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Changing the resonant head on my 16" floor tom completely brought it to life. Apparently 25 year old TAMA heads do not last forever. It was a total game changer.

Dude, this is so much more a helpful tuning tip video than I've been able to find anywhere else. ESPECIALLY because you actually talk about the resonant head; which is something that isn't very much talked about in other videos. Thanks so much!

He never blinks!!!!

Man, I've been waiting for another drummer to talk about this. Great lesson. My floor tom has sucked most of my life...and these lessons are learned the long way. Thank you for the short route!

As a somewhat novice drummer I really appreciate your videos and the details and effort you put in to them. Thanks and you've earned a sub :)

Hey Stephen! I just wanted to say how much I love your videos! They help so much and are so well explained. Thank you for making them! Keep up!

@StephenClark , It’s impressive to me how well you’re growing your channel. I would really enjoy seeing some videos of you playing through different styles, and covering some of the challenges you face in each.

Great info as always. one thing i recently tried is these new floortom rubber feet from pearle that make the tom more 'disconnected' from the ground greatly helped getting a better sound. i was amazed how much difference that makes. simply change out the rubber stops from your 3 legs and Bob's your auntie.

Thanks for all your content. It's really helping me out as a beginner. Take care.

I had problems with my floor tom and this helped A LOT thank you so much.

Thanks so much! I’m new to drumming at age 49 and your videos are extremely helpful, specifically on how to practice on silent set up and brand comparison. I have an old pearl export kit I bought for $85 that was basically everything a starter needs. I’ve since spent 3x that amount in little upgrades here and there. I currently use the pearl silencer heads that came as set off of Amazon, for my 14” rack, snare, 16” floor, and a 10” rack I added. For my 12” rack I DID get the Remo Silent stroke. All were purchases influenced by budget restrictions. My 22” bass........that’s where I had to get a little McGuyver-ish....... As you stated There IS NO GOOD BASS mesh head. So, I happened to have two large pieces of 1/4” thick styrofoam from SOME on line order. I placed on the INSIDE of my batter similar to one of the products you reviewed where the piece fit snuggly inside the rim. Same concept only my idea is to deaden the sound, while retaining some sort of bass, as well as keep the “action” of my pedal as real as possible. I also stuffed 2 quilts inside making sure they did not touch the inside of my batter. Sounds great and not too loud. I am a beginner who has never really hit on actual heads, so learning from you that applying duct tape (it will save the world one day....) to the mesh heads gives a more realistic feel was CRUCIAL!! THANK YOU! I’ve subscribed and look forward to more videos and I’ll be sure to go back through the library to see what I’ve missed. Thanks again, Conrad

just found your channel and i love your videos thanks! the struggle of the floor tom..man it took me ages to find a sound i liked haha but the EC2s slightly higher tuning was my preferred sound.

I like your videos pretty much since I'm a beginner and find your tips really helpful. Im gonna put a Evans EC2 on the Toms I use

Nice vid. Definitely gave me some ideas to experiment with. Liked and subscribed!

You have a great channel Stephen, even though i already know "everything" you are talking about it's nice to hear it explained with other peoples words. Keep up the good work, great video. Subscribed ;)

great tutorial dude. Love your work. Keep it up

I've stripped the plastic from my drums as well, such a cool look. Thanks for the tom tuning advice! Evans clear-heads sounds amazing.

This is great! Great job Stephen!

This is truly out of the ordinary. well doneand besides it was chock full of useful info. thanks

I just picked up a brand new sonor sq1 kit. It came with those coded ambassador's. I hated them. I put the ec2 s on the kit and it absolutely came to life. Great video brother keep them coming

thanks for posting this often neglected drum in the kit. I have also found that the tuning spacing interval between top batter and bottom reso head is 5 half notes (on the piano), with the reso tuned higher than the batter as you pointed out.

Best drum channel I've ever encountered (saying this as an amateur).

