Can We Make A Toy Drumset Sound Professional?

We bought a toy drumset for $50 and we're going to use it to record a real song! Do you think you will be able to tell the difference between a $10,000 kit and our $50 kit? Let's find out.
#toydrumset #drumeo #havefunwithdrums
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In this video, we sit down with Jared (our professional in-house drummer) and Victor Guidera (the Drumeo audio engineer) and we attempt to turn a toy drum set into a record-worthy professional kit. And let's be honest, the only thing this toy kit sounds better than right out the gate is the snare from "St. Anger". But in the end, will the average listener even be able to tell the difference? That's what we're here to find out.
So let's watch Jared and Victor do their thing and attempt the impossible! We'll also get to see how our favorite drum teacher reacts to this kit's transformation. Let's have fun with drums.
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Chapters:
0:00 - Intro
0:35 - Tuning The Drums
2:04 - Sound Check #1
2:29 - Mic'ing The Drums
2:45 - Sound Check #2
3:27 - Mixing The Drums
5:36 - The Drumeo Performance
6:24 - Outro
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Excerpt from "The Beat": www.drumeo.com/beat/
Can you buy a toy drum set for fifty bucks and make it sound better than plastic containers and tin cans?
The answer is yes.
In order to turn this kids drum kit into a recording monster, we needed a pro audio engineer to get there. But we didn’t need the mighty Victor Guidera to improve the sound a whopping 200% (estimated statistic - don’t come for us). Tuning and muffling did a lot for this kit’s glow-up.
You’ll see in the video how you can transform a cheap toy into a recordable kit. Here’s what we did:
- Tune the heads
- Add muffling (gaffer tape comes off nice and clean - like painter’s tape!)
- Add mics: We used a Solomon LoFReQ Subkick (to help add low end to that small, tinny kick), a Sennheiser e602 on the bass drum, an Earthworks SR20LS on the snare drum, and an Earthworks DM20 on the tom
- Mix the audio (you can use sound augmentation to improve it even more)
These cheap kits may not sound great, but they’re useful for teaching kids the basics of drumming, giving them a way to blow off steam, and get them excited to rock out. That’s $50 well spent!
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Can't get enough of this video? Check out similar content by our friends rdavidr and Stephen Taylor in their video called: "Can We Make A Kids Drum Set Sound Good?"

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Save up to 81% on drum lessons, gear, merch & more with our Black Friday deals: Drumeo.com/Black-Friday/

[@Riley88990]

The main thing I learned from this video is that a world class engineer can do a lot with drums but crappy cymbals are crappy cymbals

[@raufmeister]

actually he could fix it, its not hard but it takes time, some professional studios does it with shitty recordings, they just did basic stuff, mix, eq, compression and reveerb, if the engineer was kind enough he gave it volume.

[@f67739]

it works as a super trashy splash actually lol

[@MadWinter889]

Cymbals are wonderful instruments aren't they?

[@The_fuzz_buzz]

You could also just replace everything and trigger it with samples ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[@agoogleuser7832]

@@raufmeister No...that he cant fix. Crappy cymbals sound like they do and no amount of EQ will change that. Maybe(and a big maybe) with some severe compression with a fast attack and slow release with some verb...

[@vonirkinshtine]

Putting $2000 worth of microphones on a $50 drum set is the type of content I come for.

[@nicoeleich]

I’d say $4.000… 🤣

[@geovani60624]

well, if you used cheap microphones in a professional drum set it would sound shit tho

[@Pumpkinhead9092]

Depends on the overheads. They didn't show what they used up there.

[@bleckybob]

More like 5 $2000 mics on just the snare lol

[@nicoeleich]

@@Pumpkinhead9092 1.000% sure Earthworks

[@puop]

I am now convinced that Jared's kit sounds like coffee cans and victor just works his magic to get that to sound good.. nice work guy's.. it's not the equipment that should hold you back.

[@La_sagne]

well.. the cost of those mics + a mixer/interface can buy you a pretty decent drumkit

[@philconey11]

Let's make a note that the mixer and amp rack in that studio is a mortgage, and the salary of the engineer is another mortgage every year.

[@raufmeister]

@@La_sagne you dont need the mixer, it just makes easier to move everything and mute everything especially if you work with more than 70 tracks (probably a full orchesta, some electronic music), a mid quality mics who record a sound you like is more than enough, just see reviews in different rooms not just in studios, ill just buy high quality mics in a pretty good studio with a nice sound treatment, which will be much more expensive (10k doilars if you done everything), with some good skills you can clean and make everything sounds good, how i know it? im a producer and i been cleaning vocals who came from an iphone microphone, my own vocals who are recorded in an audio technica with low volume and a lot of white noise, after you done it properly it sounds so nice and profesional, what you can not replace its a good singer, drumer, guitarrist, bassist, producer and stuff, a bad producer/audio engineer can fuck everything done properly or fix most of the thing done wrong

[@jimmahtro2728]

@@raufmeister What the fuck did you even just say? 😂

[@rollinstoned6311]

@@raufmeister God...That was a painful to read...

