Single bass metal drumming

drummingman

Gold Member
I've played double bass for as long as I have been a drummer. Being a drummer that plays in metal band's this has always pretty much been somewhat of a prerequisit. Metal, all styles, is my favorite music to listen to and play.

I was talking with a few drummer friends the other day. I have been pondering switching over to only playing single bass in metal to see how it would force me to approach the music in a different way. By default it would make me do things differently and make my mind approach parts that I write from a different perspective.

I honestly like turning convention on it's head. Being a single kick drummer in a metal band, especially styles like black and death metal, is almost unheard of. I currently play in a black metal band. So there is a good bit of double bass parts that I have written for our song's. It would be interesting to go back and reinterpret those parts in a single kick way.

Any who, just wondering what everyone's thoughts are on this topic. I find it to be a good one to chew the fat over!
 
Go for it.

I'm in two metal groups right now, one is in that post/proggy vein, and the other sludge and doom.

While I do use a double pedal, I'm not really running constant sixteenths. I mostly just use to add to fills and give a little flourish to accents. In all the songs from both bands, I doubt I have more than a minute of song sections using constant double pedal.

Part of this is because I broke my ankle in two spots on my off foot, and I've just never really got everything working right again. The other part is because I'm genuinely more interested in coming up with different ideas than the more typical/conventional double kick stuff. In my old (for metal) age, I find that I'm more bored by constant double kick when once upon a time I would be impressed.

Also, a lot of the more esoteric metal I got into really helped change my perception on how heavy music can be delivered, and many of the bands that made the most impact on me use double kick very sparingly, if they use it all.

Another angle to consider, is that although it might not score you points with the metal elite, music without relentless and oppressive double kick is going to be more palatable to fringe groups. My post metal band can be on an indie rock bill and we'll generally go over quite well. I really think of I would have constructed my parts more conventionally, or played the heaviest/fastest all the time, we'd clear those rooms more often than not.
 
Do it :)

I grew up playing Metal in the early 80s at a time before double pedals were widely available and when the cost and transportation issues attached to buying a second bass drum made it unfeasible for me to have one.
As a result my approach was more "rhythmic" for the want of a better word than if I had adopted the Overkill/Fast As A Shark method in every song (& being young and having paid mega bucks for the gear, yes, I WOULD have gotten every ounce out of my hard earned equipment). I developed a decent right foot and when songs were belting forward I could play doubles at decent rate of knots, a moment that sticks in my mind is when we took a break during a practice session and a drummer from another band looked in the door and asked where my other bass drum was!
Before packing in in the late 80s I joined a Hardcore band (I didn't know they were Hardcore, I just thought it was very fast Heavy Metal). I hadn't heard their songs before and they just left me to play as I saw fit. The songs were just as avast and heavy as before but rhythmically more interesting as previous drummers had simply attacked them with 16ths. Which is not to say that a good drummer wouldn't use the best of both worlds, but with me having no option to double bass my way through songs I added something different to them. This isn't a rhythmically interesting one but it was me playing my pedal as quickly as I could.

https://youtu.be/KQCaSmyDJAw
 
It may be a goofy concern, but, a lot of my favorite music to listen to has double bass in it. I honestly worry that if I switch to single bass it may effect my enjoyment of the music I like most and make my tastes change in a way I don't want them too (meaning my listening tastes). What do you think?
 
Do it !

Worst case scenario go back to using your double bass, while in the best case scenario you innovate and do your own thing.

It's win-win.
 
Take the left beater off of it and leave the pedal where it is. Quick turn around if you find you don't like single pedal.
 
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Double bass is much better. Single bass is harder, but possible. I've played some heavy stuff with single bass, but I like double better.
 
I ran the idea of no double bass by my black metal band and they hated it lol! I already don't do blast beats because I find them to be super boring. But I do use skank beats.
 
It may be a goofy concern, but, a lot of my favorite music to listen to has double bass in it. I honestly worry that if I switch to single bass it may effect my enjoyment of the music I like most and make my tastes change in a way I don't want them too (meaning my listening tastes). What do you think?
It might happen, but it's bound to happen anyway. Your tastes are going to change as you hear different things and as your perception changes. I doubt it's going to really accelerate the process though.

Sometimes, certain parts just really beg for killer double kick, and that's just how it is, and expanded horizons won't change that.

Ultimately, the success of this idea is going to be determined by how much of a purist approach your band members take. Although, I could argue what is pure (a lot of seminal death metal was minimal with double kick, and there's plenty of cult black metal with none).

I could probably dig up various examples of various styles of recent metal with single kick, if you're interested.
 
It might happen, but it's bound to happen anyway. Your tastes are going to change as you hear different things and as your perception changes. I doubt it's going to really accelerate the process though.

Sometimes, certain parts just really beg for killer double kick, and that's just how it is, and expanded horizons won't change that.

Ultimately, the success of this idea is going to be determined by how much of a purist approach your band members take. Although, I could argue what is pure (a lot of seminal death metal was minimal with double kick, and there's plenty of cult black metal with none).

I could probably dig up various examples of various styles of recent metal with single kick, if you're interested.

That would be cool. Thanks! I'd also be interested in the single bass black and death stuff!
 
I'd rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it. Some of the sickest heavy grooves ever imagined incorporate double bass, just like many others are equally excellent with a single bass.

Even if it's just one part to one song, I'd hate to not play a super sexy beat simply for not having the second pedal.
 
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