Name famous songs where the drummer overplays

Generally it's a pitfall of an inexperienced drummer. Someone who is still learning and figuring out appropriate musicality You're mostly likely to hear it in guys who've never played with others before, garage bands or newer inexperienced bands on the gigging circuit.

For the most part, drum parts that have made it onto a commercially released recording have been worked out and pre-rehearsed so that they are "approved" (for lack of a better word) by a number of people (that may include other experienced musicians, songwriter, producer and at times, record labels themselves) long before the track sees mainstream release.

Generally speaking anyone who is prone to "overplaying" or at least, not playing what is required, will be vetted out long before the track is released.

Other times, it's little more than a matter of taste. A great example is Keith Moon. Some say Moon overplays, others say it's just right for the music he was playing. But given that the band, producer, label and record buying public have already lapped it up, it makes any definitive argument on "overplaying" a harder sell..
 
is there any rough guideline (some rule of thumb or common sense approach) as to how not to overplay or even when not to play in a song ...or is it just a matter of intuition and taste ?
 
Oh my that Luke Holland video is pretty much the definition of badly overplayed! I mean theres some good drumming in there and its pretty tight in places, but it has nothing at all to do with the rest of the music!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jB9g8BjIDw

The above link is an album by a band called Saosin. Might not be your cup of tea musically. But in an interview with the band, the drummer mentions that it was refreshing having a producer who allowed him to essentially overplay. I think this is about the borderline of overplaying. I personally like the drumming on this album, but I imagine many others would think it was too much in places.
 
That Luke Holland video makes me cringe, thankfully, If you watch his recent videos, you can see how much he matured.

These are the things try I keep in mind when playing. I try to feel the music and get in to the song as much as possible. I try to make it feel good as much as possible. A lot of times when I find myself overplaying it's one of the following: bored of the song, not feeling the song, not really focused, wanna show off(just keepin' it real). Notice, I used the word "I", these are not really suggestions, I'm just sharing my own experiences.
 
Pocket-full-of-gold; For the most part said:
+1. Most professionally produced albums are closer to under pronounced drumming than over. I'm sure there are more examples of over pronounced drumming on YouTube from self-released songs than successful/commercial music. Some would say that Kieth Moon frequently over-played but what he did worked so ... Other's would say unique or eccentric.
 
this is really all subjective

sometimes overplaying is absolutely fantastic !!!

check out the MIles Davis album Sorcerer .... Tony is an absolute mad man on this record .... really out there .... but it works ... and it's freakin Tony Williams for gods sake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3n2ocyeJlI&list=PLC482AA95FC3F2C94

check out the Who - live at Leeds ... same deal .... Keith is on fire !!!... it's just awesome

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEcFeNTWSB8

not always a bad thing to "overplay"

these are two of my favorite records of all time and I don't think the drums distract from the material for one second.....as a matter of fact I think they 100% enhance both records
 
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I can give you a personal story of the application of this.

I was once in a band where we wrote our own stuff, so all free to come up with whatever parts we wanted. Our aim was to be complex, but accessible. Think Tool but with pop sensibilities.

On one song I wrote one of those drum fills that is at a completely different bpm as the rest of the song but drops back in on time (I stole the idea from a drum dvd somewhere!). I thought it was the cleverest fill ever.

To our singer though, it sounded wrong and completely threw her everytime she got to that part.

In the end I removed that fill so as not to put her off, I did this begrudgingly.

What I should have done though was remove the fill because it was clearly stepping all over the vocal part, which is the MAIN part of the song and what the majority of people will be listening to.

I was trying to impress other musicians with my drum/songwriting, rather than playing what was right for the song. I was overplaying to an extent that no matter which way you looked at it did not sit with the song.

As Tony says above though, many times its a matter of personal preference.
 
Reminds me of one of my favorite cartoons...

youre-hired1.jpg
 
I hope to one day have the tools to overplay and the ears to know when.

MM
 
While I don't enjoy the Luke Holland video, it's completely distinct from the rest of his videos in that it has a clearly different intention from the off. The rest of his covers are pretty much note for note and he is playing for the song.

It doesn't matter if these songs are complex and busy, the context is going to be different for a prog metal song than a disco one.
 
this is really all subjective

sometimes overplaying is absolutely fantastic !!!

check out the MIles Davis album Sorcerer .... Tony is an absolute mad man on this record .... really out there .... but it works ... and it's freakin Tony Williams for gods sake

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3n2ocyeJlI&list=PLC482AA95FC3F2C94

check out the Who - live at Leeds ... same deal .... Keith is on fire !!!... it's just awesome

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEcFeNTWSB8

not always a bad thing to "overplay"

these are two of my favorite records of all time and I don't think the drums distract from the material for one second.....as a matter of fact I think they 100% enhance both records

Great examples-- maybe we need to reclaim the word to be more value-neutral, because lifting the music by playing more than would normally be considered tasteful is definitely a real thing.

I can't think of many recorded examples of bad overplaying by well known players. Dejohnette's playing on much of Dave Holland's album Triplicate is one. He's my favorite drummer in the world, but on that record it doesn't work for me. He does a similar thing on Turnaround, on Pat Metheny's 80/81, and it's great. I've never listened to the Bad Plus, because the first thing I ever heard of them was just wall to wall busy-sounding drum junk, and it was kind of a turn-off.
 
I think it would be easier to find a famous song that was under-played.
Something played with and a straight beat and no drum fills.

.
 
I think it would be easier to find a famous song that was under-played.
Something played with and a straight beat and no drum fills.

.


if we went by that theory then this is underplayed

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxifgnPnC4E

not one "drum fill" and never leaves the snare and hats ... and pretty much the complete opposite to the examples in my first post in this thread

is that song "underplayed"..... not in my opinion .... I never once catch myself saying... hey I wish there was a drum fill there

and I think both examples.....Tony and Moonie in my first post and Stewart here prove that there is actually only two kinds of drumming....good and the other kind
 
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