They both sound great, and it will depend on the situation, of course. Nowadays, I am more into a 70s sound; therefore, I go for hydraulic one. Great video, thanks!

This is a good solid video on the pitfalls of floor toms and how to correct them...I'm directing my students to it... :)

I recently installed evens 360 2ply. Been in a fued with floor Tom since. Your thoughts were inspirational. I have a tip that aids in keeping tthe tuning once achieved. Will send picks later.

You're a guru of drums my man...awesome content

I love both heads!! it's just depends on the Style. congrts on this amazing Channel!!!

Evans has these Hyrdaulic heads, It's great for players with no experience in tuning at all and are really easy to setup without much tuning. Try them out!

thank you very much sir. your information and teaching tips are very helpful. you seem like a great guy and very down to earth. i really enjoyed this video on tuning tips, but i also like your other helpful videos. i didn't like the sound of your floor tom with the coated 'remo' heads. i thought the clear evansc2 head was a little better, especially when you hit the sweet spot. .i didn't hear you say what bottom head that you are using on your floor tom. i love my 'attack' coated 2 ply medium thin batter heads and the 'attack' 1 ply medium clear 'reso' heads on the toms on my ludwig ' rocker' drum kit, and my mapex 'm -birch' kit..my drums sound awesome. i am looking to change them and experiment with buying 'evans ec2' clear batter heads with a 1 ply evans clear reso head.. i am looking for a whole new sound. i hope that it is an improvement to make my drums sound even better than they sound now. i am sure i am about to experiment a whole different sound. can you or anyone give me some advice as to what i am getting into? is this a good move for me? i realize that everyone has their own tastes, sounds, and desires, but it is still nice to read and hear other people's opinions. so, if you can give me any advice, i would appreciate it. thank you very much, G.

Thanks man 🙏🏽I’m sorry to say I was avoiding using my floor tom because I struggled with it so much... I don’t have that problem anymore

The craziest trick for floor toms that I've ever learned-and I've never heard of anyone else ever doing it-is tuning the batter a little higher than you're used to, then completely loosening one tension rod. I'm meticulous and neurotic with my tuning, and on paper, it seems like complete nonsense, but I can't tell you how many times it's saved my ass in a live situation where the sound guy just couldn't get ahold of the overtones.

Fantastic instructional video. Subbed. I'm going to try those EC2's - what was the reso head?

I find that floor tom resonate side needs to be tuned high because of the distance between top and bottom heads. That’s the case with my kit. Great video as always. 👍

I use Evans EC2 iced. Absolutely love the sound. To me it’s easier to get that deeper bite for me on Ludwig element birch.

Great stuff. My floor tom is always the 1 tom that drives me nuts. I never get the sound I hear in my head. I'm a fan of the coated remo heads. IMO they sound more warm compared to clear heads.

I'm digging that beat in the background

Just subscribed my brother. Thank you for this

The exact center of the drum is the drum node region and is usually avoided unless you want that sound. Also there is the matter of the reflection of the drum off of the source underneath the drum. The drum legs can affect the sound too. But main thing s get perspective from your space. Appreciate you video

Great video as always I like the sound of the Evans ec2 , I've fitted Evans level 360 gc2 clear heads to my kit and my 16" floor tom is tuned 83hz on top and 110hz on bottom which gives it a nice low sound I used,I used the drumtune pro app on my phone which I found very good and easy to use. Keep up with the videos I find them very useful

I put Aquarian Triple Threat Coated heads on all my toms to lessen the ring and high tones plus give me some warmth. Love 'em. Been playing coated heads about 14 years. Getting older and tastes and playing styles have changed.

