Hi gang. I'm moving forward on my homemade cocktail kit. Thanks for all the ideas about mounting a snare on my floor tom.
One thing I wanted to discuss is cymbal choice. I have a pair of Sabian Fusion Hand Hammered hats. They are 13 inches... so small enough. I really love these cymbals and think they surpass the popular Zildjian K/Z combo, which I think they are modeled after. But I'm stuck on crash/ride cymbal ideas. I'm thinking of using this cheap Camber 16 inch crash someone left at my house years ago as a crash ride because I don't want to ride on my very nice Sabian 16 inch studio crash. Do you think a cheap crash could serve as a crash/ride?
cymbals, cymbals, cymbals
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Tom E. Gunn
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Keith Cronin
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Tom E. Gunn
- Posts: 49
- Joined: Thu Jan 06, 2005 5:53 pm
- Location: California
Hey there. The Sabian Studio crash is a thin, brilliant finish cymbal and not really something I wanted to use as a ride cymbal with this kit and then as my main crash with my Sonor set. The Camber cymbal is not something i much care about marring up. Its a thick cast cymbal so it should take a beating. But I'd like to find something that's actually a REAL crash/ride. I wish they made a 16 inch version!
I use smaller cymbals for small get togethers, my 18" doubles as a ride but on regular gigs I use the same cymbal package I use for my kit. 17", 18" Crash, and 20" ride. I love my cymbals and I find it hard to replace anyone of them just for the cocktail kit. These cymbal are the sounds I look for and I know how to work them for each tune. Maybe try using your regular set up.
Dinkus
Dinkus
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Keith Cronin
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I guess I don't worry about a cymbal "taking a beating" when it comes to cocktail drumming - I use my cocktail drum for my softest gigs. Also, I consider riding to be easier on a cymbal than crashing it.
That said, I don't think a 16" AAX Studio Crash would make a very good ride. Most 16's would probably be too washy.
kc
That said, I don't think a 16" AAX Studio Crash would make a very good ride. Most 16's would probably be too washy.
kc
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mangorockfish
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- Location: arkansas
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Guest
I'm still waiting on my Empire cocktail kit to be delivered. The guy has not been responding to my reqeusts via email for the tracking number. hmmmm....
Anyway, the kit I won has a pretty thin looking cymbal stand that allows a highat and crash or ride to both be mounted on it. would this generally hold up a larger ride cymbal, say 20 inches? Also, with such a large ride like a 20 inch one, doesn't it kind of get into the way and hang over your drums?
Jeff "Guest" Andrews
Anyway, the kit I won has a pretty thin looking cymbal stand that allows a highat and crash or ride to both be mounted on it. would this generally hold up a larger ride cymbal, say 20 inches? Also, with such a large ride like a 20 inch one, doesn't it kind of get into the way and hang over your drums?
Jeff "Guest" Andrews
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mangorockfish
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There are all kinds of cymbal arms and other attachments on the market that will allow you to place a cymbal no matter the size wherever you want it. Pick up a Gibralter catalog andcheck out all there cool stuff. I'm using one of their SC-CLAC arms w/a 20' cymbal and it is right where I want and need it to be.
It will take time for you to get everything where it is comfortable for you. Be patient my son.
It will take time for you to get everything where it is comfortable for you. Be patient my son.
Cymbals
I use a 14 Zildjian Custom A crash on my cocktail kit. For the volume and style of music I play it works perfectly. You can actually get an amazing range of sounds out of the right cymbal. It is great as a ride, crash, and suspended crash with mallets.
I picked this thing up for about $40 used at a music store and I use it on just about every gig. It has also become my favorite top hi-hat cymbal with a sabian bottom and I use it for a crash on occasion.
As far as hardware, if you are going to mount the cymbal off of the drum, you will probably want to use a smaller lighter cymbal. The empire hardware will most likely not handle a 20" ride, plus I doubt that the cymbal arm goes very far out from the drum. Sadly, the larger the cymbal, the heavier it is AND the further out you have to put it. So if you hang it off the drum the balance gets twice as bad as you increase the cymbal size.
My favorite 'off the rim' cymbal mount is the Gibraltar Jaw:
It is a bit heavier than the LP Claw but it has an angle adjustment that let's you get it just right!
Also, about crappy cymbals, some of my favorite/most interesting cymbals are no name-tin cymbals. You just never know what you'll get from cymbal to cymbal even on high end cymbals. I have heard some really lame sounding $200 cymbals and have found some amazing $5 pieces of junk! So give ANY cymbal a try and experiment with different sticks and playing techniques. You may be surprised...