[@makaylagerald2797]

This video is the most fun I’ve had in 3 years. I wanna hear this with new heads.

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Soooo it turns out the kit had some like proprietary tech when it came to the heads 😂 this kit wants to be it's own thing.

[@theyescapedtheweightofdarkness]

This video Jared take child kit and make it professional, Next video: Jared turns into child and plays professional kit

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Hahaha now THIS is the video I want to see. Just not sure how to make it happen 🤔

[@TU42Fuzzy]

@@DrumeoOfficial You just gotta believe...

[@zooby11isbambam]

That’s just every episode of drumeo

[@tikvision]

everything is low budget and fine until you need the $2000 mic and the súper edit

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Haha fair enough! We did what we could to make this little kit sound like a beast 😂

[@tikvision]

@@DrumeoOfficial great job though!

[@bg357wg]

Or you can just use triggers hahaha

[@bobinbud]

You told the truth. I am asking them to do same thing with low budget mic with expensive hi class drums for edit doesn’t matter:)

[@raufmeister]

@@bobinbud they can make the drums sounds nice and clear if the mic have enough frequencies, you can fix everything even the lack of frequencies

[@TAHHGREEN]

Love this video. Not just because you made that toy sound pro, but loved the energy and humour while filming. It certainly put a smile on my face, well done 👏 👏 👏

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Thank you 🙏

[@henz8303]

A good engineer can make a toy sound better than my kit 😂

[@aniruddhgupta2597]

each of the mics are probably worth more than your entire kit though lmao

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Ummmmmm maybe 😂

[@rdoursenaud]

Don’t forget there’s a step you can take too. The tuned kit without mics and post-processing sounded already quite decent!

[@nakai_bee6024]

Entertaining... this is what KZbin was created for.

[@Deraco1]

This!

[@DrumeoOfficial]

If you love this video, check out rdavidr + Stephen Taylor make an EVEN CHEAPER kids drum set sound good: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rYfNmGuXqcZ9p9U

[@aaronanthony569]

What is that control surface he is using in studio that is mind blowing 🤯🤯

[@DrumeoOfficial]

@BangBangInthe BoomBoom That's fantastic! So glad to hear that deal works for you. See you inside the members area!

[@rdoursenaud]

@@aaronanthony569 It’s not a control surface, it’s a full blown digital mixing console. A Tascam DM4800 if I’m not mistaken.

[@Pablotercero90]

Jared: "Victor I'm bleeding" Victor: "keep going" Jared: "Victor??! Victor: "keep going" Jared: "dude seriously" Victor: "keep going"

[@robertnettleship5467]

1:05 the tom sound genuinely cracked me up

[@TechBaffleBits]

it sounded kinda electronic 😂

[@Slayerformayor1983]

Reminds me of the south park episode when randy is lorde, and you hear what his songs sound like before and after processing. Great stuff.

[@dongkrakata]

"what's your excuse?" "I don't have high end mics😂" anyways, cool concept!

[@peterfedi]

This may be an unpopular Opinion but i think youll get 80% of the way with only 20% of the price of the mics (or even less). Just need a good Mix :P

[@OneTeeGlory]

@@peterfedi You’re not entirely wrong. First, your recording environment is more important than your mix and 2, unless your mic is truly awful, you should be able to edit the audio to a point where it’s listenable. And decent mics have become very inexpensive now. You almost have to actively try to get a bad microphone to get unfixable audio.

[@ChimeStone]

@@OneTeeGlory i been using the pyle pro mics for years and it gets the job done! Got the 7 piece mic set for $100

[@opt6037]

I think all guest drummers should have to perform 1 minute on the kids drums with this treatment. Would be gold 😂

[@giacomonizi8930]

2:26 stops the cymbals without even playing. Every drummer: He's talking about me

[@karlspear6729]

I bought a CB drumset for my grandson, it sounded like crap with the stock heads on it. I replaced the heads with Evan's heads and it sounded so good that I made a riser for the bass drum and played it out in a couple of small venue gigs. I feel the key is in the tuning and the choice of heads. Making it sound good with EQ is cool, but it should sound good without it first!

[@rdoursenaud]

Right on the money!

