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In this post and the next… Good drummers. Henpecked drummers. The average amateur drummer. Loud drummers. Dave Headache, Ian Womb and Troy Alexander. Gaetan the knife-weilding percussionist. Drum machines? Another disastrous gig for the band Tambana. Ringo’s genius. Good drummersFinding a good drummer will be one of your most challenging tasks when forming an amateur rock band. Without a groovy, well-subdivided beat underpinning everything else, your band cannot hope to create magic. After all, rock is rhythmical music first and foremost. You must do all you can to woo a good drummer and get him or her to commit to your band. It’s critical. Good amateur drummers are in high demand. When you manage to entice one to join your band, you will probably have to share him or her with one or more other local bands. You will be competing for their time. This means you need to constantly check with your drummer when organising rehearsals and gigs, to see if they will be available. Henpecked drummers The Henpecked Drummer is a phenomenon I have come across several times over the years. He is a guy who plays the drums well and, in addition to playing with another band, is tasked with further duties by a domineering wife or girlfriend. The Henpecked Drummer is frightened of his partner, and he is not frightened of you. Her demands on his time take priority. He will be unable to attend most rehearsals as he will be busy clothes shopping, assembling an IKEA bookcase, visiting an art museum, hosting in-laws or some other non-important activity. (Not as important as playing in your band anyway.) A common phrase you will hear the Henpecked Drummer say is, “I’ll have to check with the missus first”. You may need this guy for the sake of the band. Thank God you are NOT this guy! He probably had to hand over his testicles to his partner when they first started dating, and she’s kept them under lock and key ever since. Good drumming skills and high levels of testosterone are not correlated. On the other hand... The Henpecked Drummer might not be henpecked at all. Perhaps he just uses his wife or girlfriend as a convenient excuse to get out of band rehearsals? Typical good drummer behaviour On the occasion when a good drummer actually makes it to a band rehearsal, it will immediately become clear that he has done zero homework for the rehearsal. You Whatsapped him links of songs to learn last week. He didn’t learn them. He didn’t even look at your message. But, not to worry, he simply pulls out his phone at the rehearsal, has a quick listen to the songs on Spotify and immediately nails the drum parts on the first play-through with the band. No problem. And he does so with great groove too. Because good drummers are in demand, they may receive an offer to play in another band at any moment. Your drummer may decide to take up this offer and drop your band. However, the drummer will generally not tell you this. In my experience, very few musicians say point blank, “I’m leaving the band. Sorry. Bye”. They don’t want the confrontation, the awkwardness. Instead they become less and less available for rehearsals. This is their way of edging out of their commitment to play in the band without being explicit. The popular internet meme of Homer Simpson perfectly encapsulates their method of quitting the band. In the meme, Homer slowly backs up into a hedge until he disappears completely from view, probably to avoid some tiresome social event, like a work colleague’s barbeque. After a while, you become aware that your drummer has similarly disappeared and has in fact left the band for good. Drummer for hire To save yourself a lot of hassle and uncertainty, consider paying a good drummer (a pro or semi-pro) to come in for a rehearsal or two and to play gigs. If you are an amateur musician with a decently-paid full-time job, playing gigs should not be about you earning money. You are not in it for the money. The money earned from playing gigs is only validation that you are doing well. Your band will probably only get paid £200 per bar gig anyway. So, why not reward a good drummer? Give him the full gig payment, perhaps some more too, and reap the benefits of all of his hard work and dedication to his craft. He’s spent countless hours behind the drum kit during his lifetime. His tidy subdivisions will allow you to play more easily. Guitar parts you couldn’t play with previous drummers will become effortless now. His great dynamics will add another dimension to the band. And, the payment will mean he is more likely to actually turn up. So, if you happen to know a good local drummer who would be willing, treat yourself. Hiring a pro/semi-pro drummer is not a long-term strategy as he may suddenly have to leave town to go on tour with a pro band if the opportunity arises. But you’ll have a great time in the meantime. The average amateur drummer The alternative to finding or hiring a good drummer is using the average amateur drummer. The upside of using the average amateur drummer is that they will be available for nearly every rehearsal and gig. The downsides may include the following:
Many amateur drummers seem to concentrate on texture first and foremost, i.e., the dynamics, subtle differences in volume, making the sound of the drums more 3D with some sounds at very low volume (ghost notes), some at medium volume and some loud and in your face. It takes skill to play with texture, so this is definitely a plus for a drummer. However, this skill often comes at the expense of playing with good timing. I will mention rhythmical deficiencies that amateur drummers (and other musicians) often suffer from in other blog posts titled Wonky Subdividers, The Rhythmically Dyslexic and Excessive Goosers. Ridiculously loud drummers Drums are loud. Unlike a guitar or a keyboard, there is no volume control on an acoustic drum set. However, some drummers have a subtle touch and, if the situation requires it, they can play quietly. Maybe they’ll use Rutes (a.k.a. Hot rods) occasionally. Rutes are quieter than regular drum sticks. Other drummers though, have one setting only, regardless of the situation. And this setting is: Ridiculously loud.