John
I picked this thing up for about $40 used at a music store and I use it on just about every gig. It has also become my favorite top hi-hat cymbal with a sabian bottom and I use it for a crash on occasion.
As far as hardware, if you are going to mount the cymbal off of the drum, you will probably want to use a smaller lighter cymbal. The empire hardware will most likely not handle a 20" ride, plus I doubt that the cymbal arm goes very far out from the drum. Sadly, the larger the cymbal, the heavier it is AND the further out you have to put it. So if you hang it off the drum the balance gets twice as bad as you increase the cymbal size.
My favorite 'off the rim' cymbal mount is the Gibraltar Jaw:
It is a bit heavier than the LP Claw but it has an angle adjustment that let's you get it just right!
Also, about crappy cymbals, some of my favorite/most interesting cymbals are no name-tin cymbals. You just never know what you'll get from cymbal to cymbal even on high end cymbals. I have heard some really lame sounding $200 cymbals and have found some amazing $5 pieces of junk! So give ANY cymbal a try and experiment with different sticks and playing techniques. You may be surprised...
John
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fw
Hey Tom!
I personally use 12" 70's A Zildjian Hi hats and a 17" Zildjian remix ride on my set. The hi hats are just amazing for anything, but I have thought about the idea of getting two wuhan 10" or 12" splashes and using those for hi hats. They sell them for about $15 each at Guitar Center, and they vary a lot from cymbal to cymbal in terms of weight, so it would be easy to get one light and one heavy. Last time I was there, they had a whole barrel of them. I'm a huge fan of Wuhan cymbals, and if I didn't already have so many cymbals and were just starting out today, I might buy a whole set. You have to find a place that sells them because the boxed sets are almost certain to have a clunker, but they are hand hammered, B20 alloy, the company has been making cymbals for 2000 years, the cymbals are cheap, and the best ones have the funkiest overtones I've heard--I've another company get what Wuhan can get out of cymbals. Of course, their quality control is butt compared to most manufacturer's cymbals, so again, find a dealer.
My cocktail set has a much more focused, tight, quiet, punchy sound than I'm used to from conventional drums, so for my ride, I had to look for something that was also quiet and focused, but also very multi-purpose. I liked the ReMix ride because the crash is decent, the bell works within the volume of the cocktail set even if it doesn't work so well on a conventional set, the tip-ride sound and shank-ride sound are very nice, stick-shoulder crashes crash and die very quickly (which is important if you have to ride on the same cymbal you just crashed on), and the full-on crash sound at the edge of the cymbal has a nice crash sound, even if it can sometimes get a little John Bonham-ish. Unlike my big collection of 19" and 20" rides, the sound doesn't overwhelm the kit--it's perfectly in balance. Also, the 17" size doesn't put excess pressure on the mounting hardware or shell.
I found my A and K Zildjian crash cymbals were a good size for the set, but too washy to match the tone of the kit. My 15 3/4" Bosphorus rock crash is a good second choice for a ride--it washes a bit more, but the ride tone has some definition to it.
One thought that occured to me is that Paiste 2002 15" or 16" crashes might not be bad cocktail rides. They don't open up unless you really bash them, so you get a small, heavy cymbal with a focused tone that has the potential to spread with a harder crash. I've often thought the remix sounds like a 2002 crash.
I like Keith's idea of a timbale cymbal, too. Timbale cymbals are designed to do it all.
About John's cheap cymbal idea--I played a Pearl 20" ride from the eighties the other day with a big dent in the bell from where someone probably had the throne on the cymbal and sat down. I've always thought those rusty old Pearl cymbals were worst cymbals ever made (beside Zildjian Scimitars), but the thing was a great jazz cymbal--the driest thing I've ever heard--moreso than a heavy flat ride left underground for ten years, but it still had a great bell. So you never know.
Will
I personally use 12" 70's A Zildjian Hi hats and a 17" Zildjian remix ride on my set. The hi hats are just amazing for anything, but I have thought about the idea of getting two wuhan 10" or 12" splashes and using those for hi hats. They sell them for about $15 each at Guitar Center, and they vary a lot from cymbal to cymbal in terms of weight, so it would be easy to get one light and one heavy. Last time I was there, they had a whole barrel of them. I'm a huge fan of Wuhan cymbals, and if I didn't already have so many cymbals and were just starting out today, I might buy a whole set. You have to find a place that sells them because the boxed sets are almost certain to have a clunker, but they are hand hammered, B20 alloy, the company has been making cymbals for 2000 years, the cymbals are cheap, and the best ones have the funkiest overtones I've heard--I've another company get what Wuhan can get out of cymbals. Of course, their quality control is butt compared to most manufacturer's cymbals, so again, find a dealer.
