PDP Pacific Drums and Percussion

I was first "Introduced" to the 7 Piece CM from PDP about 7 years ago. I bought a Cherry Fade to Black Sparkle. First of all, the Finish is down right Amazing - The ONLY thing, okay, there's many, that tops the look is how Amazing they sound. DW has taken the time and effort to build a ton of quality in these - Lot's of High End touches. I thought it was just going to be a halfway decent Gigging Kit, but I was mistaken - I would stack these against ANY Kit selling at or under $4000.00 easy. I play hard, but with a good deal of Finesse and the tones of heavy hitting, or those subtle touches all deliver - A FINE BUY, and at under $1000.00 - It was a No Brainer - Recently I was in my Mom & Pop - I saw the White Kit I am now using for touring in our Band MRBLITX - It was on Sale for $750.00 - It flew off the upper shelf and into my Studio.

This tobacco-to-natural finished 14" maple-shelled PDP snare was part of a trashy parts kit I picked up for a rehearsal space. The kit has long been replaced but the snare stayed, it sounds so good I've used it to record (play Rock Star by Greg Clarke + The Madvarks). Pacific Drum Company ("PDP") is a budget Drum Workshop brand, and the MX series was made in Ensenada, Mexico. The core is a 14" x 5" 8-ply maple shell stamped November 4, 2005. It has 8 DW TruePitch tuning lugs per side, which have a finer thread pitch than conventional lugs, and a DW-style throw-off. I replaced the 20-strand steel strainer (which had a broken strand) with brass and it came with a plain old Remo Ambassador head that I've just replaced. I've kept the original snare-side head, it's pretty standard. This snare tunes and sounds great from low to high pitches. I keep it fairly high and snappy, and it has a really small but sweet amount of natural ring, making it ideal for 60's rock or swing. A bit of damping, whether a ring or gel dot, makes it a punchy rock snare. I honestly never throught I'd keep it around as long as I have, but it's hard to beat its versatility, it's light to move around, and sure won't attract the thieves. If you see one with an intact shell and a working throw-off for a decent price I would not hesitate to grab it. The True-pitch tuning lugs are the only "specialty" part here and should be available at any DW dealer. The rest can be fixed or upgraded and you'll have yourself a great-sounding snare quite literally for a song.

The PDP Pacific Mx drum set is an intermediate level kit for the experienced drummer. The maple wood is a huge improvement over entry-level drum sets. The sound quality is significantly better than anything you can buy for under $500. Granted, there are a lot better drum sets you can buy for over $1000, but are more appropriate for professional drummers. The Mx series is adequate for experienced players to be used for practice or for gigs where you wouldn't want to risk beer being spilled on $2000 drums. If you keep new heads on these drums, they can sound decent. I recommend swapping out the hardware because the official DW hardware isn't ridiculously expensive, but is much more durable than the PDP hardware. The kick pedal is particularly low quality, and probably worse than any other pedal you could replace it with for $50. The hi-hat stand is has some decent features like rotating legs. However, I would not feel comfortable touring or even gigging for fear of it breaking. I also recommend purchasing a better snare drum at some point. The snare alone can make all the difference for the sound of a drum set. If you are eyeing a more expensive drum kit, but are hesitant about spending all the money, get the Mx and a sweet snare drum. It is the way to go. I have used these drums on many recordings over the past several years. I typically play pop/rock styles of music. These drums are perfect for these styles because they have a strong and hard attack, but also a nice tone to the sustain. I don't feel like this drums would be good for soft or delicate music like jazz. I suppose with the right drum heads, tuning, and playing style that decent results could be achieved. However, the 22' bass drum that came with my kit produces some serious punch. I would definitely recommend a smaller size kick drum if you want to play something other than rock music.

I bought these from Guitar Center Feb 2004 Paid $799.00 for 5 piece LX ( shell kit} The color is Ultra Violet The color and finish is absolutly awsome! The sound edges are perfect no holes or pockets. The mounting system (ball socket} is great, they stay put or atleast have so far. The shells are ROUND to the thousandth. They have a pretty wide tuning range for thin shells, with G2's. I had some lug and rod problems, the t nuts started to strip in two of the snare lugs and one rod broke off in the T nut on a tom( with low tention). But a call to the factory with only one minute on hold and they hooked me up(super cust support!) Use grease and ck for burrs! I dont like the hoops i had some problems tuning and i knew the shells should sond better. I bought aftermarket super hoops and O'Boy what a differance,They tuned themselves,and man what a sound!!! The construction and quality is great, as I mentioned before sound edges and roundness is perfect. There is litterly no ring or vibration(Just Sound). The shells are matched in pitch very well! Great projection! Great Bass thud. The fine thread T rods are nice for fine tuning but run a die on them and USE GREASE! The hardware is very adjustable and easy to position. With very little tweeking (Heads and Hoops) You get a proffesional sound. For the money paid i dont think any other set comes close. I have played and scrutinized many sets. Hope my dribble helps! This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I just started drumming and was looking for a goog beginner kit. I went to the guitar center and paid just under 400 dollars for it. I saw a lot of expensive stuff but since I was just starting to drum it seemed like a waste of money to buy high end stuff. The kit sounds great...if you know how to tune it. The snare is pretty decent. All the drums seem to be well made. Comes with OK heads on it. The stands are super flimsey and my snare drum already tipped over once. The cymbals it comes with are lame. The bass drum beater is decent though. I don't like the tom mounts it comes with but i have seen worse! The shells are made of about 5 plies of wood. For the price the kit is great! The paint looks great. If you are just starting out this is the best you can get! I went out to the store and upgraded the cymbals. I suggest you do too. I put another $200 dollars into my kit for cymals and stands. I am going to keep upgrading it! The color choices are wine red or jet black. I suggest the red! This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