These videos are totally addicting.. like 'Dirty Jobs' or 'Deadliest Catch' lol.. I truly enjoy them and I thank you for each and every one of your videos :)

Stephen, my compliments to great practical, logical presentations. I have a cheapo Gammon kit , gifted to me xmas 2018 by my wife (!!!!), to allow me to return to playing drums after a 50 year hiatus. Im 69 years old and retired now with unfortunately spinal issues . The kit includes 12, 13 and 16 inch toms. I ditched the snare for very good used pick up on a DW Design one, changed all the heads on the toms with 3 or 4 different combos. Tbe 16" floor tom is absolutely the ost difficult to obtain acceptable Dooooo, Doooooo sound I'm looking for. I'm spending too much $$$$ on different heads , probably very foolishly. G1s, G2, Remo ambassadors, and even 2 different Attacks...... the lztest being their ToneRidge heads . The ToneRidges didn't work well, same with the G2s. So i went back to Remo Ambassadors coated on the reso, and G1s clear on tge batters. Changing and mixing is driving me Nuts. Its becomming an obsession. Whats your advice ? I'm not sure what tge Gammons are made of......probably some wood combo. Thx, be well and safe

A mallet is great for hearing the tone at each lug. Much more of the fundamental than the attack. This was a real revelation to me!

My interest here in browsing up this vid was in how to get best sounds from my cocktail kit floor tom - which is really a tenor up on short legs (i.e. upright) - so the batter head for me is the underneath (which is struck by my adapted kick pedal) from below. The reso head, in effect, is the top head in this case - which I can also strike at need (preferably with the pad-end stick), or even with brushes if I want a 'soft jazz' sound. For my samba/calypso type arrangements, I can use this in combination with a small mounted tom and a snare plus cowbell - and I add my two steel-shelled congas also when needed (plus a lot of small hand percussion on top - when I multi-track). I've experimented with different heads on all my drums (including on my regular full kit, my various hand drums and on my range of various home-made 'kettledrums') and etc. But I would say that, after you've done the sensible tuning, a lot of it is down to **how** you hit and with what desired effect. Cotton balls is interesting (one poster here mentioned that I believe). You can even put small rattle-y things inside the shell (which will 'jiggle' as the beater strikes the batter head of course) - which can be interesting; if that's what you want! I think, too, your choice of **beater** is important: Sticks can be harder or softer, (as with all things musical, it's not just about price alone!). larger or smaller head (and I have some which I use with - my own -latex rubber caps on these, for another kind of sound - which also, in this case, gives very fine control on cymbals when you want that). Brushes of course you can use (and you can choose - on mine anyway - how much wire and how broad and spread therefore) as well as hot rods have their uses too. In essence: I think it's as much as anything about being entirely clear about what kind of sound *you* want. You the drummer are the master (if you know what you're doing). It's not the other way about!!

All good advice, and I feel ya on the cheap drums! lol. I didn't realize how low my 16" batter was tuned until this, and it sounds just like your "super low" tuning, so I gotta fix that. But how much can a 2-ply reso hurt a floor toms sound?

Great video. Helped.

Here’s a pro tip from the front lines...we’re talking the Boston, gb circuit, Berklee dweeb stuff that no one tells you. The kind of stuff that will get you more gigs. A huge majority of drummers out there tune their toms too low nowadays. Especially, ESPECIALLY if you’re in a situation with minimal micing. Low tuned drums sound amazing behind the kit. In my practice space, I keep my drums tuned nice and low because I prefer that sound in that environment. In a gigging situation, no one can hear that. The low end dies in a sea of guitars, bass and middle management douchebags trying to outdouche each other in front of you. Tune your toms a liiiiiittle higher when you’re out. At the end of the day, the most important sound is the sound 20 feet out front. If you tune your toms low like every other drummer, your tom work is going to sound like the same indistinct “papapahdodododoo” as every other drummer. A little higher and your personality will pop right through in that context. This is the best single tuning tip I ever got and it’ll help with floor tom tuning as well. Floor toms become exponentially more difficult to tune as the pitch decreases.

Nice video. I loved you in "Patriot" too.

a trick i came up with on my 16 was to put a clear 2 ply on the bottom to help control the drum, i never use dampening on toms and this worked well for me.