[@patrickpeters6016]

Do you like Evans? I’ve been considering replacing my heads with Aquarian, but that’s just because it’s the best brand I know of

[@deansheridan]

@@patrickpeters6016 buy a bunch used mismatch. Save money

[@breathingspace23]

I would like to see more videos on mixing drums. That was amazing, the EQ is worth a video on just that part for each drum. Thank you for the great videos and you are a talented drummer and teacher.

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Noted!

[@aarongroh8018]

Good video guys, definitely fun and entertaining to watch and the sound man did an amazing job tweaking it to recording level ! Hilarious 😆

[@speaktowalls]

This is hands down my favourite Drumeo video, probably my favourite drum related video ever. It's so captivating and hilarious - Great work!

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Wow, thanks you so much 😃

[@ruaraidhmcdonald-walker9524]

I love that you guys did this!

[@martindrumkid]

Nice to see you have fun. I started my drum experience exactly on this kind of drums.

[@rickerickson9310]

I really enjoyed watching the process of making this Kids Kit sound, loved it!

[@vicadamebbborla6127]

U guys are the definition of awesome!

[@xSTONYTARKx]

I used to be in a marching band since i was 6 until i was about 14. When i was 10 or something my younger brother got one of these toy drumkits. He never really played it but i did play it really a lot and i think that my interest in moving on to drums instead of just a snaredrum started there. Now I'm 25 and i played in several bands and played quite a lot of live shows, some small and some big ones. I still play i a band, but obviously no live shows now sadly... It's funny to look back on how it all started.

[@BetterDrummer]

I first started on a tiny kit like that. It's hilariously bad now of course, but as you said, you can't discount any tool that can get a kid started on playing drums 😁

[@carlchan5094]

Daaamnnn that sounded professional!! Amazing!!

[@DvjLuna]

I guess this is where the term "Polishing a TURD" comes into play. It actually did sound great after tweeking the various different components of the drum set on post recording! Nicely done.

[@Toinks97057226]

Loved this video!

[@maximusDMR]

OMG you are insane! Such a fun watching this, I was crying when you said “you just need to hire the sound engineer” buahahahahaa I’m getting one of these for myself!

[@toddwalkerdrumstudio]

......That was a great , fun & entertaining "drum/mixing" (toy kit) processing experiment, I must admit! ......Thanks!

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Glad you enjoyed it! We had a lot of fun making this video!

[@toddwalkerdrumstudio]

@@DrumeoOfficial .....Great job guys!!!!!

[@coryroberts5048]

Amazing work y'all

[@michaelwirth6843]

Incredible idea!

[@joeykickass8284]

I did something similar 20yrs ago... I put some remo's on them so they could take a hit and used triggers... used my cymbals and played a show with them... it was fun!. Everyone got a good laugh out of it...

[@katabatica]

Awesome vid guys

[@jackbrown3270]

yooooo the mixing portion of this video was extremely insightful!!!!!

[@aaronf8710]

Oh man. I’ve been learning from Jared’s videos for like 12 years. Glad to see he’s still going strong.

[@WilberWisdom]

I thoroughly enjoy it when pros take things to the extreme. Taking a crummy toy drum set and turning it into a monster sound is the best! Now if we can just get a big name to tour with that little set!

[@ruthmacayayong4505]

that sound so good !! 🤩🤩👏👏

[@dftns]

Just amazing!

[@TU42Fuzzy]

This video was amazing, great job Drumeo! 🔥🥁🙏🏼

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Thank you!!

[@TU42Fuzzy]

@@DrumeoOfficial Yw! :)

[@NARMAK1966]

That was incredible and unbelievable.!!!!! I really enjoyed the sound quality of the playback.!!!!! The new technology can create magic.!!!!!!

[@DrumeoOfficial]

So happy to hear you enjoyed it!

[@wilcandou]

Victor... you're the dude! 👍

[@laszlozoltan5021]

I think we've all seen street performers playing amazingly on overturned plastic containers- so it's not what you play, but how you play

[@joelmarquez4629]

Who needs DW,Ludwig, Sonor? Lol

[@JasonSmithSlayboneGardener]

that was awesome!!~!

[@toshemanka]

Now I need this drum kit!!!

[@daraichel]

I think it would be fun for you guys to buy a really cheap drum set, guitar & bass and have yourself and some others jam with the toys, tuned of course, and see what kinda sound you guys can make with then. I'm sure we'll all be impressed. Great vids. Love the channel

[@el_nestorvgc]

You can't imagine my face of joy when I saw the engineer making his job. Aplausos

[@erikkroll2154]

Hilarious! This was awesome.

[@M4RCM0NT31R0]

Oh yurrr! New Drumeo video!

[@ZebulonJakub]

Fun stuff!!!!

