Strange Rhythmic Properties

That Guy

Platinum Member
Have you ever picked up on rhythmic properties in places or sounds that you might not otherwise consider?

Example: I was checking out the forum and my washing machine was running on the rinse cycle and I ended up picking up on a nice little session of sound between the churning of the machine, the filling of the water and the patterned squeeling of the belts. Strange as it is, after a minute I picked up on the rhythmic properties... they were on time and consistent to the point of laying it down on the kit.

Anyone?
 
I noticed something like this once.

Me and my guitar player were coming home from a gig, and got caught at a train crossing. The boom gates come down, the red light starts flashing, and the bell warning goes off. I turned on my indicator, to make a turning after the train tracks and my indicator and the bell locked on together, playing a 3 over 2 pattern.

We sat there for 5 minutes and this pattern just get going, it was crazy.
 
Forever since I was young. Probably my first taste of rhythm was the windshield wipers. And I am old enough to remember when they ran off of vacuum so as the car changed speed so did the wipers.
 
Very true! I've noticed both the rhythm of the washing maching as well as the rhythm of the windshield wipers! I have used both as a metronome to laying down some beats.
How about an alarm clock chime? I have often awaken thinking of what patterns could go against that steady annoying chime,,,
 
This is a cool topic. I remember those old style gas pumps that had spinning analog wheels to show the price, not digital readouts. Those pumps could get some cool rhythms going, often in really fast triplets. Different gears inside the machine would be turning and clicking the background. I wish I had recordings of some of those.
 
A drip in a tile shower, the water drops tattooed a rhythm I wished I could play.
 
That's funny you should mention it b/c I just started doing laundry! I was waiting for the water to fill up when I logged in to check out some posts.

Also, as a testament to the collective subconscious, I just wrote about this today in an earlier post on songwriting.
http://www.drummerworld.com/forums/showthread.php?t=45900

I'm always finding rhythmic patterns - in almost everything I hear. Makes life interesting.
 
Last edited:
I sing to windshield wipers all the time.
And when no ones with me in the car I even mouth strange Bobby McFerrin-type bass lines.

I love windshield wipers. They have these subtle polyrhythmic things happening underneath the big 'Squeak-Squeak'.
 
Last edited:
The ticking of my clock and the noises that come from my computer often combine to create some interesting rhythms, always perfectly in time. And the only people who would actually notice this stuff are drummers...but it's great.
 
I do this all the time... washing machines, blinkers on vehicles...etc. I do other weird things like look at the relation of a car blinker with another blinker. I check out how close they are in time, which one is blinking faster then the other... there's rhythm everywhere!
 
Yes, the windshield wipers have always been there since childhood. I never noticed the old style gas pumps DMC but I can understand exactly what you mean. I might have been a little too young to pick up on it then.

It's neat to find music in such oddities.
 
Once I watched a good band on a truck bed stage set up for a street dance, right in front of a rail road crossing.

A train came through, the cross arms came down, the lights flashed and the bell went clang clang clang, right in the middle of a song.

At first the rhythms clashed, but slowly the band adjusted the tempos to match, the singer guitarist pumping his fist and grinning.

That was Coco Montoyo, the place Corvallis, Oregon.
 
Once I watched a good band on a truck bed stage set up for a street dance, right in front of a rail road crossing.

A train came through, the cross arms came down, the lights flashed and the bell went clang clang clang, right in the middle of a song.

At first the rhythms clashed, but slowly the band adjusted the tempos to match, the singer guitarist pumping his fist and grinning.

That was Coco Montoyo, the place Corvallis, Oregon.


Thats a neat little story :)
 
This is a cool topic. I remember those old style gas pumps that had spinning analog wheels to show the price, not digital readouts. Those pumps could get some cool rhythms going, often in really fast triplets. Different gears inside the machine would be turning and clicking the background. I wish I had recordings of some of those.

You have no idea how much time I spent last night searching the web for mp3's or sound effects of old gas pump sounds after reading this post DMC. Old enough to hear it in my head but can't find it anywhere.

And there is nothing better than the sound of the train car wheels as they roll over the seams in the rails.

http://www.sounddogs.com/previews/2118/mp3/172189_SOUNDDOGS_TR.mp3

http://catskillarchive.com/rrextra/04.wav

http://catskillarchive.com/rrextra/06.wav
 
Last edited:
You have no idea how much time I spent last night searching the web for mp3's or sound effects of old gas pump sounds after reading this post DMC. Old enough to hear it in my head but can't find it anywhere.


Dude, take a drive down SR 50 and you will come across them. I'm sure theres some down SR 60 as well. You know how backwoods it gets that direction.
 
Back
Top