I have that Evans head and I really like it. I would recommend that one.

I use the Evans Level 360 Hydraulics on my Gretsch and it works very well. No need for muffling or any other ring control products. Resos are all single ply G1’s and balance the thicker batters well.

The closer to the center of the head you hit the less overtone you have. For a fuller sound it could be fixed by hitting slightly off from the center

Very nice of this surgeon to take a break from the O.R. to give us drum tuning tips.

Thank you so much for doing this video

Great vid. Thank you!

Context is so important too. Often a floor tom that sounds too flappy or boomy will sound great played in context with the rest of the kit and even better with the rest of the band.

Thanx great video I use remo pinstripe

Funny, for me it's always the mid tom espacially 12".

I’ve noticed stock heads now often seem to carry a name brand but a lower quality, so still always worth swapping stock heads to quality heads like you say, I also found the quality of the resonant head can hugely affect the sound. 😀

Love your channel. Vary helpful

I am new to learning drums I purchased a decent Ludwig I have a large ride cymbal and 1 crash cymbal 14 inch High Hat. I got some moon gel that seems to help with over resonation. I only use it in my studio at home. I want to learn enough to accompany my guitar and bass and keyboard parts that I record. I like everything to be recorded with microphones and live amplifiers. I need some help with tuning my drums but d not really know how to get started. Thank you for a great video I am subscribing to your channel.

I use the Evans Hydraulic heads on my toms, they work great for me, I do use a different snare head though, Aquarian High Energy. Thanks for the tips man.

I got no problems with the floor toms, it’s always my 12/13 that sucks

the ec2 sounds great! :) love your videos, cheers!

Great. solid Info.

Really great and useful!

I have a vintage Slingerland 16in floor tom that I wrestled with and was never happy with, it just always sounded dead. The drum had straight legs with small rubber tips. I finally solved the problem by changing the legs and rubber tips. I switched to the Pearl floor tom legs with those big rubber tips. This completely changes the characteristics of the drum.

Hi, great video. I have 16" and 18" Gretsch Catalina floor toms and I really struggle to tune them. I think what not sure of is the interval between the reso and batter head - any tips please? I use Evans two-ply on batter, and single ply on the reso

For toms, I use a one-ply resonant head and a two-ply batter head, tuning the reso a perfect fifth higher than the batter (for a perfect fifth, hum the melody to "Here Comes the Bride" in any key). This means that your drum will pitch high as the reso rings out first and then drop down when your stick releases the batter. IMHO, this sounds way better than going from low to high or trying vainly to get both heads tuned to the same pitch. They never will stay at the same pitch anyway and will merely run interference with each other - kind of like a pair of air horns! Then I tune the batter of the the next tom up to match the reso of the lower drum. If you use four toms, say 10, 12, 14, 16, then the reso of the 16 will be the same pitch as the batter of the 14 and the reso of the 14 will be the same pitch as the batter of the 12 and so on. This means that the kit is in tune with itself - like a guitar - because when you hit one drum, all the other drums ring a bit too, don't they? In fact the whole kit resonates - the cymbals too! So ... Remo Emperors or Pin Stripes on top and Ambassadors on the bottom (or Evans G2s/EC2s and G1s). Nice Evans drum key BTW. I have two of those that I use for quick head changes. Not only do they have that cool knurled knob at the top, but they have little magnets inside the key so they stick onto your tuning rods. Please note: this stuff works for me and it's just my opinion that it sounds good. However, if you're having trouble with your tunings, then you may as well try it. Also, if your kit is just too ringy in the studio or your practice space, then try using Aquarian damper rings. I get a nice fat sound with them on my heads, but I take them off for live. Drums should ring - that's what carries your sound. Thanks for the videos Stephen, they are really good!

The heads I have on my toms are the Remo Pinstripes: 10, 12, 16.

