<snip> One of my pet peeves is the sound-persons who over-mix the drums. <snip>
One of mine is the phrase "pet peeve" but I wholeheartedly concur with your sentiment. Though I don't think I'd use the phrase "over-mix" (which would seem to imply that they worked too hard on the mix). A drum kit can be difficult to put in its place in the mix. I have a "formula" that I use and it works pretty well in a live setting. It's way out of the scope of this topic, though.
What I really can't stand are shitty drummers; the ones who are heavy-handed and are too deaf to realize it (or too egotistical to care), the ones who play conservatively during sound check and then go "Animal" during the performance, the ones whose 120 dB snare drum sounds like a gym ball with fender washers inside it (and they usually are very proud of the sound of their snare). It's distinctive, surely, but only in the way that it sounds like shit. And drummers who don't tune their drums are as irritating as guitarists who don't tune or intonate their instruments. I'm "in" to alternate tunings but a sour note is a sour note. That shit may have worked for (some of) the "New Wave" but $30 chromatic tuners didn't exist back then. But I guess that's why the "big names" have technicians - to make sure that everything sounds good. And it's always a shame when it doesn't (Pixies at the Fox in Detroit? Awful!) Sorry. I had to get that out.
I am curious, dimm0k, how close to the stage were you when you recorded this? I forgot to ask in the previous reply. I (until recently) used a MZR700 for location recording. What I'm doing to improve my future recordings is ditch the MD and get solid state! Seriously, though; one thing you could do is head for the mezzanine (the front part of the balcony) in a venue with balcony seating. It'll put you up out of the crowd and put the remainder of the crowd more or less behind you (out of the cardioid pattern). Usually, the mezzanine is also the "sweet spot" of the venue; with some nice line arrays and competent sound technicians, it'll be like sitting at home but with hundreds of people and live musicians.
Not trying to be snobbish, Beagle, but the only way I'd use an R-09 is if someone gave it to me. Even then, I'd have my reservations. I don't doubt that you can make good recordings on it. I've heard some recordings made with those machines that I could listen to more than twice. But the fact that you call your recordings "perfect" is laughable.
I've made recordings through $25k consoles with $8k microphones that I would call "very nice". Of course, the same could be said for recordings I've done with a $400 8-track and a combined $300 in microphones. So, clearly, price isn't much of a factor at that level. Lately, I've been making "OK" recordings with my home MD deck, a scavenged mixer, and an NT4. Next month, I hope to start capturing "impressive" (thanks for the adjective, Doug) recordings with a PMD660 and the NT4.
I truly want to hear what you're calling "perfect". Seriously. May I have links to these recordings of yours?