Gavin Harrison here!

Hey Gavin,
Lemme start by first saying that you rule! I have not seen creativity like yours since Bruford; it is very welcoming. I assume it is a total trip to play for crimson!
Anyhow, I live in California and I was wondering when or if PT is coming near here; I would love to see you guys in concert!
Keep it up, You Annihilate!
-Paul
 
Alex P. said:
Hi everybody,
Hi Gavin,

I finished the transcription of "Blackest Eyes".
I hope there are not too many mistakes.

( Bar 21 to 35: I think you play on a other snare drum, on the second "16nd note" of the third beat, but I'm not sure.)

Now, I'll try to transcribe "Nil Recurring".

Best wishes

Alex P.
Click to expand...

Hello

I can't see the picture of your Blackest Eyes transcription anymore.
 
Hi drummer girl09

I don't know if this question has been asked before, but how often/long do you practice, and what does it consist of?

I try to play everyday - and I'm lucky that I have my drums setup ready to go in my studio at home. I tend to practice concepts, coordination and timing exercises. I don't really do muscle exercises too much - occasionally on a pad just for a warm up. I like to improvise and try to create new ideas.

Do you have any songs one where you play things like the bongos or djembes, etc.? I am interested in hearing them.

I have played percussion on many tracks - but none that are a real feature.

Hi ItalianRicky

some pages ago, you gave me a older photo about you with claudio baglioni. I saw that you're using 4 crashes. if i'm right you has 18 K crash and a 15" K crash on your right side, and a 17" crash in front\left position.the crash in the most left position was a 16"???

If I remember correctly - from left to right it was : 17" 18" 16" 18"

the drums in that photo is an yamaha recording custom?

No, the snare drum is - the rest of that kit was Pearl. I took off my bells for that photo.

if you have some photos of claudio's era, can you post (or send) me some?I saw on some photos that your cymbal setup have changed many times in that years.Overall the splash position...and i wanna study your setups, and find some good solutions for my set,especially for cymbals. ;)

I don't think I have any more photos from Claudio's tours on my computer.

Hi pzimmerdrummer03

Anyhow, I live in California and I was wondering when or if PT is coming near here; I would love to see you guys in concert!

We have no definite dates yet - but I believe we will be out there sometime around September/October this year supporting our next record. The dates will be announced first at porcupinetree.com

cheers
Gavin
 
Hi Gavin.. Congrats on making the front cover of Modern Drummer. Great article.
I'm sure I speak for many that it was long over due ;-)

Anyways. I have a recording question for you. I've been doing a lot of recording
with bands over the years in my area as a hired gun but only recently was I
asked during a recent recording session to tune my snare drum
to the song. Frankly, it was annoying because the tension of my top drum head for certain tunes was loosened which drives me nuts. I play a lot of ghost strokes and the tension (tuning) changes for this 10 song album just got under my skin. When I heard the final product, to be honest, I was not impressed. In the old days I'm sure drummers like Stewart Copeland, Neil Peart or Buddy Rich never tuned their snares to the key of the song. Sometimes their snare sound was part of their style and identifying style and I highly doubt it was tuned to the song. I could just see Buddy Rich telling the engineer to drop dead. :)
Anyways.. I'm recording yet another bands album in this same recording studio and yet again I get the "tune the snare to the song" speech again. I basically said, no, let's try it without that and the guy almost had a fit. He really went anal on this and I find that mind boggling to say the least.

My question to you is simply, do you tune your snare to each song you record and if so, did you do that with every album? Don't get me wrong.. I can tune my kit to make it sound sweet, but is this tuning the snare to the song necessary? In my 30 years of playing this is a first for me. I can talk to 10 of my best experienced drum buddies and listen to a recording and I'm sure none of them will say.. "HEY that snare is out of tune with the song". Sure, you can have a bad sound or a good sound, but out of tune with the song? Please.. what's your take on this?