The rubber feet on toms' legs mostly stiffen with time, losing shock absorption, so i set them over an additional sheet of rubber tiles - those stuff kids play on that can be locked like puzzle tiles - over three layers of cheap carpet. The legs dig into these a bit so it kinda works like 'memory' as well. Where the bass drum spurs rest i inserted a sheet cut rectangular, of material used as rubber sole, between the top two carpet layers. The round, meaty sound blooms from there. If I may add, I also weighed down the beach towel inside my bass drum with 11 kgs of packed fine sand I bought at a nearby construction supply outlet to stabilize the bass drum sound, as well as the mounted toms. My bass player tailored his sound to complement mine as a consequence.

This channel Is so freakin awesome!

Well done !

I like the tuning of the ec2 and just to clear head itself as I play punk music so I like a little brighter but still able to get a nice low-end punch

My problem was with the bearing edges and crooked hoops. It sould be your tip #9. Cheers!

My floor tom is only 13" (8, 10, 12 rack toms). Evans EC2 is the only head I've found that works well for smaller toms that want to sound big. Love the videos, keep up the good work!

My favorite head for my toms at the moment are Evans Black Chromes. I also dont use resonant heads.

Hi, I really like your channel and I subcribed it as well. I have a question: what kind of practice pad over the drums did you use for the backing track in this video? I use remo silentstroke heads and ziljidian low volume, but my sound is not good as yours. Thank you and have a good holiday weekend!

Why did you choose different brands for the heads?? I mean for the reso and the batter. Thx, dude, nice videos always

Great ideas here bro

hi Stephen, very informative video but according to me, you forgot an important reason why a floor tom can sound bad; the legs of the tom! i m talking here about floor toms that stands on three legs, not suspended toms on a cymbal stand that usually sounds great because of their good sustain, and sustain is maybe the most important topic when we talk about a good sounding drum, without sustain, nothing possible, and of course it's possible to control the sustain the three legs of floor tom are sometimes the reason of a cruel lack of sustain, and if you lift the tom from the ground, you will find that the sustain is back, as if the ground would absorb the resonance of the drum...the reason of that could be because the gum at the end of the legs in not protecting the drum to sound and vibrate freely, or the gum isnt here anymore, or sometimes a bad conception of the drum itself thank you for your videos greetings from France

I use a pretty standard head setup on my 13" rack tom and 16" floor tom. Clear ambassador heads for batter and clear diplomat for reso. On my 18" floor tom I use a Powerstroke 3 batter and ebony ambassador for reso. I find the 18" resonates like crazy so I have to use a heavier head for the better to match the other toms.

Nice to see Song of Songs in the background.

Great tutorial dude. I like to use Remo Coated Emperors on my toms with a piece of moongel and tuned low to get that boomy and slightly muffled sound. Kinda like Travis Barker.

For Rock Fusion, try the evans hydraulic double ply with thin oil inbetween layers, if you wan't that short tom attack with rumble, they realy awesome ^^ no need moon gel anymore !!!

Good stuff man :)

Can you make a video about which company makes good products for each category (pedal, drumheads, cymbals etc.)

I have a 14” Pearl EXR floor tom with a shitty mounting system that just clamps on the hoop. I have NOT played a venue when the sound tech or some other person compliments how well my drums sound. I use a Remo Emperor Black Suede batter and an Ambassador Coated on the resonant side. Super low tuning on top and slightly higher on the bottom. I love this sound!

I replaced my stock Remo heads with Evans Hydraulic Heads and Evans G1'S for the rest heads... Much improved

One thing I learned early on in my youth was hitting the shell dead center first - why, because the shell has a resonant frequency that is what it wants to play. Once you have that tone, strive to tune both bottom and top heads to that tone. You'll find the drum will 'sing' in a much more distinct manner. Also when you tune tune above the tone you want and then bring the head back down to the proper tone, this will help to "seat" the heads properly, much like first tune of a guitar string too high then drop to the correct pitch, why, because all stuck and plucked instruments have to give a little at first, which is why most heads take a few days to get to where they "hold" their tune correctly. I find with this technique you use little or no muffling/dampening except where volume control is an issue (practice/low volume/etc). I personally haven't used dampening in recording or live play in over three decades. :) (Thank You Neil Peart for that tip. MD 1988 or '89 interview - took me a while to learn it correctly.)

