E-drums: could they be a common thing for small bands gigs?

[molul]

Coming from this 4-page thread derail: https://thegearforum.com/threads/kemper-profiler-mk-2.8888/post-386669

Summary: just like some guitarists are moving to digital modelers/profilers instead of carrying an amp, would it make sense that drummers make a similar move, at least for convenience? Do we reject it just because we are not used to it yet or do they really sound that bad?

I mean, if I watched a concert that used these drums, I don't think I'd say it was bad:


On the other hand, we're used to see bands playing keyboards that sound quite close to a real piano, and so many keyboardists don't feel they're playing garbage because the keys don't feel the same as a grand piano.

Is it the time to go for e-drums for rock, at least for small bands that need their rigs to be as compact as possible?

 

[Mikael Dez]

Coming from this 4-page thread derail: https://thegearforum.com/threads/kemper-profiler-mk-2.8888/post-386669

Summary: just like some guitarists are moving to digital modelers/profilers instead of carrying an amp, would it make sense that drummers make a similar move, at least for convenience? Do we reject it just because we are not used to it yet or do they really sound that bad?

I mean, if I watched a concert that used these drums, I don't think I'd say it was bad:


On the other hand, we're used to see bands playing keyboards that sound quite close to a real piano, and so many keyboardists don't feel they're playing garbage because the keys don't feel the same as a grand piano.

Is it the time to go for e-drums for rock, at least for small bands that need their rigs to be as compact as possible?

I would not care as soon as I heard the drummer play, and if it sounds good then it sounds good! Musicians are a weird combination of keeping tradition while also pushing boundaries

 

[Mikael Dez]

Kinda like when the old boomer bands have 50 empty cab shells etc etc

 

[FuzzyAce]

E-drums have been used for decades live. Like with guitarists, I think most drummers prefer the feel and response of real drums.

 

[MadMaxG79]

My band have "silent" rehearsals. In that we all plug our gear into a digital mixer (Zoom LiveTrak L-20) and play with headphones on. The drummer is on a live kit that we've mic'ed up with two overheads and a bass drum mic. It sounds good.

But the few times he's had to use E-Drums, such as during COVID, where we couldn't use the regular rehearsal space, or during dedicated "band weekends" where we don't want to haul and setup an entire acoustic drum kit, the sound in the headphones has been absolutely great. The drums just sit way better in the mix.

I have been pleading with him for years about switching to an E-Drum setup. But he won't budge. Says that it just doesn't feel nearly as good playing E-Drums as it does acoustic drums. And I can appreciate that.

I've suggested maybe trying some of the newer "Acoustic" E-Drums that claim to have a lot of the feel from regular acoustic drums, but he says that when he can afford them, he wants one of the Roland VAD acoustic e-drum sets. But for home use only So he can have the feel of real drums at home without waking up the kids. Because, as he says, if he can't play the acoustic drums at the rehearsal space, where else could he play them?

I totally understand where he's coming from, but for the rest of us, the sound is just so much more satisfying when coming from an e-kit, when playing with headphones.

 

[FuzzyAce]

And to add, hybrid sets are probably more popular in general.

 

[molul]

My band have "silent" rehearsals. In that we all plug our gear into a digital mixer (Zoom LiveTrak L-20) and play with headphones on. The drummer is on a live kit that we've mic'ed up with two overheads and a bass drum mic. It sounds good.

But the few times he's had to use E-Drums, such as during COVID, where we couldn't use the regular rehearsal space, or during dedicated "band weekends" where we don't want to haul and setup an entire acoustic drum kit, the sound in the headphones has been absolutely great. The drums just sit way better in the mix.

I have been pleading with him for years about switching to an E-Drum setup. But he won't budge. Says that it just doesn't feel nearly as good playing E-Drums as it does acoustic drums. And I can appreciate that.

I've suggested maybe trying some of the newer "Acoustic" E-Drums that claim to have a lot of the feel from regular acoustic drums, but he says that when he can afford them, he wants one of the Roland VAD acoustic e-drum sets. But for home use only So he can have the feel of real drums at home without waking up the kids. Because, as he says, if he can't play the acoustic drums at the rehearsal space, where else could he play them?

