placing the resonant head on a carpet surface to muffle it, and repeat the process with the batter head, but if I want a slight overtone, I will turn the key a half turn to a three quarter turn instead of just a quarter turn. then proceed with the evening the drum out.
Tuning the Kick Drum
My kick drum tuning is rather the easiest of them all. I just put the head on hand tight and tension the rods until there is no more wrinkling in the head, then find the pitch of the head's tension rods and tune to the lowest as long as the wrinkling is out of the head. I, then put the pillow in, and put it in place, then put the resonant head on wit the batter head face down on the floor, repeating the process with the resonant head.
My resonant head has six evenly placed holes along the outer edge that are each a half inch in diameter. This is default by the DW resonant head I use. It gives me the benefits of both a ported and non-ported head. This is especially handy when tuning two kick drums, which is a different beast altogether. For me though, I tune them both to the same pitch, unless I am doing something that requires two different pitches for the kick drums.
My Setup
My kit is a DW collector's series from the mid 90's. It's a double bass kit, with 5 toms, and a pork pie snare. It's been loyal to me and I love it.
For my kick drums, I use a Remo Powerstroke 3 3-ply Clear Pinstriped head, with no beater pad. My resonant head is the DW resonant head with the 6 vents that are a half inch in diameter each. I use DW pillows inside the drums held in place by velcro. and my beaters are plastic for the attack. I may use felt for some softer stuff though and wooden for the hard hitting stuff like metal.
My kick has a very strong overall punch and low boom that you can feel in your chest, even when not mic'ed up.
My toms all use Remo 2-ply Coated Emperor heads for batter heads, and 1-Ply Emperor heads for resonant. They are generally thicker and I love the resonance they give with my shells. Especially since the coated heads tend to have a bit less than their clear counter parts. This gives me an overall not too ringing warm tone. with enough attack to cut through, but not so much it's overwhelming.
My snare uses a Control SOund X head with reversed dot on the batter side, and a Ambassador snare side head on the snare side. The Control Sound X is a coated head, with the dot on the underside of the head instead of the top side. This is handy especially when using brushes or rods. The head has some ring, but not so much it's overwhelming, I love it.
I use wooden tip sticks for the attack. Nylon feel very soft to me.
My kit samples
Here's a sample of my drum kit on some cheap microphones when recording an old drum cover.
I am using a single kick, 10, 12, and 16 inch toms, and my steel snare. that is a 14 inch diameter, 5.5 inch deep Pork Pie.
Ed Sheeran, Cold Coffee drum jam.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDs26Du5DuU
Jason Aldean, She's Country
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3CiMlS03iM
Oasis, Wonderwall. For this one I am using Rods.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5mH_39YsSA
The Black Crowes, Hard To Handle.
My Solo album, "A Life Seen Through Broken Eyes", available now:
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