Stephen: What size tom would you recommend for a cajon kit church set up where its in a very echo-y in the room? I'm trying to find a balance between a small sized floor tom (for easy/quick set up) & cheap price but still have it sound deep enough. My regular set's tom is 14x14 so I'm thinking either a 12x14 or even like a child's sized floor tom. Rookie mistake or just odd?

Hi Stephen. Thanks for your videos. I have heard somewhere one way of tuning, whih is the reso heads tuned very high and the batter heads tightened just to get rid of wrinkles and basically get some sound. It worked somehow for me while I was using the Remo pinstripes, cannot really tell for the Ambassadors I use now. Would you have some comments on such tuning style? My 14" floor tom sounds great, I would actually need to shorten the sound somehow, but my 10" tom, which always used to be my sweetie just lost the tone after I changed the heads. I tried the matched tuning, but it still has no body... Any ideas?

My floor tom rumbles and vibrates like crazy when I hit it. I've tuned both heads the right way and every other tom on my set and my snare they all sound great. I don't use muffling. I've got good quality evans heads on all of them. Tom still rumbles like a monster, BUT then I put a pillow underneath it in between two of its legs, meaning the pillow is in contact with the two legs, yet not in contact with the drum itself or the heads. It's just on the floor inches away from the reso but pressed in between the legs. SO does this mean its a hardware problem? Obviosly I've made sure the legs are tight enough, they were tight enough already before the pillow, and the lugs on the tom seem all tight enough. Could it be a loose part inside one of the lugs causing unwanted vibration? If I take the pillow away it goes back to the same loud rumbling.

I struggle with getting it line with the other toms. When I was an ignorant novice, I just couldn't figure out how the drummers of my favorite bands got the amazing sounds. Then I realized that they were all using mic'd up toms using computer assisted sounds to achieve warmth. Maybe the sound you are trying to achieve isn't something that is natural. It kinda like photography. The camera does most of the work, but you still have to use Photoshop to get the ideal photo. Just food for thought.

im using Cotton inside my floor toms lying on the resonant head and a Clear stick atack and the Cottons jumps and when it lands it muffels the drum and i'm not losing res from my floor tom stick atack

Going from a Remo pinstripe to a coated, playing harder stuff, but allowing for versatility, what do you recommend? Been looking at the Remo Suede. They seem like a nice middle ground. My impression is more warmth than the clear heads, while being more durable than the ‘jazz’ heads. Haven’t played them yet.

I have a Pearl Maple Session from around 2002. It’s supposedly a high end drum but I’m have a difficult time getting my 14” floor Tom to sound right with the low punchy sound. Tried both of the heads in this vid, plus Emperors and G2s... with clear Ambassador and clear Genera Resos. Could be the age of the heads. How long are you supposed to keep the batter/reso? Both are a couple years old, but haven’t been played much because I was away for graduate school. I like to use no muffling if possible.

Do you think that sm57 is the best mic to represent the true sound the floor tom should be have? I use a kick mic for my floor tom to get a meaty low but still give the 500kh frequency as well

I use the ec2 by Evans, takes out a lot of the over ring. I also use the aquarium Studio rings. I have a standard 12 and 13 inch Tom mounted on my bass drum and a 16 inch floor tom, I just bought a matching 18in floor tom and I cannot seem to get it tuned lower than the 16 in. I think I'm going to have to tune up the 16 so it will be a nicer flow from the 13 to the 18 in. Wish somebody out there would do a video on tuning a 12 13 16 and additional 18, enjoy your videos a lot, if you have an 18 please make us a video