I am looking into a drum set for my 13 year old to carry him through High School? Any clues/ideas? Thanks?

Question

Something not too expensive, but reliable and if you can send me a link. Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

You could buy him a really cheap set like CB or Pearl Forums, but in a few years he'll want to upgrade anyways and you'll end up spending more money. If you think he's really serious about playing, I would suggest Pearl's Export series, Tama's Rockstar, Yamaha's Stage Custom, Premier's Cabria or something from Pacific. All these are student-level lines that run from $500-1000, not too expensive but quality enough to offer some professional-level sound, hardware and accessories. If you splurge and get him something like this, he'll be more inspired to practice--the better your drums sound, the more you want to hear yourself play! My parents got me a beginner's set because they didn't think I was serious, and then I ended up spending tons of money to upgrade what I had....but in the end it was worth it, because as I acquired better-sounding equipment, I was more excited about practicing.

More important than the drums you get are the cymbals. You could get a cheap beginner's set, but those usually come with crappy brass cymbals that sound like you're hitting a metal trash can lid. I would suggest getting cheap drums and good cymbals--you can make a cheap set sound nice with good heads and tuning, but there's no substitute for quality cymbals. As far as those are concerned, I would suggest the Zildjian ZXT line. Those usually sound great for the price and and are just a step below Zildjian's professional line. If you can afford professional cymbals from Zildjian or Sabian, by all means go for those. But if you want good sound for a good value, you can't go wrong with the Zildjian ZXT line.

Guitar Center or Sam Ash music stores should carry the Pearl, Tama, Yamaha and Pacific lines I suggested. I would also suggest musiciansfriend.com or interstatemusic.com for a bigger selection of options.

Hope this helps....if you have additional questions feel free to email me--I love talking about drums!

Answer 2

I would go with the Pearl Export series. I wouldn't recommend combo deals that come with cymbals since those cymbals are usually poor quality. You can tune a fairly inexpensive set of drums to sound good, but there is no way to make a cheap cymbal sound good. Look for used zildjian or sabian cymbals.

http://www.samash.com/catalog/showitem.asp?ItemPos=1&TempID=2&DepartmentID=4&STRID=165642&CategorySubID=14&CategoryID=14&BrandID=1435&CategorySubPriceRangeID=0&pagesize=10&SortMethod=3&Method=3&PriceRangeID=0&SearchPhrase=&Contains=&Search_Type=Department&GroupCode=&categorysubsearch=true

Answer 3

cb drums are fairly inexpensive. also a pearl forum series set would be a great beginner set and you can usually find them for 300-400 on craigslist. try craigslist there are usually really good deals on there

Answer 4

e-bay