I’ve met three ridiculously loud drummers in my time: Dave Headache, Troy Alexander and Ian Womb. Dave Headache played for a while in the afore-mentioned Shiny Exciters band, with Colin Europe and myself. Dave tried, for our benefit in rehearsals, to play quietly. He could never manage to do it though. His time-keeping went out of the window as soon as he lightened up his touch. In spite of this inability to play at low volumes, he was actually a good drummer in the John Bonham style with a lot of technique and massive amounts of energy. He sounded good at gigs, but rehearsals in small practice rooms were uncomfortable for the band and ear plugs were needed. It’s always less enjoyable to play with ear plugs as you lose all the high end. The sound is muffled. And you have to keep taking them out to communicate with the others between songs. Another drummer I knew, Troy Alexander from the band Dad Bod Millionaires, was nearly an exact photocopy of Dave Headache. He also could not temper his loud drumming. Troy once asked me to sound engineer at a Dad Bod Millionaire gig. It was in a tiny bar. When I arrived at the bar, Troy handed me a complete set of microphones to mic up his drum kit and put it through the P.A. speakers for extra volume. Suffice to say, I did not use these. After the sound check, the owner of the bar approached me and said, “Please turn down the volume. It’s way too loud!” He then immediately turned around and walked off before I could respond. Little did he know that Troy’s drums were the factor that determined the volume level of the band. I had zero control over the volume of Troy’s drum kit. All I could do was adjust the other instruments to somewhat match Troy’s volume. And I had to do this otherwise the music would have been ridiculously unbalanced: it would have been mostly drums with a tiny voice singing and tiny instruments playing faintly in the background. I passed on the owner’s concerns to Troy. Troy shrugged his shoulders. Once the audience arrived and the band launched into their first number, it became immediately clear to me that the sound check had been a muted affair. Troy, and therefore the band, were playing much louder now! Troy had gotten excited by the presence of the audience. I saw the bar owner’s face drain. He had now lost his opportunity to negotiate over the volume level: the gig was under way and a room full of people were enjoying themselves (despite undergoing a degree of permanent hearing loss!) Near the end of the gig, I had to leave the mixing desk in the hands of someone else. I had to go and catch the last train home. As I ran to the station, I could still clearly hear the Dad Bods from two blocks away. Relations with the bar’s neighbours probably soured significantly that evening. When I walked past the bar in the subsequent months, I saw posters in the window advertising upcoming comedy nights and salsa dancing nights, but never another band night. So, Troy’s excessively loud playing probably reduced the area’s music scene by one venue that evening! Since this gig, Troy Alexander’s name and that of the Dad Bod Millionaires has come up in my conversations with other local musicians several times. Mention of Troy and his band is always followed by the comment, “Too loud!” or words to this effect. “Too loud” is the overriding impression that one is left with after attending a Dad Bod Millionaire gig. Ian Womb, yet another super loud drummer I’ve encountered, used to organise a local open mic night. He would often play drums for the different acts. Ian’s open mic night changed venue four times in about six years, due to neighbour complaints. Eventually, I saw a post on Ian’s Facebook page announcing that their would be no more open mic nights. I think Ian had run out of available venues in town. A less heavy-handed drummer would have been able to continue at each of these venues, I’m sure. (The names of some musicians and bands in the above post have been changed to protect identities) Mark Baxter (c)2024
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In this blog post… Famous goosers in rock history. Good goosing versus goosing gone too far. Avocado Disappointment and Victor Movlove. Bob Marley and The Wailers, starring Family Man. How to cure a bad case of goosing. In his autobiography, jazz legend Miles Davis mentions a player who ‘gooses” the rhythm. Goosing is a slang term which means pinching another person’s buttock in order to hurry them up. The gooser, in a musical sense, is a musician or a singer who plays slightly ahead of the beat, and this has the effect of accelerating the tempo of the band as a whole. A gooser can be of two kinds: a player who occasionally plays notes too impatiently (e.g., due to getting overly excited at choruses or crescendos) or a player who consistently plays every note slightly early (a.k.a. playing on top of the beat). The other players in the band can try to ignore a gooser and maintain the original tempo, but the rhythm will then seem like it is slowly deflating. The music’s vitality will start to drain away. Realistically, once a musician plays even one note slightly ahead of the beat, the other band members must react. They have to follow the gooser and step up to the new, faster tempo he or she has set. The gooser may then goose again, and the other musicians will have to step up again, and so the cycle continues, with the song getting faster and faster... Having a gooser in the band is not necessarily a bad thing, especially when playing energetic rock music. Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones is a famous gooser of the tempo. Live and on studio recordings, you can hear him dragging the rest of the band along behind him. Charlie Watts, the band’s drummer, was a master of following Keith’s every acceleration. Take a listen to the original version of Honky Tonk Woman. The cowbell and drums start off the song at a steady 111bpm. Keith’s very first guitar lick is impatiently played and this immediately gooses the tempo up to 113bpm. Then the roller coaster ride begins... The song reaches 118bpm by the end of the first verse. A lot of acceleration then happens during the first chorus. By the end of the song, the band are playing at 126bpm. Quite an increase in tempo! (A 14% increase.) The song is a classic though. It has loads of energy because of the continual acceleration and it sounds great. Other great performances that are goosed and which accelerate considerably:
Goosing becomes a problem when it is excessive and when the other musicians have a hard time keeping up. An amateur musician or singer may get overly excited when they reach a chorus or a crescendo part in the song. Their intention is to give a boost of energy to the music at this moment. They hit harder, increase their volume (often a good thing) and push the tempo too fast in too short a space of time (NOT a good thing). The effect is the opposite of the one intended: the song’s energy is lost. Another way goosing can be a problem is when there is more than one gooser in the band. In this scenario, tempos can get out of hand quickly! Victor Movlove One excessive gooser I knew was a bassist called Victor Movlove. We briefly played in the band Avocado Disappointment together. Victor was a tall, joyful guy and renowned gooser (only in the musical sense, I hasten to add). At one Avocado Disappointment concert, I began to play the guitar intro to Chuck Berry’s Johnny B Goode at the regular tempo, which is already fast, only for Victor to push the tempo so fast, it was impossible for me to play the solo I had planned in the second half of the song. Abort! Abort! I had to improvise a much simpler solo on the spot; one that was possible to play at the now ridiculous tempo. The drummer was also dragged along. He dropped beats in order to catch up and messed up drum fills which were now impossible to play at this break-neck speed. This was probably the most punk rock version of Johnny B Goode ever played. On another occasion, Avocado Disappointment were recording a demo song in a recording studio. Victor Movlove laid down his bass line on top of a pre-recorded percussion track. The producer noticed Victor playing was on top of the beat and in the DAW (recording software) was able to move the bass back by a certain number of milliseconds relative to the percussion track. The track immediately sounded groovier. How to deal with an excessive gooser The gooser may not be aware they are pushing the beat, so it’s best to tell them: “Roger, you are f***ing up the rhythm!”, or words to that effect. You should probably sugar-coat the message a little. A fellow musician once told me that I was pushing the beat. His comment stung me. It hurt my feelings. After listening back to some of our recordings though, I knew he was right. I felt deflated. I then spent a month focusing on this aspect of my playing and I largely sorted it out. So, I urge you to tell it to the gooser straight, at the risk of offending him or her. It will be better for the band and for the gooser also (although, don’t expect to be thanked for delivering this message!) And, of course, make sure YOUR playing is on point before giving them the bad news! Things an Excessive Gooser can do to improve
Ultimately, if the excessive gooser doesn’t stop excessively goosing the tempo, it may be better that you let them go and find a replacement. Another related aside… While gradually goosing the rhythm can give a lot of energy to a song such as Honky Tonk Woman, other classic performances slow down during the song and sound great nonetheless. For example, Stir it up (live at The Old Grey Whistle Test, 1973) by Bob Marley and The Wailers. Family Man Barrett, the bassist, pulls on the rhythm (plays very slightly behind the beat of the drums) and this gradually decelerates the tempo of the band during the song. It is interesting to listen to the start of the song and then skip to the end, to hear just how much of a reduction in tempo has occurred. The effect of Family Man playing slightly behind the beat is a very grooving, relaxed rhythm; the opposite of the ‘rocking’, goosed rhythms of the songs mentioned earlier. And certainly the opposite of Victor Movlove. (Some musician and band names in this article have been changed to protect identities.) Mark Baxter (c) 2024 |
Blog: How to form a rock band. Also, how NOT to form a rock band.About this blog
These blog posts contain info I would like to pass on to my music students when they form their first bands and start to play live gigs. I explain more here in my first blog post.
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Mark Baxter, musician, music teacher, guitarist, bassist, drummer. English expat living in Belgium.
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