Wednesday 17 March 2010

O baterista


The drums then. Well it all went rather swimmingly, especially as I was having my doubts approaching the rehearsal studio where the lesson took place; it was at some industrial units at a farm just out of town. Very dark and very lonely during the evening.

I introduced myself to the teacher and after we exchanged pleasantries he sat me behind the drums straight away and we were in. I don't like blowing smoke up my own trumpet but he said that he couldn't believe that I'd never played the drums before as I was picking it up straight away and had bags of 'natural rhythm', oo-er. Or do you think that was a ploy to give me confidence and go back? After twenty minutes I was playing a basic rock drum pattern which he said can be heard, most famously, on AC/DC's Back in Black. Which is handy as that's the ringtone on my mobile.
He then stood there and said "We'll have you playing Rush fills in no time." the word 'fills' means nothing to me, it must be something technical, but I smiled to make out I knew what he was on about. In fact, we spent half the lesson talking about which bands we liked in common.
The upshot is that he says I need to practise, practise, practise. So to that end I'm in the process of buying an electronic drum kit. I'd love an acoustic drum kit but space is at a premium and there are other people to consider. If I get good at it I'll have an acoustic kit though. So my teacher is coming with me tomorrow afternoon to demo a drum kit I've seen and tell me if it's any good or not.
I'll bugger off before I turn into a drum bore. Next lesson on Monday. Can't wait.

Genius:


9 comments:

Clair said...

Excellent! What are you going to call the band?

Matthew Rudd said...

This could easily be the coolest thing you've ever done.

Jon Peake said...

Can I be the singer in your band? Or are planning on being a Phil Collins/Woman from the Honeycombs kind of drummer?

Hawkfall said...

Fills are the short flourishes that break up the regular beat in between the bars. I think. You know, like the bits that break up the verses of "Iron Man"

*is insanely jealous of all this*

Simon said...

Nice one keep it up.

My brother has an electric kit up for sale if anyone wants to buy one - you can practice without annoying the neighbours.

Louis Barfe said...

Good luck with the drumming. It's enormous fun, all apart from the lumbering your gear around. As for fearsome technique, I've always thought this clip - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ln6b_nBM-V8 - very instructive. Weckl and Colaiuta overplay masterfully, to polite ripples of applause. Then Gadd comes in, with a fairly simple military pattern, but Christ it grooves. At 3:25, in with the Mozambique and the audience go justifiably nuts. From there, everything Dave and Vinnie do has a form, a purpose, while Steve shows that he can overplay with the best of them when he wants to.

Bright Ambassador said...

Phil Collins? We have two things in common: our haircuts and we're both c**ts.

Sorry Simon, I've just bought a kit.

Louis Barfe said...

Phil Collins really should have stuck to drumming. He's a great sticksman.

Bright Ambassador said...

That's the general consensus, although he did do some good stuff with Genesis after Gabriel left. I think we could have done without Another Day in Paradise though. And Buster. And his general twattishness. Led Zeppelin, rather unfairly, made him their Live Aid scapegoat.