Sound Absorbing Help

[DOMINIC]

I need to setup a little recording setup in the basement of my drummers house.

It's just me and my drummer recording...

He's playing a little kit and i'm playing a just electric guitar...

I think we're going to be running into some problems...

Some problems with the basement is that the floor and the wall are all cement and brick...

I don't know much about sound recording, but I do know that that isn't good..

is it possible to just use some sound absorbing stuff and carpet and setup a decent sounding setup...

is there a way to just put up some boards around the drummer and this will lower the loudness of the drums to the rest of the house, while sounding good recorded?

i really don't know anything about this stuff and hope i can find some help here

Thanks

 

[jammybastard]

cheap option...
carpet under the kit, hang some packing blankets across the corners of the room to knock out the hard angles and kill any standing waves.

you can build cheap gobos/baffles (the boards around the drummer you see in studios).
it might cut down on the bleed to the other mics, but it won't cut down on the amount of sound going out of the room to the rest of the house for a number of reasons like sound traveling through air ducts, vibrations through the foundation, etc...

as far as getting a "decent sounding setup"...that has as much to do with your mics, and their position as it does to the room you are recording in.
you can get a good sound in a small space, but you need to spend a lot of time experimenting with mic placement, playing dynamics, and baffling to make it all work.

there's a ton of info on building a home studio, baffles, etc...at
www.gearslutz.com
go there and do a search and you should find answers to almost any question you might have.

 

[zep41]

http://www.audimutesoundproofing.com/Default.aspx

i can attest - the sound absorbtion sheets are GREAT and relatively cheap

 

[Jason Lynn]

With concrete your going to have to absorb a lot of the reflections. I recommend mineral board or owens corning rigid fiberglass. You can find these on acoustic recording sites but even cheaper from insulation supply houses that carry them. See if these guys have a location near you www.spi-co.com

I built frames and wrapped them with burlap (you have to use a breathable fabric so sound can penetrate) You can find tons of threads showing folks building these but since it's a basement I'd just find a way to get it on the wall and be done with it unless you want it pretty.

This won't sound proof the basement...that is a much more involved process and one you probably don't want to fool with. You should check out John Sayer's studio construction website to get a better grasp of what that takes.

 

[fr8_trane]

I wouldn't put carpet under the drums. Instead I would use 2 4x8' plywood sheets put together with hinges as a platform. Wood will give you a warmer and more controlled refelctive surface. The idea here is NOT to completely deaden the room. Drums like a bit of bright ambience. I would put heavy drapes behind the kit, on the opposite wall and above the kit and possibly gobo's to either side. Adust to taste and don't make it too dead sounding.