I totally understand where he's coming from, but for the rest of us, the sound is just so much more satisfying when coming from an e-kit, when playing with headphones.

I can understand that, yes. Maybe it would be something that changes with time if e-drums become more common amongst new drummers.

A couple of years ago my drummer left the band, and I considered buying a Roland v-drums kit for the rehearsal place, both for auditioned drummers not to carry their stuff and for having a drumkit that belonged to the band, in case we lost the drummer again in the future. My guitarist said "no f#&@ing way, they sound horrible!" and I was like "wtf? They don't, and we can control volume much better". And he had a Kemper, so he wasn't against digital solutions

I'm hoping I find more open-minded musicians when I move at the end of this month. It's difficult to find people willing to experiment a bit. I've only had one keyboardist that loved finding any way to improve his workflow with synths (by automating things from his Mac, for instance), and only one bassist that was willing to buy a HX Stomp and try synths or effects. I wonder why it's that difficult to find people like that.

 

[FuzzyAce]

I can understand that, yes. Maybe it would be something that changes with time if e-drums become more common amongst new drummers.

A couple of years ago my drummer left the band, and I considered buying a Roland v-drums kit for the rehearsal place, both for auditioned drummers not to carry their stuff and for having a drumkit that belonged to the band, in case we lost the drummer again in the future. My guitarist said "no f#&@ing way, they sound horrible!" and I was like "wtf? They don't, and we can control volume much better". And he had a Kemper, so he wasn't against digital solutions

I'm hoping I find more open-minded musicians when I move at the end of this month. It's difficult to find people willing to experiment a bit. I've only had one keyboardist that loved finding any way to improve his workflow with synths (by automating things from his Mac, for instance), and only one bassist that was willing to buy a HX Stomp and try synths or effects. I wonder why it's that difficult to find people like that.

We exist in a time now where it doesn't have to be an either or thing. Why not have and use both. We guitarists have tube amps and modelers, and jump between them all the time. If one solution makes more sense in a given situation then go with that one. At least we have great sounding options.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Like with guitarists, I think most drummers prefer the feel and response of real drums.

This. And as said in the Kemper thread already, for us guitar players, not much is changing regarding playing feel when going digital, at least not necessarily so. With an e-drum kit, the playing feel is different right at the source already.
Possibly kinda like having to play with paperthin picks on 13s when what you really wanted is 1mm+ picks and 10s. Add to this that all of a sudden there wouldn't be pinch harmonics anymore. Or so.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Btw, I'm sometimes gigging with a very great drummer who absolutely loves e-drums. But he very decidedly only uses them in case a) the music needs electronic sounds or b) when the situation absolutely demands it (such as a completely quiet stage being mandatory). For any kind of "normal" music, he's bringing an analog kit. But fortunately, he's one of the guys also being able to deliver a great sound at very modest levels.

 

[Orvillain]

Most of the gigs I've played in my career have been small to medium sized rock clubs and pubs in the UK, with 3-5 band line ups, with shared drums and cabs, and people usually would just bring their breakables.

Now here's how I see it with drums:

- Drummer sits at kit. First thing they wanna do is adjust the hihat clutch. On an acoustic kit, this is a very intuitive and tactile thing. On an electronic kit, this completely fucks any playability that has already been dialed in for the kit.

- Drummers usually want to move stuff around, change the heights of things, switch out cymbals, change the kick pedal, change the snare, etc. Okay, so anything 'sound' related... cool... just turn a knob. But if a drummer wants to add a 2nd floor tom, or remove a rack tom and put the ride in its place (typical punk layout for example) then all of a sudden you're in a hellish world of removing cables, plugging cables back in, getting the inputs wrong on a dark grimy stage, and just generally introducing lots of potential for mistakes.

- Drummers typically don't realise that you have to play softer with an e-kit. Imagine an in-house e-kit owned by a venue. How long do you think the piezo's are realistically going to last, with up to 12 drummers (let's say 4 bands 3 nights of the week) hitting the thing? I give it a month, maybe 2, before they need to start thinking about replacing things.

- In a very real way then, the e-kit breaks the "grab and go" paradigm that most drummers are looking for.

