What's Your Signature Fill?

Hewitt2

Senior Member
Realizing that a drum "fill" is a bit of a four letter word around here (ha!), I think we all have that one drum fill we strategically keep in our back pocket until we let loose and totally wow and astound our family, friends, loved ones, soon-to-be girlfriends/boyfriends, and/or sworn enemies. The impact is especially felt when you play straight time both before and after said fill, leaving the room temporarily befuddled and awestruck as to that one fleeting moment when you drew thunder from the Gods.

So how about it? What's that one lick that proves to the world you are one bad mofo?

Personally, I love the play a 16th note triplet fill between my hands and feet. Left hand on snare on 1 + 3 and the rest of the fill on the upper tom; right hand on the floor tom. Surprisingly effective for a relatively easy fill, especially at BPM greater than 100.

Lfrflf Rflfrf Lfrflf Rflfrf
 
2, 4, or 6 on top with 2 on bottom in between or some variation thereof. I know that gets some hate on here because Portnoy uses it so much, but I don't abuse it nearly as much as he does. The guy is one of my main influences.
 
No idea really, but if I'm stuck I guess I og to something like this:


rrll-1e&a2e&a3e&a...............
 
So how about it? What's that one lick that proves to the world you are one bad mofo?
well, with me, it would take so much more than a fill to convince anyone of that ;)

Playing the game though, this fill in 5 (played twice, right at the start of the clip) with a resolve on the exit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyWG-eCo2uc

Rarely used though, so absolutely not a "signature" fill, but it is a bit of fun :)

RLRLRKKRKK
 
I really like doing inverted paradiddlediddles (RLLRRL) with the diddles as ghost notes. Whenever I'm free improvising I tend to do sort of marching-style 8th note flam stuff with toms on the flams. I also tend to use closed hi-hat with toms. Nothing too codified as a "signature fill".

I do have several show-stopper fills for some songs in my rock band. Maybe that would be worth its own topic if I had video of myself playing them. One of them is pretty simple, going into the last chorus with just snare, floor tom, and kick at about 160:

STKT SKST KTSK SSSSSS

16th notes and a sextuplet on beat 4. Originally I played it really flashy as RL RL RL RL RLRLRL with my hands crossing over, but it's very difficult to get rimshots like that so I've been doing it as gridded alternation: LR RL LR RL RLRLRL.
 
I have nothing technical to share, but what I like to do often is incorporate outrageously placed accents on splashes / effects cymbals into a fill. That always makes me grin when I play it back and listen to it.
 
I like to do a fill that utilizes a triplet style single stroke roll on snare with a crash on the quarter notes for three counts then a crash with the kick doing a triplet on the fourth count which ends the fourth crash on the one of the next measure. Sometimes I'll vary it by doing a triplet Tom roll on the third count.

This stuff is hard to explain.
 
I don't have a signature fill, but I do have a signature beat.
 
The Uncle Larry Shuffle is it?

No, not a shuffle. I cant divulge anymore, it's a secret.

Ah what the hell lol.

It's nothing really, in a straight time tune, where it sounds good with 16ths on the HH, I play the 16ths on the hi hat with 2 hands, snare on 2 and 4. (the bass pattern can vary) But every quarter note I leave the hi hats to hit the cowbell on the QNP. It's my beat, I made it up. I didn't even steal it. I'm sure I'm not the first to do it (nothing new under the Sun) but TBH, I never heard anyone do it before. So in my mind I made it up.
 
No, not a shuffle. I cant divulge anymore, it's a secret.

Ah what the hell lol.

It's nothing really, in a straight time tune, where it sounds good with 16ths on the HH, I play the 16ths on the hi hat with 2 hands, snare on 2 and 4. (the bass pattern can vary) But every quarter note I leave the hi hats to hit the cowbell on the QNP. It's my beat, I made it up. I didn't even steal it. I'm sure I'm not the first to do it (nothing new under the Sun) but TBH, I never heard anyone do it before. So in my mind I made it up.
That sounds cool, man. I can do that with 1/8th notes, but never tried it with sixteenths on the hats.
 
That sounds cool, man. I can do that with 1/8th notes, but never tried it with sixteenths on the hats.

Yea, 8ths....that's the same feel essentially, except double the HH.

To me it sounds like a drummer plus another person playing the cowbell.

I like when any single musician sounds like it's 2 people playing.

That was one of the reasons why Robert Johnson is so highly revered. He played a rhythm figure while playing lead, even slide, at the same time. Really hard to do. Kind of like the challenges drummers face only on guitar, which I think is phenomenal.
 
Mine would be inverted swiss triplets (I think that's what they are called) between the snare and one of the toms, mostly the floor tom. I use it a lot during blues shuffles. The left hand stays on the snare and the right hand moves back and forth between the snare and tom. It starts with a left handed flam and goes
rLRL rLRL. It's only the grace note of the flam thats on the tom. The other three notes are on the snare. Some times I flat flam it.
 
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