Why, just why?




 

Probably because the lead guitar or vox thought standing on it would let more people see them, which then turned the front bass hoop into a slight oval and now the drummers $2500 C & C bass drum is outta round. Since the drummer spent $3500 on the kit (that he scrimped and saved for years to finally buy his dream kit) he can't even afford the $40 to buy a replacement Gibraltar hoop Nah, looks like a double pedal drive shaft back there and he's using a concert rack tom so I think he's going more for attack than tone.






But seriously don't stand on my fucking bass drum or you'll get a 5B to the balls, or eye socket, or both



 
 

Most of the times I've seen or used a batter head only it was for recording.

 
After listening to this band for an hour I'm gonna say you nailed it.

Pinstipe - check
Big towel - check
No resonant head - check

These all support the original hypothesis. But...  He really wants to capture that attack with both the bass mic and the boundary layer mic.

 
And sure enough 3/4 of the way through the show I notice the bass player pointing at the drum.  The Beta 91 had slid out and I had to jog onstage and tape it back in place




Yeah, the inside mic really captures the attack.  I usually start blending it into the monitors when the outside mic isn't cutting it (with the polarity switch set to taste, of course).


 

I also just noticed his big tom right next to it has no reso head, by design.

I have seen this in some studio recordings, done to mic from the bottom/internal.  Mostly for metal, where they wanted to get the attack and the tone is going to get lost in the cacophony anyways.

But not sure if you wanted the attack why you'd bother with the Shure mic as well.  Or frankly, why not just trigger the kick at that point.

ETA: One reason I would never do this is that touring with your reso edge completely exposed is begging to have you bearing edge fucked up beyond repair, so that kick drum will only ever be useable without the res heads on it.  Better to slap a res head with a huge ass hole in it.

That was my initial thought, too.

Then again, I'm just a very basic 4/4 hack. A hack that gave away his acoustic kit, traded his DW5000 & 8000 hardware plus a full set of A Zildjian cymbals for a Telecaster with TV Jones pickups, and kept his old Roland TD8 e-kit.

Because that's the way we did it back in the 70's.

--David