During Covid in 2020 I bought some Remo Silent Stroke heads and some “holy cymbals” to put on my teaching and practice kit at home. My wife Georgetta was working from home so I had to lower the volume. The Remo mesh heads are very quiet. They are the same as the mesh heads that come on many electronic kits. I could hear some tone of the bottom head. I experimented with no bottom heads but they were just too silent for me. One big plus in using them in my drum studio is that it didn’t kill my ears and the student and I could talk to each other easily while playing. The main drawback is the feel, which is bouncier than a real drum head, especially the bass drum head. also the snare drum doesn’t sound quite right. It’s hard to get the snare wires adjusted to respond accurately. But you get used to it - not a major complaint. Also you have to remove the mesh heads and install the real drum heads if you want to take the kit out to play. But despite these compromises it accomplishes the goal - “silent’ strokes. The teaching studios at Memphis Drum Shop have Remo Silent Strokes on the high end Pearl kits and Zildjian Low Volume Cymbals (Holy cymbals!). Those heads have yet to break or wear out after six years of heavy use. This setup has worked very well there. I bought the cheapest practice cymbals I could find online from China that are stainless steel. They sound a little brighter than the Zildjians. If you want a practice kit that is very low volume or even completely silent, the Remos are a good choice. You can buy them and the Zildjian Low Volume Cymbals at Memphis Drum Shop online.
In my new house, my office is very small. I am not teaching at home now - only at Memphis Drum Shop. And I don’t have a full drum kit set up anywhere at home, so I had my five piece kit (Famous Drums that I built) in the office with the Remo Silent Strokes, but needed something that had more of a tone but still very low volume - something that approximates more of the sound of a real drum head. I discovered the R Tom Black Hole mesh practice pads that fit over the top head and hoop of the drums. I put them on a set of a four piece Gretsch bass and toms and, voila! - instant tone and increased volume. I can hear the resonance and tuning of the top and bottom heads. A couple of advantages - Their mesh is a little stronger than the Remos and is closer to the feel of a real head. It has a black dot in the center which gives it more attack. Also, they are tension-tuneable with a metal ring underneath the head that is tightened or loosened with a turnbuckle. And, best of all, you do not have to take the top heads off of your drums. The Black Hole frame is made of a flexible composite that fits over the head and hoop and snaps into place. So, if you need to take those drums out to play a gig or practice with a band, the Black Holes just snap off of the top head- no changing heads. Somebody put a lot of thought and engineering into this. Also, the Black Hole works as a stand along practice pad. This video from Sweetwater is a great demonstration of how they sound and how they work.
Of course there are the older types of mutes, like Daddario’s Sound Offs which are foam pads that sit on the top head but they don’t feel as good or bounce as well as the newer mesh head types - a little mushy. But they are the most popular drum set mutes for probably two reasons; they have been around for a lot longer than the other types and they are the least expensive which is why parents tend to buy them for their beginner kids’ drum sets.
The one Daddario/Evans product that do I use on my practice kit is the DB One Snare Drum Head which has plastic strips underneath a mesh head and sounds uncannily like a tight snare head with tight snare wires - very snappy. I put this on an old cheap metal snare with no wire snares and its volume is about the same as the R Tom Black Hole heads. Daddario’s DB One drum heads for toms and bass are very similar to the Remo Silent Stroke heads. They do have a black dot in the middle of their black mesh and foam rings underneath the head.
So there you have it. There are other types and brands of drum mutes out there but these are the ones I am familiar with and have used. Here is a picture of my practice kit with the R Tom pads and Evans DB snare head. And, by the way, I’m going to sell those used Remo Silent Stroke heads if you want some on the cheap. Rock on!