- E-kits are not very forgiving when it comes to poor dynamic control. This is inherent to the tech, because no matter how many discrete signals you track, and no matter how much precision you have in your analog to digital conversion stages, at some point you do need to dumb the numbers down to a 1-127 midi selection stream. I'm simplifying the logic a bit here, but ultimately, you're trying to turn a discrete physical mechanical signal, into a quantized set of layer options, and you lose so much information. There's a lot of clever things we do under the hood to make drum software dynamic, but it just isn't the same thing as the physical experience of hitting a kit. This is way more true for drums than it is amp modelling.

- Many venues still have poor FOH setups, especially in countries where the government doesn't particularly fund live music very well, and venues have no money to really sink. This is why you end up with so many venues and bands essentially just putting kick and vocals through the PA, and letting the amps and cabs on stage do the work for the guitars.

- E-kits are heavily marketed as songwriting or practice tools, and they're not designed with real world touring in mind. To combat this, you'd have to spend as much as you spend on the ekit, on additional pads, stands, cables, mesh heads, etc. When really you could go and get a Pearl Export, slap some decent skins on it, and have a much more instant-gratification experience.

It was very interesting to me, how back in the day we had a deal with Zildjian to provide them their own software to go with the Gen16 cymbals... and not many years later, those same cymbals are being sold as quiet practice tools... and they completely dropped all of the software side of things.

I'm a big fan of e-kits, and actually since leaving inMusic, I am going to need to buy a new kit for home. But for live shows?? Nah. I just don't see it working. A hybrid setup is much more interesting to me, because you can get a small unit like the Alesis Multi Pad stuff, or a Mandala pad, and do a lot of cool and clever interesting things with it.

And funnily enough, most drummers I know want some sort of digital thing in their rig, so they can have access to non-drum sounds. This doesn't get acknowledged enough IMO.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Now here's how I see it with drums:

I agree to 99% or so.

I don't see the MIDI velocity range of "only" 127 steps to cause much issues, though. At least that doesn't seem to be something most drummers complain about. Fwiw, the guy I mentioned before, which I talked to about this thing quite a bit, never seems to even bother about the lack of dynamics, it's always about the feel of the entire thing, most notable hihats, cymbals and partially snares. He also said if things would feel 1:1 identical and allow for the same "actions" (such as manipulating all kinda strokes, be it semi opened hats, manually stopped cymbals, stick-muted toms and what not), he'd be all over an e-kit as a permanent solution. But we don't even seem to be in the ballpark yet.

 

[molul]

if things would feel 1:1 identical and allow for the same "actions" (such as manipulating all kinda strokes, be it semi opened hats, manually stopped cymbals, stick-muted toms and what not), he'd be all over an e-kit as a permanent solution.

Makes so much sense.

Roland, are you listening? This is what you have to do for a future VDrums Stadium

 

[Orvillain]

I don't see the MIDI velocity range of "only" 127 steps to cause much issues, though. At least that doesn't seem to be something most drummers complain about. Fwiw, the guy I mentioned before, which I talked to about this thing quite a bit, never seems to even bother about the lack of dynamics, it's always about the feel of the entire thing, most notable hihats, cymbals and partially snares. He also said if things would feel 1:1 identical and allow for the same "actions" (such as manipulating all kinda strokes, be it semi opened hats, manually stopped cymbals, stick-muted toms and what not), he'd be all over an e-kit as a permanent solution. But we don't even seem to be in the ballpark yet.

I was heavily simplifying for the sake of brevity.

But essentially the issue you have with drum-sampler playback systems is one of quantization and data loss. When you hit a real drum or cymbal, there is residual energy that passes over from strike to strike; the nodes and modes of a drum membrane react differently according to how often they're excited, the intensity of your hit, and probably all sorts of other stuff I'm too stupid to understand.

Samples just take a signal and go "okay... for this signal... which sample do I play?" - which is not at all the same thing as an amp modeller.

In essence, we still don't have the tech to do great physical modelling of full multi-mic acoustic drumkit experiences. There's all sorts of ways to fake it.

RE: Hihats.

These truly are some of the most detailed hihat samples you can get - if I do say so myself. In fact, the additional hihats I recorded for the Alesis Strata kit are more detailed, because we also did all of this states of openness on the bell zone as well; not just bow and edge (tip and shank in BFD parlance)

But you're still dealing with data quantization here. Because whose to say that the space between 7_8T and OpenT, doesn't contain another possibilities for tonally distinct hihat sounds.