Also.. do you gate your snare sound? This is also a first in this recording studio for me. The engineer pretty much gates out the ghost strokes. He's "gate" happy. I personally don't think he understands "ghost strokes" or gates. ;-)

Thanks Gavin.
 
Hi glen thomas

My question to you is simply, do you tune your snare to each song you record and if so, did you do that with every album? Don't get me wrong.. I can tune my kit to make it sound sweet, but is this tuning the snare to the song necessary?

No I've never tuned my snare to the key of the song. I don't have a ringy snare drum with a lot of overtones or harmonics to it that would bother most people. I have tuned it up or down of course to suit the style of the track - but when you start becoming aware of the pitch of it - then you're in for a whole load of trouble. It sounds like this engineer has really got it in his head that it should be in tune. Maybe try dampening your snare so that any ringing note disappears. That might placate him a bit more. Is he asking you to do it because the pitch of your snare bothers him - or he just thinks that it's a really cool thing to do?

Hi Alex.P
thanks for re-posting those transcriptions.

cheers
Gavin
 
hi gavin

i just wanted to drop in and ask you something 'bout your pasic-performance of the song 'so what'.
so here is my question (in fact two): at about 1:56 into the song you are doing what i think is a little cool illusion...you hit your tom and the hihat at the same time and it gives me as a listener the impression as if the song is slowing down during this fill...so what exactly are you doing here?

furthermore at 3:30 you play this great fill...what's going on there? is it in quintuplets?
a transcription would be great..
it is really exciting to listen to you because of these little extra things you incorporate.
have i mentioned your fingerfill on the snare?!

thanks in advance

ps:eek:ne short question i forgot to ask...is there a recording with decent audioquality of this perfomance?
 
Gavin Harrison said:
Hi glen thomas

My question to you is simply, do you tune your snare to each song you record and if so, did you do that with every album? Don't get me wrong.. I can tune my kit to make it sound sweet, but is this tuning the snare to the song necessary?

No I've never tuned my snare to the key of the song. I don't have a ringy snare drum with a lot of overtones or harmonics to it that would bother most people. I have tuned it up or down of course to suit the style of the track - but when you start becoming aware of the pitch of it - then you're in for a whole load of trouble. It sounds like this engineer has really got it in his head that it should be in tune. Maybe try dampening your snare so that any ringing note disappears. That might placate him a bit more. Is he asking you to do it because the pitch of your snare bothers him - or he just thinks that it's a really cool thing to do?
cheers
Gavin
Click to expand...

Once again you are "the man"! Thanks for your response Gavin. I just think someone pumped this engineers head with the "tune your snare to the key of the song" thing.
Needless to say I recorded 12 tracks today and not a peep from him after I told him I wasn't tuning to each song. :)

Glen
 
Hi 12:5

i just wanted to drop in and ask you something 'bout your pasic-performance of the song 'so what': at about 1:56 into the song you are doing what i think is a little cool illusion...you hit your tom and the hihat at the same time and it gives me as a listener the impression as if the song is slowing down during this fill...so what exactly are you doing here?

It's just 1/4 note triplets.

furthermore at 3:30 you play this great fill...what's going on there? is it in quintuplets?
a transcription would be great

Triplets in a sticking of 5 like R L R R L.

ps:eek:ne short question i forgot to ask...is there a recording with decent audioquality of this perfomance?

Not to my knowledge. I did record this piece for my DVD Rhythmic Horizons.

Hi glen thomas

Once again you are "the man"! Thanks for your response Gavin. I just think someone pumped this engineers head with the "tune your snare to the key of the song" thing.
Needless to say I recorded 12 tracks today and not a peep from him after I told him I wasn't tuning to each song. :)

Glad to hear it - good for you. I have fought engineers in the past because they wanted to take the front head off my bass drum - but I refused.

cheers
Gavin
 
Gavin Harrison said:
Hi glen thomas

Once again you are "the man"! Thanks for your response Gavin. I just think someone pumped this engineers head with the "tune your snare to the key of the song" thing.
Needless to say I recorded 12 tracks today and not a peep from him after I told him I wasn't tuning to each song. :)

Glad to hear it - good for you. I have fought engineers in the past because they wanted to take the front head off my bass drum - but I refused.

cheers
Gavin
Click to expand...

