Underrated/overrated manufacturers

[slinky]

To me there seems to be 2 categories of drum manufacturers. You have your heavy hitters Ludwig, Pearl etc, then there are the boutique companies. But I'm mainly talking about the bigs.

imo, dw is overrated. John Good can walk us through the factory and tell us how high tech their building processes are and searching the globe for some plys of rare exotic wood in the Himalayan mountains somewhere but I just don't think they're all that.

I think they try to get as many drummers they can to sponsor just to have their sets out there. The band and drummer don't even need to be known. Just get that dw kick drum logo on stage. I'm not anti dw they just seem overrated.

Underrated companies to me seem to be Yamaha, Sonor and even Ludwig isn't in the spotlight as much as they use to be. All these companies make great sounding stuff. If I could have a choice it would be Yamaha for me.

What do you think?

[Ricardo]

You are correct on the dw sponsors; they gave away more drum sets than any other maker for years to get that logo on stage.
And it worked.
I think dw makes excellent (pro line) drums....as do a lot of other makers....including their historic American competition, Gretsch and Ludwig.
My biggest beef with dw has ALWAYS been the lugs on the Collectors shells....too big and too ugly.

[nubdrummer]

I agree on DW, specifically the Collectors line. The fact that they're hand-made, custom to order with rare exotic woods may justify the price, but it doesn't necessarily mean they sound good. A friend of mine who builds drums and is a touring drummer says he frequently plays Collectors kits provided by venues and they usually don't sound great. He prefers the Performance or Design series as they are more consistent, probably due to the more automated build process.

[Bish]

I agree on DW, specifically the Collectors line. The fact that they're hand-made, custom to order with rare exotic woods may justify the price, but it doesn't necessarily mean they sound good. A friend of mine who builds drums and is a touring drummer says he frequently plays Collectors kits provided by venues and they usually don't sound great. He prefers the Performance or Design series as they are more consistent, probably due to the more automated build process.

I would agree with this. I owned a Collectors kit and wasn't impressed. I now own a Performance Series and am keeping it for now. lol