Drums for acoustic song?

[jimmiehendricks]

Anybody got some creative ideas on drum lines for an acoustic song? (think Incubus - Drive)
I've got the whole rim click and bass drum thing going on with a bit of hi-hats in the chorus but I'm not experienced at the genre and I want some more "out of it" lines.

[millerdakiller]

The first thing you might want to try is changing your sticks. Try out some 7A's or maybe some of those Vic Firth "Rutes" [ http://www.vicfirth.com/products/brushes.html ]. Also Brushes might be a good thing for you to learn, but that requires a whole new approach to your drumming and technique, so it depends on how crazy you wanna get with it.

With Acoustic rock, its important for the drums to be subliminal. The thing that is great about acoustic guitars is thier spacious and resonant sound, so you have to give them room in the mix. Tone your drumming down a lot, and try to swing your eights. Not like a straight swing, but just let your ands fall a little bit behind of where they should. I call it drummin' lazy. It's hard to explain, it's all about the feel. Just experiment, make a cd of some acoustic songs and just jam to it see what you can come up with.

I personally like to ghost every upbeat when I'm playing acoustic stuff, i think it helps smooth out the drums and keep things flowing. I also like to play stuff only involving nothing but bass drum and snare drum stuff. Like lazy 8's (as I call them) with an accent on the back beat, and maybe like a real simpl BD pattern.

Experiment, that's the best advice anyone can give you. Sometimes it'll sound good, sometimes it won't, you'll learn the difference though. Good luck to you.

[Victor_se]

Hot Rods Maybe is a good option for acoustic gig

http://www.promark-stix.com/products/view.cfm?product_id=82cf1ae8-4240-4337-8ac0-434755fab7b2

not too quiet but no too noisy

[Joe P]

You could try to... use the rhythm of the acoustic, and phrase it different ways around the kit.
Also, try different hi-hat pressures (different levels of "crispness", or so to speak). And another idea: use a tambourine in place of a snare on 2 and 4, or a mixture of snare and tambourine, or whatever you can drum up (pun intended... wow, I just said that on a drum forum)