Hi Gavin...

|O| Funny you should bring that up. I forgot to mention that this engineer also wanted to remove the front head on my kit along with the snare tuned to the key of the song thing. Needless to say I said "NO" to both. haha. He was a bit peeved but all was good after the recording got going. :)

Thanks again Gavin for your input.
 
Gavin -

I had a simple question about a certain hi-hat technique; I'm not sure of the actual name for it. It's one I've seen or heard you do a number of times (towards the beginning of 'Normal' from Nil Recurring, for example), and it involves kind of glancing the hi-hat pedal to crash the two hi-hats together rather than choke them together and hold them there for a quick chick sound.

I've been trying to get this down for awhile but I'm so inconsistent with the technique that I lose it altogether when trying to play it during a beat.

Do you have any tips for troubleshooting the technique, or possibly have any drills or exercises that halped you develop this technique?

Thanks...
 
Hi Gavin, Just wanted to say a couple of things:

1)Thanks for posting that Slippin' Away groove (5/8) - I saw "half" of it on another post a while back and found that it works great as a really smooth sort of halftime 5/8 shuffle.
2) Also, I have been working up the hihat pattern you said you got from Mr. Gould that's incorporated so nicely into Unsettled. Love it.
3) I am finding the practice routine bit you posted a while back, where you try to line up bass and hands perfectly, to be a great challenge - playing hands and feet in unison is a LOT harder than it may seem to some but, like you said, practicing that way makes grooves you play afterwards very smooth. I've spent so much time concentrating on alternating and filling up space that I forget how important "in unison" and silence/rests are - and challenging!

Your generosity is inspiring. Take care.
 
Hi NeuroAxis

I had a simple question about a certain hi-hat technique. It's one I've seen or heard you do a number of times (towards the beginning of 'Normal' from Nil Recurring, for example), and it involves kind of glancing the hi-hat pedal to crash the two hi-hats together rather than choke them together and hold them there for a quick chick sound. Do you have any tips for troubleshooting the technique, or possibly have any drills or exercises that halped you develop this technique?


I would call it 'splashing' the hi hats. Steve Gadd explains this very well in his first video "up close". Basically you keep the front part of your foot on the pedal at all times - and whilst keeping the cymbals reasonably close together - you then bang you lower part (heel) onto the pedal and that should cause the two cymbals to splash together. To do this successfully you do need a quite large space between the two cymbals about an inch (or 3cms) at least - it also helps if the top cymbal isn't held too tightly in the hi hat clutch. I'm always amazed when I see drummers who have their hi hat cymbals about a 1/4 of an inch apart - it means that they can't really make this 'splashing' sound or get a decent 'chick' sound out of them. Two very useful tones from the left foot.

For anyone unsure of what we're talking about you can see it at the start of this video

http://www.drummerworld.com/Videos/gavinharrisonfutile.html

Hi jimmyC

Thanks for posting that Slippin' Away groove (5/8) - I saw "half" of it on another post a while back and found that it works great as a really smooth sort of halftime 5/8 shuffle.

It's the same pattern that I use at the end of a Porcupine Tree track called "Cheating The Polygraph"

I am finding the practice routine bit you posted a while back, where you try to line up bass and hands perfectly, to be a great challenge - playing hands and feet in unison is a LOT harder than it may seem to some but, like you said, practicing that way makes grooves you play afterwards very smooth. I've spent so much time concentrating on alternating and filling up space that I forget how important "in unison" and silence/rests are - and challenging!

I'm still practicing it too. Actually another surprisingly hard thing to do is to just play a samba bass drum pattern whilst pedaling 8ths with the hi hat foot - and making sure they REALLY line up.

Hi *JOHN FAVICCHIA *

Can you share you Axis pedal settings?

