First impression when carrying the drums: they're so lightweight! The wood lugs will save your back!

Then, for the first time in my life, I hit a calf skin and understand that I'm into trouble as I like the sound so much: organic, rich, raw, less under control, which is something I'm after these days. Crush!

Then, listening to the toms, I'm surprised at how much better the 12" sounds to me. The rest of the toms are lacking lower harmonics or depth to my taste. Looking at the shells, I can see a center re-inforcement ring, which is clearly limiting the drum's elasticity and therefore the lower harmonics (at least this is my understanding).

Removing the 12" tom's head, I realize that it doesn't have that center re-inforcement ring.

The kick drum has a raw power feel to it that I really like and the steam bent snare is a pure pleasure to play with, at all tuning tensions. Those wires are really tired, I'll have to fix that.

So, now I need some good hardware and cymbals to dress up that lovely kit!

A few eBay bids later, here I am with a set of pre-70s Avedis and some brand new hardware.

I've found a Gibraltar universal tom suspension mount that just fits the 12", even though not vintage at all. This is a no-choice as there isn't enough space between the hi-hat and the bass drum to acomodate a snare stand for the 12" tom.

Now I'm just discovering that Puresound actually don't produce replacement wires for this type of snare anymore. My guess is that PR1416 should just work but I'm actually 10mm wrong and - even though it's usable - I'll have to find another option. Some folks at Vintage Drum Forum are helping - very grateful!

I've also bought a range of heads to test with the kit:

Evans Emad and Remo Fiberskyn for the kick, Remo Skyntone and Renaissance for the snare. Toms will keep their calf skins, although the 16" would benefit from a thicker one.

Heads tests:

Fiberskyn is a nice attempt to emulate skin but produce that typical Remo "click" that I don't like so much. A decent alternative should I need this sound for gigging and for a mid-rangey kick sound in the studio.

Evans Emad has a lot of attack and a deep bass that makes it good for heavy rock. I'm surprised by the bass drum versatility. The external muffling system comes very handy for sessions when different muting is needed.

Resonance heads: the thicker calf skin that came with the kit is the best hands down. Plastic head with a hole sounds very click-y, not my thing at all.

A thinner calfskin produces too many upper harmonics. I'll stick with this thick calf skin as much as possible.

Now I'm realizing that where plastic skins are mass-produced, calf skins are coming from actual animals and therefore vary a lot from head to head!

On the snare, changing for another calf skin changes the sound by a good bit. This is getting out of hand/exciting!

Remo Renaissance doesn't sound bad but Skyntone is clearly what sound the closest to the a calf skin, although a bit lifeless in comparison. Again, a very good alternative to true calf skin for practical reasons or when a more standard sound is required in the studio.

I've yet to discover what brushes sound like on calf skins...

Time is flying and I need this acoustic spoken word to be finished soon. So, after those initial tests, I feel comfortable enough to jump on the throne and get ready for a session.

Just practicing a bit feels great, that skin tone is talking to me in a way that I've never experienced before. Drums have been made for true skin - this just hits home.

The dampers I got from the kit seller fit just right on the bass drum rims but tend to slip away. I'm thinking of adding a thin layer of rubber but there won't be enough space in the clutch, I'm afraid... not sure what I'm gonna do.

In the meantime, I've received 2 Slingerland cowbells but the mounts are not working with them :-(. I need to purchase 2 separate mounts - extra unexpected costs. While I'm at it, let's get that other Avedis ride ;-)

Those 15" hi-hats are simply the best I've ever played.

It's now time to hit those drums for a recording session.

I'm going for a simple microphone setup:

Coles 4038 as Blumlein overheads

Neumann U67 on the rides (as this is a ride-based song)

Neumann KM84 on the snare top

AKG D12e on the bass drum

Neumann U89 a few centimeters from the bass drum

All mics going into a Studer 269 -> Prism Orpheus -> Reaper on a Mac, except for the snare (preamp: TAB V376).

As it's a pretty deep and slightly depressed piece, I'm tuning the kit as low as possible and loose the snare wires. I'm quite happy with the tuning, even though it's not perfect for sure (which actually fits the song pretty well). That 16" tom has a good attack but is lacking a bit of depth. I will need to experiment with other heads.

Mmmhh... cross sticks on those wood hoops are gorgeous and the snare tone is rich and fat.

Very good first impressions - let's see how this turns out when mixed.

Time to record a very intimate open sounding tune.

I'm pitching the toms a bit higher and the snare on the song's root note. The bass drum beater is the Vater Vintage model, a quite bulky hairy beater indeed producing a super soft sound that reveals the deepness of the drum.

Brushes are just a joy to play on those calf skins and the cross stick sounds very organic on the wood hoops.

Beautiful.

Tomorrow, I'll explore a drier punchier sound for a more groove-pop tune - I can't wait!

Mazel tov! May the two of you have a great and long life together.

Hahaha - thanks!

Today's session was great and productive!

First a pretty fast track using brushes and bass drum mostly. Again, calfskins are loving brushes ;-) and we got a very deep tone from the bass drum that made the whole control room shake. Very rich - I just liked it a lot!

Then we went for a funkier mid-tempo tune and - again - the raw sound of the Rolling Bomber worked just great. Deep rich tones.

Third song was a cleaner radio-friendly uplifting tune. The kit was overly fat for this style and I went for a Black Beauty + 20" DW kit that worked better.

I tried an Evans Emad head on the bass drum's batter side: lots of attack and sub. Now, as the bass drum's resonnance head is almost sticking to the drum (it's probably a bit tight in size), I always hesitate before trying to change it. I did that when testing head options, but the plastic resonance was very... plastick-y, so I gave up. I'd be interested to try again with microphones, though, just to hear what they actually pick.

Fourth song was all about percussion ambiences, so I played the bass drum fully open (without any damping) with mallets for a symponic percussion type of sound. It worked perfectly well!

A few Avedis swooshes on top of that helped creating that foggy atmosphere.

I should also receive 2 16" calf heads I bought from eBay, hopefully thicker then the current one I have that I find to attack-y.

Last song I had to track for the current album in production in the studio was a rootsy hip-hop / spoken word tune mixing vintage electronic sounds (Drumtraks) and acoustic stuff.

I quickly set up a basic kit in the vocal booth for a dry sound, added a U67 as overhead (Motown-ish), went for KM84 on snare top, SM57 on snare bottom and ended up using a 441 for the kick (first time) after trying a 421 (which had more bass but also those ugly upper mids).

I muffled the bass drum more than for the jazzier open sounding songs and banged!

I definitely like this bass drum, it's rich and raw at the same time. Lovely.

The snare was a Black Beauty, so no Slingy here.

Very nice vintage punchy sound overall.