Music Mall, Worcester, MA Shells/hardware: $489.00 Cymbal pack: $110 I was looking for a basic but not el-cheapo kit. A friend recommended this one. I looked around for about two months and felt the $300-$400 range kits were OK but lacked three things: fit and finish, durability and resell value. As for tone, my ears are semi-educated but I won't really know for another couple of years, I'm sure. The finish -- red satin -- is immaculate. Looking at that alone, you know the drums are a cut above the basics. The bass drum is very loud and tonally rich. Snare has a nice crack to it. Toms seem fine. The hardware is solid and smoothly constructed. The tom suspension mounts are cool and very functional. Set up as a whole, the kit has an ergonomic and highly adjustible feel. Sweet. Kick pedal is good but could be a little beefier. But you get what you pay for. The fit and finish of these drums is fantastic. FANTASTIC. I am very happy. With cymbals, a throne and some drum mutes the setup ran me about $800 but it was money very, very well spent. What sold me on this kit is the fact that I'll probably never have to buy another set; not the case, perhaps, with your average $350 'beginner' kit. It was worth spending a little more to be set for years and years. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

My dad got this drumset at our local Guitar Center for me. With cymbals, and all hardware, he paid somewhere near $800. The set alone was $599 (which seems pretty unbeatable), but since it was during their Swap Meet sale, the sales person was able to take ALOT of money off. I love this set. I like the fact that it's a maple drumset. When you start getting into maple, the sets start costing at least $700 or up. I think this is a GREAT drumset for an unbeatable price. I just love almost every detail about it. It's greatly built, it sounds really nice, and I love the colors (mine was Onyx White)! I think the only two problems, were: 1. I had no clue where to put the biggest tom, which turned out that you had to put it on the cymbal stand. 2. I think they should have given a manual on how to put it together, and how to tune it. Or, maybe a video. I just called my friend though, because he's really knowledgeable in drums. I think the construction and quality of the set is superb. It's really well built, and pretty heavy-duty. I love this set, I recommend it to the beginner who's willing to spend a little extra money on the better set, or the semi-professional who's looking for a great set, at a extremely reasonable price. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

I used this snare drum for a pretty long session at an audition that I was just at. They were using this as the main snare drum, which I found different (being that it’s only 10”), but as a surprise, it worked. There were some pretty good things, and some bad things that I found about this drum in this context, and I am willing to share it all! To my surprise, this drum actually worked decently as a main snare. I’m not too sure what model head was put on there, but it was made by Evens. The tuning seemed pretty standard, but man did that thing crack. It also wasn’t as high pitched as you would think, because it’s only 10 inches. Later I found out that the drum was made from maple inner and outer plies with select hardwood internal plies. Thus the reasoning for not being so high pitched. Great idea by the makers of this drum! Now time for the bad aspects of this drum. Now you must read this part very carefully, because I’m going to talk about how this drum didn’t perform too well when it was being used as a MAIN snare. This snare drum didn’t seem too versatile when it comes to being used as a main snare drum. But if you’re looking for a specific high pitched, cracking sound (many times used in punk music) this is the right drum. But for getting a “Big” rock sound out of this drum, better luck looking somewhere else. PDP has never really let me down in any department; you just have to know how to use the equipment right. Due to its size, this drum is meant as an auxiliary snare drum, not a main one. I cannot really help you out when it comes to using it as an auxiliary snare drum, but I can tell you that when it comes to a main snare, this drum actually did pretty well. Not necessarily recommended for s main snare drum, but I definitely didn’t see anything wrong with it.

I first bought my PDP 402 double pedal about a year ago. I was going to my local drum shop, looking for a nice double pedal, with the same nice price. I came across this PDP 402 and first thought “Wow, that’s a sleek looking pedal for that price”. I was also impressed with the fact that PDP is made by one of the best drum companies, DW. So the combination of the price, look and brand, all caught my eye and I decided to buy it. As I was going home, I realized that there were no instructions as to setting up the pedal, but I ended it up finding out on my own, and it being very easy. So once I got home, I went upstairs to my drums, set the pedals up, and started to play. The first thing I noticed was that the pedals seemed very “weak”. I tried to adjust the spring tensions, but I just couldn’t shake the feeling of this “weakness” that this pedal held. After tightening my bass drum head, messing with the pedal springs, and trying to play with no shoes on (to get more power), I ended up giving up on the pedals. They’re overall very weak pedals because the chains are only single drive. If you want more of a powerful, fast, more responsive feel, you should go with some sort of strap pedal or double chain drive pedal. So about a month after buying it, I decided that I just wanted to sell it and get a little bit of money out of it. I sold it to a friend, telling him about how weak it felt, but despite that, he bought it. About a week later, he called me back and told me that he had broken it! He was playing it and the beaters just snapped off. Over all, I would NOT go back and buy this one again; I would go to a more expensive, high quality one.