For most of us musicians, we know that practice makes perfect. And when it comes to a band, that maxim holds true all the more. The only obstacle in the way of a band’s musical progress is most often the availability and accessibility to a practice pad.
So, what is the usual suspect of a hurdle when it comes to setting up your own practice pad?
Noise levels! Keeping things at just the right volume to rock your socks out, but without bothering the neighbours! Except when it comes to an apartment complex or a residential area, this isn’t easy with the constraints of traditional invasive soundproofing and the costs involved, especially if you are renting your home!
So, what are your options? Let’s first assess the problems objectively and then look at the collective solutions that are viable at a low to no budget.
Now this could be an intensive read for some, so if you are in a hurry, just scroll down to the bottom and I’ve included a short summary of budget friendly acoustical solutions for your jam room.
Problem 1: The drum kit
Without question, your drum kit is the loudest instrument in your jam room, across most genres. The impact sound and the airborne sound have to be dampened suitably to achieve sound transmission loss out of your jam room. Impact sound is that which travels through structures coupled to the sound sources, i.e. like the drum kit or bass amp sitting directly on the floor and airborne sound is that which travels from the source through the air around it, like egg shakers, conversation, etc. A simple way to experience the difference, is something I’ve become aware to when I heard very succinctly, the sound of a glass bottle hitting the floor in the apartment above me, but the lack of exclamation in conversation that should have followed suit.
Solution 1: Decouple the drum kit from the floor.
Decoupling simply is separating a source from the structure it is connected to/resting on to simply involves ensuring that sound energy does not transmit via vibrations on through from the source to the structure. Effective decoupling over the entire spectrum of music requires significant investment and construction acumen to prevent sound from leaving your jam room. Since that is not our goal here, the decoupling we pursue is more to dampen the impact noise over as much of the musical frequency spectrum so as to attenuate the amount of energy leaving the room. Now decoupling is no easy task, because an effective system (when it comes to a drum kit) involves a mass-spring (M-S) arrangement which needs significantly heavy mass, to be customized to an ideal weight range (inclusive of the kit and drummer) to allow for vibrational energy to be dampened effectively by a suitable spring system. Further, the arrangement calls for a low resonant frequency
(which is dependant on the heavy mass, but let’s not worry about this in this post because there is no budget friendly workaround to this). Any under-compression or over-compression of the spring in the M-S decoupling system renders ineffective the degree of its ability to dampen impact noise properly and vibrations pass through onto the surface that the system is placed on. Now a drum riser (an elevated platform that can help dampen vibrational energy from being conducted to the structure) isn’t hard to make with the DIY information on the interweb, but DIYers have been divided by the overall effectiveness being greater with electronic kits rather than acoustic drum kits. My take on this is because risers don’t do much at all for airborne sound (which is what you hear in the jam room), but help reducing the high frequency range of impact sound (which is a sizable contribution to what your neighbours would hear the loudest when you hit the kick, especially from an electric kick). Bear in mind, they don’t do anything for isolation (essentially, the transmission loss you would expect from soundproofing). Personally, in my experience the most budget friendly and accessible solution has been placing a couple layers of heavy carpets with a layer of thick curtains on the floor and then the kit on top of them (this is what I did, and there’s a link at the end of this blog where we recorded a song live in the jam room). But expect no isolation (again, transmission loss that you’d expect from soundproofing), very little in terms of low frequency impact noise damping. But the airborne sound will be dampened a bit by the carpets and high frequency impact noise should be attenuated, which is still a plus for a tier of low to no investment solutions. If making your own drum riser sounds like too much work and/or if you feel that these solutions might not be effective enough for your jam room’s needs, leave us a message and we will help you with some customized solutions.
(Picture courtesy : Sound on sound’s Building a drum riser for your electronic kit)
Solution 2: Mattresses
Another affordable solution to help quieten your practice pad when it comes to your drum kit, is mattresses on the floor around the kit. They aren’t expensive if you know where to look, and they certainly dampen a lot of the airborne sound, thereby effectively making 16% (1 of the 6 surfaces in your room, i.e 4 walls, a ceiling, and the floor) of your room an extensive mid and high absorption provider. Also, placing your instrument amplifiers on them help dampen them fro being coupled to the floor as well.
(Picture courtesy : the interweb)
Problem 2: The bass, keyboard and guitar amps, and your windows!
Once you’ve dealt with the drum kit, you’ve tacked quite the slice of the problem pie. Now it’s time to focus more on the upper bass, mid and high frequency problems that stem from your instrument amplifiers. Most of the problems from these sound sources can be tackled with the following solutions
Solution 1: Close out the gaps in between the windows and their frames.
