Best China you've ever heard?

**Drumbledore** · 05-19-2014, 02:35 PM

If you can ever find them second hand, an old series that Meinl put out, the 'Rancan China' or 'Dragon China' (and there were cup chimes in this series too). Basically, for a short time, Meinl had a distribution licence for some Wuhans that they've done something to......whether is was some rehammering and lathing, I'm not sure....but whatever they did when they relabelled them, they sounded awesome....the larger ones that you could get, say bigger than 20" or so, had a roar to them and yet it was somewhat 'gated' and controlled at the same time. I believe LP then took over the distribution for a short while, but haven't seen them in their later catalogues after the early 2000's or so. There were even small crashes, splashes and a ride in that limited series. The very few Youtube videos around don't do them justice, you really have to hear them up close, but I can remember someone had one for a short while, trying them out in drum shops and even coming across the bells and splash when I went to a private sale on some other gear (naturally, the owner was keeping those, but at least I got to try them out, made me a happy lad for sure).