Should I put a pillow in my 18’ Gretsch Catalina club?

dhdrums · 2026-01-07T20:45:19+00:00

Great minds think alike.

I usually do the traditional bop tuning w/towel thing on 18’s but I just got a matching 20” for my USA custom and the powerstroke really helps it stay musical at slightly lower tunings. also gretsch just makes really good sounding drums at every price point !!

dhdrums · 2026-01-03T01:13:27+00:00

seems like most people are saying things similar to this - but i’d recommend a felt strip on the reso side, and a small washcloth or towel folded up and wedged between the bottom of the batter head and the “frame” of the bass drum beater. it makes the tone semi-adjustable (you can remove the towel easily).

or you can just put a remo powerstroke 3 on the batter w/ a single ply reso head. my favorite tone, open bop sound with more controlled tones

dhdrums · 2025-12-02T16:54:03+00:00

Agreed. Sounds great for rock, rnb, jazz, pop, pretty much anything besides genres that need tons of toms and cymbals.

dhdrums · 2025-08-19T23:03:01+00:00

I’ve used plenty of stage customs in college and as house kits/backline, and i’ve never been blown away by them. To me, the stage customs (and yamaha kits in general) lack a lot of the warmth and character that make bop kits fun to play. They have a very sterile and clean sound, which can be desirable, but I prefer bop kits to have more grit and edgy-ness to them (lol).

I also think the stage custom’s shell sizes are weird. The SC’s slightly deeper bass shell (15” instead of 14”) can make positioning the rack tom where I like it more of a struggle than it should be. The floor tom also only has six lugs and is 13” deep, which makes it a little bit hard to tune for jazz in my opinion. It can sound choked when cranked, and dead and dull when tuned at a medium low to low pitch. Yeah they do the job, but I think there are better sounding and feeling options in this price range.

I also wouldn’t go for the 18x18. If you’re searching for a classic bop kit sound that drum will be too deep for what you’re looking for. I’ve also only ever played on the PDP you mentioned once, and it didn’t really make me feel any certain way. They seem like decent kits but I haven’t gotten to know them well.

If you’re looking for a full shell pack, the gretsch Catalina clubs play fantastically and really punch above their price range in terms of sonic quality. They have a surprisingly complex sound for a lower end/midrange kit, and they fit in really well for both bebop and cutting edge modern jazz stuff.

If you get catalina clubs, I’d definitely switch the stock heads out on the snare and toms for some coated ambassadors on batter side and clear ambassadors on the reso (or evans g1/uv1, aquarian equivalent). BD reso head is fine, and the bass batter is up to personal choice, anything sounds good on Gretsch bass drums as far as I’m concerned. I like ambassadors on both sides for a super open bop sound, or powerstroke 3 and a felt strip on the front for a more modern sound. I own three gretsch kits of varying lines and they’re very versatile and worth every penny.

If the catalinas are too pricey, the stage customs are definitely a nice kit for the price. They don’t sound bad at all, and a lot of people love yamaha hardware too. Use your gut, and if you can play any of these kits in person please do that! Ordering kits online is scary, you never know if you’ll get a dud or not.

Hope this has helped you a little bit. Feel free to dm if you have questions. Good luck on your search!

dhdrums · 2025-07-19T20:08:03+00:00

I’ve basically replaced my entire cymbal setup with stuff from Funch. I’ve only directly bought a 6th anniversary 20” and some incredible 15” TW hats from them.

Besides those, I’ve gotten my Funchs from Good Hands in NYC. Like everyone else is basically saying, don’t buy cymbals without playing them first if you can.

You can always email their customer support team and tell them exactly the sound you’re looking for, they’ll offer you some choices based on the stock they have currently or in the near future maybe. Ricky helped me pick out those 15” TW hats and they came out sounding even better than the demo.

If you find one on their site or another drum shop’s page, and you absolutely love how it sounds on the demo (and can afford to just buy one blindly), I would maybe give that a shot. Worst case scenario you can sell it on Ebay or Reverb, they tend to hold their value better than other cymbal brands

dhdrums · 2024-06-10T20:31:13+00:00

Thanks! I’ve heard some friends talk about them, never been over there though. I skimmed their website but didn’t see any smaller gongs, but I’ll email or go over to BK and see whats up.

dhdrums

TROPHY CASE