I've got the beaters set back around 7.5 inches from the head and I would say they are leaning back close to 45 degrees. The springs are on a medium tension.

Cheers
Gavin
 
Gavin,

Just thought I'd stop by and compliment you on the drum part for the song Unsettled. I have heard some of your work with Porcupine Tree and other miscellaneous songs but that one I was really impressed with. It seems like the drums on that, truly, come alive and turn into a shape-shifting monster. I'm a big fan of a musician making the best of a given musical context, more so than a display of intricate chops, independence, or speed (although those things do help with expression). In my mind that song defines your abilities and approach very well and just has that Gavin sound to it :) I know it isn't easy to say in words, but any ideas on how went about coming up with your part to that song would be helpful. Did you have any more freedom as a musician in playing with 05Ric than others you have played with?

Thanks

Gish
 
Hi intooder,

Thanks for the kind words. We had written most of the album at that point but we still didn't have what we thought was a great opening track. So one day I just sat at the drums and imagined "what would I like to hear as the opening"? I messed around a bit and then stumbled across that tom figure - so I recorded it along with a couple of the groove sections and sent it to Ric. He came up with a load of stuff for it and so it was born. Me and Ric have total freedom to do whatever we want - there's no record company - management - publishers - or even expectation from any fans - because we didn't have any. And that's how we've approached our next record too - which we are mixing right now.
Hopefully I should have some previews of it on MySpace soon.

cheers
Gavin
 
It must be a welcome change to have that freedom, especially for someone who makes a living as a musician, where in most cases you're at the mercy of the producer. Anyways, hopefully you enjoy your masterpiece as much as I do. I'm looking forward to hearing more from your collaboration with Ric.
 
Hi Gavin,

I am planning on putting new heads on this weekend..and I was wondering if you could share with us how you tune them, not in what pitch, but the steps you take from mounting the head, to tuningmethod..... how you seat the head....

It doesnt have to be very precise...just in short....

Many drummers have many different technique's for mounting a new head, so I was just curious for your method...

Take care,
Dre

PS. thanks so much for being here for us mere mortals
 
Drizzle said:
Hi Gavin,

I am planning on putting new heads on this weekend..and I was wondering if you could share with us how you tune them, not in what pitch, but the steps you take from mounting the head, to tuningmethod..... how you seat the head....

It doesnt have to be very precise...just in short....

Many drummers have many different technique's for mounting a new head, so I was just curious for your method...

Take care,
Dre

PS. thanks so much for being here for us mere mortals
Click to expand...

I'm not Gavin but I've picked up some techniques in the last few years that have made a world of difference in my approach to replacing drumheads.

One is to use the exact same head on the top and bottom of the toms and floor toms. This is something I almost never see drummers do, and of course a lot of drummers get great sounds using different heads, but I have found that it really opens up the drum and lets it sing. A drum resonates the most when both of the heads are vibrating perfectly in phase with each other. The more the two heads differ in their physical characteristics the harder a time they have going into phase. Again, it's not like you can't get a good sound using two different heads but I really like the effect it has on the tone of the drum.

The other thing is to use a direct heat source like a hair dryer or a space heater and once you have the head seated on there for the first time and the tension rods cranked down a little bit and go around slowly around the edge of the head two or three times, just until the head is slightly warm to the touch. What it does is actually melt the plastic slightly to the leading edge of the drum. Shells that are sold as the same size will actually differ from brand to brand by hundredths of a millimeter so drumhead manufacturers accomadate for this by making sort of one-size-fits-all drumheads (which is why a new head will always wiggle a little bit on the shell before it has been stretched out). Taking the time to melt the head to the leading edge of the drum makes a world of difference when it comes time to tune it.

I know you came here for Gavin's advice and not mine, but these tips have worked really well for me ever since I started doing them.

Also check out Bob Gatzen; if there was such a thing as a PhD in drum head placement and tuning technique, he would have one. He has a great DVD called Drum Tuning Sound and Design and loads of good stuff on Youtube.

Hope this helps...
 
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