Depending on what season of year it is, you must have experienced that your windows sometimes don’t shut tightly enough. Now where air can pass through, sound can propagate. Thin rubber strips ( or nitrile foam or neoprene rubber strips, whichever suits your budget) adhered firmly to sit snugly between the window pane and its frame provide a tight fit all around the year that ensure that air passages are sealed. This will help in ensuring that some notable transmission loss is achieved in the mid and high frequency range as the sound travels through the windows.
(Picture courtesy : the interweb)
Solution 2: Heavy curtains on the windows
To help maximize any transmission loss of sound through windows in the mid and high frequency range, heavy (or at least thick) curtains on your windows can help absorb some sound before it leaves the room through your windows. Effective sealing of airways in between the windows and the use of heavy curtains can absorb and attenuate transmission of mid and high frequency sound energy out of our jam room
Problem 3: Your jam room in itself!
A room equipped with multiple sound sources needs acoustical dampening on the walls and ceiling. This ensures that the resonant and reflective nature of the room when excited by so much sound energy does not act as an amplifier to the sound levels being generated there! Acoustic absorption devices in your jam room are essential to keeping your jam room sounding pleasant and audible for each instrumentalist without having to be too loud to hear himself or each other.
Solution 1: Acoustic panels
Acoustic panels usually represent mid to high frequency absorption devices that when ideally located in a jam room can help contain the sound energy and at the same time allow for music from every instrument to be heard clearly. The primary goal with acoustic panels in a jam room is to negate the reflective nature of the walls and the ceiling to create a tight sounding room which allows for musicians to hear themselves accurately without the room smearing their collective listening experience, and also create an environment which does not fatigue their ears. Acoustic panels can not only be a functional boon to your room, but also an aesthetically professional one. The “Home Series” of Acoustic Panels from E Flat are designed for optimal efficiency in compact dimensions of 1 and 2 inch thicknesses, and the packs of 12 are ideal for a professional musician’s practice pad or a budget friendly jam room. Our recommendation leans toward the 6 foot x 2 foot x 2 inch acoustic panel, and the 12 panels pack offers the most economical cost to square footage and performance in our entire “Home Series” range.
(E Flat Acoustical Solutions 4 ft x 2 ft x 5 inch Acoustic Panels)
Solution 2: Foam
Foam, or acoustic foam is a very subjective and opinionated topic, so I’d like my take on it be taken as such as well. Acoustic foam of many pleasing shapes and colours have become popular and often overpriced in the market, but when compared to their cost to performance ratio, I’ve maintained that acoustic panels have superior mid and upper low frequency absorption. But if one is faced with the scenario where panels or acoustic foam may be outside of one’s budget, packing foam will serve as a viable option. You may have to trade off with a room which has uneven absorption across the frequency range when compared to the performance of panels, and it might be a little dead and zap you of energy in the conversational frequency range, but it is better than a bare wall.
(The packing foam I used in my jam room, back in 2008, about 500 sq ft cost me Rs. 10,000/- in all)
Summary of budget friendly solutions for your jam room.
Drum kit to be placed upon heavy carpets and curtains under them for additional dampening.
Mattresses all across the floor and around the drum kit and the amplifiers on top of them. They serve to dampen about 16% of your room’s surface area.
Thin rubber strips (or nitrile foam or neoprene rubber strips, whichever suits your budget) adhered to your windows so there is a complete seal when your window shuts into the frame and no air can escape.
Layers of curtains on your windows.
A generous spread of acoustic absorption panels on the walls and ceiling if you can manage it. Packing foam as a last option if you are on a very slim budget (it’s neither ideal or recommended, but it’s better than nothing). Please do not use egg crates. Someone’s really got a good laugh out of that gag.
Included is a link to my first jam room, where I recorded my first album with, and it wasn’t half bad, if I could say so myself. https://www.reverbnation.com/eflatzone . The vocals and almost all the guitars were tracked in this room.Also, a band I played bass with tracked a live session in this jam room with a brilliant mix and mastering engineer who played guitars on the track as well. You can check out the room for yourself and the quality of the drum kit captured in the video for yourself with this link : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHgcuFHGwQ8 .
The room has been treated with packing foam, carpets, mattresses and three layers of curtains on the windows. The decrease in sound energy leaving the jam room was more apparent in the mids and highs, but evening walkers outside still heard the band practicing cause they could hear the kick, the bass, and the resonant head of the snare and toms. But no one really complained. I tell myself that we were a pleasant band to listen to, but i imagine that we also got lucky with nice neighbours.
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