My cocktail set has a much more focused, tight, quiet, punchy sound than I'm used to from conventional drums, so for my ride, I had to look for something that was also quiet and focused, but also very multi-purpose. I liked the ReMix ride because the crash is decent, the bell works within the volume of the cocktail set even if it doesn't work so well on a conventional set, the tip-ride sound and shank-ride sound are very nice, stick-shoulder crashes crash and die very quickly (which is important if you have to ride on the same cymbal you just crashed on), and the full-on crash sound at the edge of the cymbal has a nice crash sound, even if it can sometimes get a little John Bonham-ish. Unlike my big collection of 19" and 20" rides, the sound doesn't overwhelm the kit--it's perfectly in balance. Also, the 17" size doesn't put excess pressure on the mounting hardware or shell.
I found my A and K Zildjian crash cymbals were a good size for the set, but too washy to match the tone of the kit. My 15 3/4" Bosphorus rock crash is a good second choice for a ride--it washes a bit more, but the ride tone has some definition to it.
One thought that occured to me is that Paiste 2002 15" or 16" crashes might not be bad cocktail rides. They don't open up unless you really bash them, so you get a small, heavy cymbal with a focused tone that has the potential to spread with a harder crash. I've often thought the remix sounds like a 2002 crash.
I like Keith's idea of a timbale cymbal, too. Timbale cymbals are designed to do it all.
About John's cheap cymbal idea--I played a Pearl 20" ride from the eighties the other day with a big dent in the bell from where someone probably had the throne on the cymbal and sat down. I've always thought those rusty old Pearl cymbals were worst cymbals ever made (beside Zildjian Scimitars), but the thing was a great jazz cymbal--the driest thing I've ever heard--moreso than a heavy flat ride left underground for ten years, but it still had a great bell. So you never know.
Will
12" Wuhans
I followed Willy's advice awhile back about the 10" Wuhan cymbals as hi-hats. I was ordering some stuff from musicians friend and just added 2 of them to the order and figured I'd chance it. Well, it turns out they are PERFECT as a small set of fixed hats for my Cocktail Kit! They are dark, earthy, and imperfect enough that they sound like a much larger set of hats. They are also fairly thin so as you play louder they have a slightly looser sound to them. A lot more tones come out of these than a regular set of 14" hats fixed closed.
So, a great $30 investment!
Another great use for these:
attach them to the rim of a small piccollo snare and put the snare on a stand to the left of your hi-hat. It's amazing how much you can color a song by switching snares AND hi hats between verse/chorus/bridge/etc. Really handy for emulating that heavily produced sampled drum thing where they use 4 different kits throughout the song!
- John
PS: Old cymbals to look out for... 'Krut'. These always seem to be really 'funky' maybe not what you're looking for but they are usually 'interesting' at least : > )
So, a great $30 investment!
Another great use for these:
attach them to the rim of a small piccollo snare and put the snare on a stand to the left of your hi-hat. It's amazing how much you can color a song by switching snares AND hi hats between verse/chorus/bridge/etc. Really handy for emulating that heavily produced sampled drum thing where they use 4 different kits throughout the song!
- John
PS: Old cymbals to look out for... 'Krut'. These always seem to be really 'funky' maybe not what you're looking for but they are usually 'interesting' at least : > )
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Tom E. Gunn
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- Joined: Thu Jan 06, 2005 5:53 pm
- Location: California
"Krut" is actually "Turk" spelled backwards and were Ludwig's answer to Gretsch's affiliatiion with the Zildjian Ks. Ludwig had exclusive rights to sell Turk cymbals way back in the day.
I had a Wuhan 14 or 16 inch China (can't remember the size) and it was cheap and had this really unique sound. I thought when you struck it, it sounded like a toilet flushing in the men's room at Grand Central Station.
I had a Wuhan 14 or 16 inch China (can't remember the size) and it was cheap and had this really unique sound. I thought when you struck it, it sounded like a toilet flushing in the men's room at Grand Central Station.