spelman
Senior Member
Yes, a review from when they were new in 1988/89:
Zildjian Piggyback
In recent years, it has become popular to
mount two cymbals together, producing a
dry, short sound best described as a "splat."
Terry Bozzio mounts various combinations
of cymbals in this manner, and Dave Weckl
has a China mounted over a crash, which
he uses for punctuation. But there has been
no particular standard in terms of what
cymbal combination produces the best re¬
sults.
Zildjian has attempted to standardize
things a bit by introducing a cymbal spe¬
cifically designed to be used in conjunc¬
tion with another cymbal: the EFX Piggy¬
back. The cymbal is 12" in diameter, has a
China-type profile, and is very thin and
lightweight. Its size and shape make it ideal
for a variety of mounting applications. You
can mount it right side up on ride or crash
cymbals, or you can invert a ride or crash
and mount an inverted Piggyback inside of
it. You could also mount a larger cymbal
over the Piggyback, or mount a small splash
inside an inverted one.
There are no hard and fast rules when it
comes to matching a Piggyback with an¬
other cymbal, and experimentation is defi¬
nitely called for. Generally, when mount¬
ing two cymbals together, you'll get that
basic "splat" sound, but within that you
can get some variation. The pitch will be
affected by the cymbal that you are using
with the Piggyback. We tried a Piggyback
inverted inside an 18" A Zildjian crash as
well as inside a 17" K Zildjian. While the
overall character was the same, the pitch
was significantly different.
We also found that the sound could be
varied quite a bit by how tightly the cym¬
bals were held together by the wing nut.
We experimented with an inverted Piggy¬
back mounted inside an inverted 17" crash.
When angled and screwed down tightly,
there was very little sound. When mounted
fairly flat with little or no tightening of the
wing nut, the cymbals would vibrate against
each other for a couple of seconds. Various
degrees of tightening the wing nut produced
various effects, ranging from a fairly nice
sizzle effect to a rather annoying rattle.
There were also differences in sound de¬
pending on whether we struck only the
edge of the 17" or both cymbals together.
We had interesting results when we
mounted a Piggyback underneath a 20" K
Light Ride. By placing a very thin piece of
felt between the bells and angling the cym¬
bals just a little, we were able to get just a
hint of a "trash" sound when playing on
the ride cymbal. I must mention that it took
quite a bit of experimenting on our part to
determine the optimum thickness of the
felt and the right amount of tilt on the cym¬
bals.
We encountered one potential problem.
We borrowed three Piggyback cymbals for
review, and one of them was slightly
warped. That was only a problem in cer¬
tain applications, where we were trying to
get one cymbal to vibrate evenly against
the other (as in the above example of the
Piggyback mounted under the ride). Given
the thinness of these cymbals, it's easy to
see why they could be prone to warpage,
so you might want to check for that before
you make your purchase.
Zildjian's promo for this cymbal states
that it can also be used as a small China.
The MD editors who tried it felt that it was
too thin and high-pitched for that use, and
preferred it in combination with another
cymbal. But that's not to say that someone
else wouldn't be able to use it by itself and
be pleased with the sound.
The EFX Piggyback has a list price of
$164.00, which is comparable to what you
might spend on a 17" crash. Considering
that the Piggyback can be used in several
different ways—depending on what you
mate it with—it might not be a bad invest¬
ment if you're looking for something differ¬
ent.
—Rick Mattingly , Modern Drummer