This is ultimately where I think the feel and playability issues come from - capturing a real acoustic drumkit in the right amount of detail is very expensive, very difficult, requires expertise that your average studio drummer and engineer does not have, and ultimately.... you'd end up with something very wasteful in terms of resources.

 

[BahamaDada]

The drums just sit way better in the mix.

I have been pleading with him for years about switching to an E-Drum setup. But he won't budge. Says that it just doesn't feel nearly as good playing E-Drums as it does acoustic drums.

We all play silent. 1 Helix, 1 Fractal and 1 Bias(?)(Or what is that shit thing called?).

Oh how many times we begged the drummer to go electric for rehearsals. We have a superb sound through our X32 and InEars, but his fucking acoustic drums bleed so much into all our vocal mics. I could fume, bc otherwise we'd have a nearly perfect demo-envuroment.

 

[jay mitchell]

The implicit parallel being drawn here - between guitar players using modelers and drummers using e-drums - is one step off. The closest parallel is between edrums and modeling guitars, e.g., the Line 6 Variax; and that parallel isn't perfectly accurate. Whether you're playing through a modeler or a physical amp, you're still playing the same instrument you spent all those years learning to play. To play edrums, a drummer must learn to play an entirely new instrument. As has already been pointed out, the new instrument is missing many nuances of acoustic drums. The fact that edrums can be made to sound good is beside the point. To a drummer, it's still a completely different instrument.

Edrums are not new by any means. Ca. 1983, while I was in graduate school, I mixed a band in which the drummer played a partial Simmons kit. He retained his acoustic snare and cymbals. There was no such thing as a "silent stage," nor did IEMs exist. Scott played the kit to reduce stage real estate and to produce specific sounds that were very much a part of recorded music at the time. The kick and tom sounds he got were excellent, and he was easier to mix FOH than any other drummer I'd encountered. A year or two later, he'd gone back to a complete acoustic kit.

 

[Sascha Franck]

In essence, we still don't have the tech to do great physical modelling of full multi-mic acoustic drumkit experiences.

And even if there was, that possibly still wouldn't change too much with drummers having issues to play the damn thing, simply because a stick hitting whatever material used for triggering, say, a cymbal will feel quite different from the stick actually hitting a piece of vibrating metal.
There might be drummers happily accepting things one day, some may even prefer the new feel, but as is, we still seem to be quite far away from that.

And that's without even taking all the other things you've brought up in your previous post into account, live monitoring possibly being the most crucial issue as long as people aren't entirely commited to IEMs. Place a well sounding kit at a decent spot on stage and bob's your uncle almost instantly. Bring an e-kit to any average non-IEM gig and see eyebrows raising (to put it carefully), just as on my gig last friday - which, as said in the other thread, ended up with a louder on stage drum sound desaster than what I've experienced with real drums in a long time.

 

[RGB]

I love the sound and convenience, but E-Drums don't seem to elicit the same response from small club audiences that the analog kit does. Stage sound is more important in the smaller clubs, it seems.

 

[[Nathan]]

Imagine you rock up to band practice or a gig and your drummer places this in your hands, cmon dude let’s rock some killswitch engage…. What a total buzzkill of an experience.

Everything has its pros and cons and there’s tons of good examples here already I don’t need to cover. But it’s no surprise most drummers stick to real kits for the most part. It’s not just about end result sounds, it’s a direct connection to that instrument.

 

[OneEng]

Bands that use eDrums have a much better chance at having a good mix at FOH. The drums cause so much stage noise that it is impossible for all the vocal mics not to pick them up.

All other differences in sound are trivial in comparison.

Unless you are gigging a stadium where there is all the room in the world for the drums to be set back away from the vocal mics, eDrums will always make a better solution for a live gig. Of course, there is always drum shields for acoustic drums. They work OK, but ultimately eDrums just sound better live with much less work.

I do get that they don't physically react the same as real drums ..... although the newer ones with mesh heads are closer. I have played in bands since the early 2000's that use eDrums. I won't ever hire another drummer that uses acoustic drums. It's just a "No" for my band.