[@trollingfortruth5039]

I want to know more about how your talented engineers make all of those kits sound so good on every video, I wish you guys went into more depth about different mics and stuff. Also a video about how to set up a studio in your small rehearsal space would be cool too.

[@ElitexBrikz]

This is actually a video showcasing Jared’s chops on anything just to flex on us lol 😂

[@BardofCornwall]

It does come out pretty impressively!

[@quadzmotooffroad2904]

I think its awesome that you got your hands on the same kit Lars used on St. ANGER

[@itisconsulting]

So great!

[@drummermomcjs]

Pretty impressive! This video is a hoot! Just goes to show that even the most humble of surfaces can be an amazing sounding drum! :-)

[@drumanddrummer2959]

Honestly cheap drums can be the easiest to control in the studio haha

[@UsoMerit]

When you want to have a pretty natural sound it gets difficult though. Like when you want a natural sounding kit for Jazz for example. There you would be pretty helpless with a drum kit like the one in the video.

[@duncanbrode381]

Well, that certainly answers the "What if?" question...well done!

[@MickPosch]

6:24 Say what you want about those drums, but you gotta love a kit that you can pick up in one hand!

[@JoshuaWillis89]

I’m seriously impressed by the tom.

[@drummerduckgaming2084]

Make a giant drum set out of a bunch of kids’ drum sets

[@penelocent]

Your a Genius.

[@spencerj]

I love your end sound, but I'd love to see a junior kit version of this using sample layering and close mic cymbals to demonstrate "the next level" of turning a junior kit into a professional kit

[@DaveStutts]

This is my favorite drumeo video

[@angelon1980]

This is prettey awesome.

[@lalramaralte6049]

Great drumming skills, great mixing...Great content🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥SO SATISFYING

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Thank you 🙌

[@micaiahwidmer6902]

Literally one of the most fun videos

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Thank you!! We had so much fun making this one!!

[@nancypaul2703]

It's really fun...as a Drummer I appreciate what make me interesting as well as innovating. 💪💖

[@culpritdesign]

I love this so much.

[@zagadape109]

I had so much fun watching You going nuts on this kit at the end :D Well made video on very interesting topic Jared, thanks. Pozdro666

[@marcpatzelt2430]

Everything except for the cymbal sounds amazing!

[@billcichoke2534]

Um...wow. I'm a guitarist and trying to get my kids exposed to as many instrument types as possible. I was thinking about an old Roland electronic rig, but NOW... You guys just opened up s whole new possibility for me. That's friggin' AWESOME.

[@kiheirc3195]

Awesome drummer

[@JulianFernandez]

Also, Victor KILLED IT.

[@soyandresmoreno]

Amazing!

[@stewedpuppet4555]

This hypes me up. Knowing that you can turn something cheap into something better to produce decent music.

[@alonzovillarreal4666]

lol that was awesome!

[@pete5668]

Loved it when the drum set decided to lie down and take a nap.

[@andrewmccormack4295]

Pete.... that's funny. LOL

[@LENWOIS]

that was awesome

[@banqueproductions2763]

Jared you’re a beast!

[@mattdangerg]

This was great

[@philwright2480]

Back in the 90s Carmine Appice and Edgar Winter were on KLOS 95.5 radio in Los Angeles, Mark and Brian in the morning, they played Frankenstein, Carmine played a toy/kids jr set they had in the studio, they sounded great.

[@jackdrums1714]

Plot twist: all of the background music was recorded with this drum set

[@MajesticDemonLord]

Honestly - a decent Cymbal - and I would never guess it was a childs kit!

[@jelisa1984]

bro when it fell over at the end, I about hollered

[@tosinkingfishercheeseburge8901]

Really good drum

[@RogerBergqvist]

Jeees.. A have a Yamaha 9000 kit. Cooooool! 😄😁

[@millennialanimal]

I’m so tempted to buy one and try this out.

[@forresthouser5807]

KILLER!!!

[@LasseHuhtala]

An entire band with toy instruments, please. :-)

[@tylergoodguy1194]

Victor has an incredible radio voice.

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Haha he does doesn't he?!

[@AlessandroCorazzaCA]

He has built-in EQ and compression.

[@goocheegus]

This is mindblowing hahaha

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Right!?

[@hannesdrumss]

We need more of these crafty videos, I especially enjoyed the suitcase kit!

[@platupla]

Nice!!! 🤘🏻

[@doctorknow]

Sounds actually great lol

[@DrumeoOfficial]

Right?!?!

[@MinimGuitars]

Nice! I've got a kid's kit that also has a hat and a floor tom; it's like a "real" kit - just small! Going to see if I can get something workable out of it.

[@OnlyHumanYT]

This just makes me want to get one now lol

[@bretdorton]

Yes you can because the engineer can do miracles with toys if he or she is good