Drum Snobs

Despite my inner engineer reminding me that it's incredibly practical, I can't help but judge drummers who mount their rack tom on a snare stand for being too cool to use the bass drum, tom stand, or even a rack like everybody else.


Oh no! And I was just about to come out of the closet and say I was thinking of buying a remote high hat and mounting it under my ride cymbal on the right side....

Never mind....

(I will say I'm not so much a drum snob as I'm an English snob....like when someone refers to cymbals as "symbols".....)

Smile.
 
More than an English snob (although I'm actually Scottish and therefore choose to describe myself so in language terms only) I am a total grammar facist!
 
Just recently at a gig, I was trying to strike a conversation with the drummer that was opening up for us. He just seemed to not want to have anything to do with me. We were talking about drums and gear, and his answers were just one offs. I don't understand why some players feel they have to be like that. I think what set it off was that I asked about his drum kit, i couldn't tell if it were Yamaha's or Pork Pies, and dude was like they are Yamaha's. Pretty much like, Yamaha's and go away, so I was like whatever, he played his set and I played mines, but yea some players are just sometimes jerks and I don't get it. We all share the same love for the instrument and the music we are playing.
We should all be great full that we can do this and make a living off of it too...
 
Just recently at a gig, I was trying to strike a conversation with the drummer that was opening up for us. He just seemed to not want to have anything to do with me. We were talking about drums and gear, and his answers were just one offs. I don't understand why some players feel they have to be like that. I think what set it off was that I asked about his drum kit, i couldn't tell if it were Yamaha's or Pork Pies, and dude was like they are Yamaha's. Pretty much like, Yamaha's and go away, so I was like whatever, he played his set and I played mines, but yea some players are just sometimes jerks and I don't get it. We all share the same love for the instrument and the music we are playing.
We should all be great full that we can do this and make a living off of it too...

He might have been preoccupied thinking about the upcoming performance. Normally I am chatty but sometimes I get like that.
 
Yeah maybe, but even still I think you'd want to chat with a fellow musician to kinda calm the nerves down. I do that to get me settled in... That's just me though.

You never know, maybe at that time he didn't want to talk, and didn't know how to politely say, leave me alone.
Was he still setting up his gear?
Possible you just caught him at the wrong moment. Or he is just a dick, who knows!
 
I also play the guitar and I really love guitar gear. I am fascinated by how different players get different tones. Over the years I have found guitarists to be some of the biggest jerks. I can usually chat with the drummers and have a good conversation, but guitarists almost never want to talk. It like they treat their gear as part of a big secret.

A few weeks ago a guy came in with a Friedman amp, which I had never seen. When I asked about it he basically said, "yeah its a Friedman, you should look it up" and walked away. I made sure he was nice and low in the mix all night. Should have probably been nice to the sound guy!
 
I've met quite a few drum snobs. But I haven't met the guy that is apparently one of the worst one in my town.

A couple years ago, this guy filled in for me on drums at my church on a weekend I was gone. I forget who he was, I think he was maybe a friend of the worship leader. Anyway, he complained the whole time about how the kit was set up, how it was tuned, etc. He even took a jacket from the worship leader (I would have loved to see how that went down exactly...) and proceeded to stick it in the bass drum. It was still in there when I came back the next week. Keep in mind, he had to actually remove one of the heads to do this. Did everyone seriously just stand around and watch this guy do this during rehearsal?! Weird...

It wasn't even touching either of the heads. It was just thrown in because he told them kick drums are supposed to be filled with something.

Needless to say, the kid has never been back.

theres a fine line between drum snob and buffoon.
 
You never know, maybe at that time he didn't want to talk, and didn't know how to politely say, leave me alone.
Was he still setting up his gear?
Possible you just caught him at the wrong moment. Or he is just a dick, who knows!

He was setting up gear, but here's the thing, he didn't even play them drums! But either way who knows. I played one hell of gig that night... That's all that really matters...
 
I think Larry is being honest. There an old joke about how many drummers it takes to play a solo, answer; six, one to hit the drums and 5 to sit around talking about how much better they could do that.

Around here there are less gigs than there are people to play them. So there is a subtle subtext of competition. And the Alpha types maneuver themselves into gigs that more introverted folks could play better. While I'm pretty far down the ladder, I'll admit I've seen bands where I thought "where did they get this guy? X could do that so much better and I know that he hasn't played in a few weeks". Sometimes I even think I could do it better (which is pretty scary) but I tend to have pretty high standards having been a guitarist who's played with some pretty great rhythm sections.



Yeah maybe, but even still I think you'd want to chat with a fellow musician to kinda calm the nerves down. I do that to get me settled in... That's just me though.
Yes, that's just you. I know one journeyman guy who you just don't say anything to until the first break. He is trying to get his head into the music and while he usually won't snap at people interrupting him, anyone with a clue can tell he wants to be left alone.

I saw an interesting take on introverts vs. extroverts the other day. That as an introvert resonated with me. Extroverts get their energy from interaction with others. While with introverts, it's internally generated. Meaning if they interact with others, they are giving out their energy. This contrary to the general perception (typically championed by extroverts) that introverts are sucking the energy from the room. While extroverts are charging it up with all their interaction. The assertion in this article was that extroverts are using others energy to charge themselves. And when confronted with an extrovert doing this, an introvert feels like they are being sucked dry. Being made to give up some of their internally generated energy to feed the extrovert, whether they want to or not. Extroverts like to brand introverts as selfish for not giving it up and engaging. But which is really the selfish one?
 
Just recently at a gig, I was trying to strike a conversation with the drummer that was opening up for us. He just seemed to not want to have anything to do with me. We were talking about drums and gear, and his answers were just one offs. I don't understand why some players feel they have to be like that. I think what set it off was that I asked about his drum kit, i couldn't tell if it were Yamaha's or Pork Pies, and dude was like they are Yamaha's. Pretty much like, Yamaha's and go away, so I was like whatever, he played his set and I played mines, but yea some players are just sometimes jerks and I don't get it. We all share the same love for the instrument and the music we are playing.
We should all be great full that we can do this and make a living off of it too...

Some people just don't want to talk all the time, or most of the time. One off answers usually indicate that they want to be left alone at that moment. My advice is, y'know, just say cool, good luck, and go do something else.
 
also play the guitar and I really love guitar gear. I am fascinated by how different players get different tones. Over the years I have found guitarists to be some of the biggest jerks. I can usually chat with the drummers and have a good conversation, but guitarists almost never want to talk. It like they treat their gear as part of a big secret.

A few weeks ago a guy came in with a Friedman amp, which I had never seen. When I asked about it he basically said, "yeah its a Friedman, you should look it up" and walked away. I made sure he was nice and low in the mix all night. Should have probably been nice to the sound guy!


Too funny!

ALWAYS be respectful to the sound guys (until proven otherwise.)
 
Some people just don't want to talk all the time, or most of the time. One off answers usually indicate that they want to be left alone at that moment. My advice is, y'know, just say cool, good luck, and go do something else.

I agree.

I used to be into modifying cars and driving and remember alot of painfully awkward nights standing around talking to randoms about cars and car parts and sometimes I was stuck there until my friend was ready to bail. It was just really boring and pretentious and it went on too long. The last time I took my car to have it tuned some guys wanted to play that game again.. I'm pretty sure I reacted the same as the yamaha guy in that story.

He hates talking about gear, full stop.
 
I think drummers that use evens heads are second class, mixed brand cymbals even lower,and putting ketchup on a hot dog... total trash. yes total sarcasism. Drum snobs, thats just silly

You kid, but those guys ARE out there. =)
 
Back
Top