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Head Choice and opinions please......

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I have a 70's Ludwig Stainless Steel Set that gets played by a variety of drummers with a variety of styles and I need to find a good compromise with heads.

The set is currently miss-matched with heads and came with 4 towels stuffed in the bass drum and I never had time to fuss with the drums in regards to heads and tuning.

It is driving us all crazy and I want to invest in new heads for the set.

Let's see, between the three drummers and two bands we play Jazz, Rock, Blues and Surfer Music.

Personally I do not like muted tone dead drums so sustain is important to me. I believe the other dummers would agree on that.

The sizes are 12 - 13 - 16 - 22 so I would guess this will cost a pretty penny to head.

Any thoughts on that?

Thanks

David

Posted on 18 years ago
#1
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I have the same drumset in my collection now. Just got it yesterday. These are the heads that I have put on that set. Bass drum got a 22" Aquarian Super Kick II and I put a Remo PowerStroke 3 Resonator head (enclosed) on the outer side. The Toms all received Aquarian Studio X heads w/white dot on top and Aquarian Classic Clear on the bottom. The snare has an Aquarian Focus X on the batter side with an Aquarian snare side head. This combination is amazing. A ton of projection from the bass drum, very nice presence of overtones from the toms and an extremely nice sharp "pop" from the snare with a hint of very high overtones, but it also allows the snare to be very VERY sensitive. It's worked great so far. Something to think about. I have heard that these Ludwigs have been known to be very different in response to the same heads as the metal shells are alittle different from set to set. That's just rumour I've heard. I can't say for sure that is true, it's very possible, but I don't have or know of another set to try this on. Oh yeah, about $160 to do the whole set.

Posted on 18 years ago
#2
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I've been using Remo coated "Diplomats" almost exclusively, since 1970, in every musical medium you can think of, and have always loved the sound. These are very clean-sounding, resonant heads, with great response at all dynamic levels. They are NOT durable, but that's the price you pay.

The only temporary change I've made occasionally is to use Remo "Pinstripes" on the batter heads of the toms and bass drum, when a really "generic" top 40 sound was called for.

Regardless, I always use the "Diplomats" on the snare drum (clear one on the snare side) and love what they do for any drum.

Support live art!
Mike James
http://www.mikejamesjazz.com
Posted on 18 years ago
#3
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Thanks to the both of you for the feedback on the heads. Time to go make a purchase!

I will update on the sound and what I ended up doing.

David

Posted on 18 years ago
#4
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