What's the most shallow-minded thing you do in regards to playing or owning drums?

[mikyok]

I also rarely socialize at gigs. I tend to set up, and if I can, I just sit behind the kit and play on my practice pad. This is more the introvert in me. I just can't bring my self to hold pointless conversation with drunk people.

Dude, I'm the same, in fact the band is.

Doing the functions stuff, plastering the fake smile on to play Brown Eyed Girl and Sweet Home Alabama takes a lot out of me!

I also sigh when a conversation starts with "Hey are you the drummer!"

 

[mikyok]

I avoid drum solos at all costs, there's a band I play with that does 'Wipeout' and I really don't like playing it.

I'd rather play Peggy Sue which is wipeout with words attached!

 

[mikyok]

I'm always aloof with the audience at gigs. I'm polite if an audience member approaches me before or after a show, but I make no effort to engage anyone in the crowd, and I usually attempt to flee the facility as soon as my gear is packed. I have a wife and a kid. My goal is to get home, not to loiter and mingle. Drumming hasn't been a social vehicle for me in a very long time.

I don't know that I'd call this tendency shallow. I have a good reason for upholding it. I'll let readers decide.

I'm the same, not shallow. I look at it as time=money. Also after a gig I can hear my bed a calling.

There's jam nights for the social side of drumming which I love.

 

[AzHeat]

I also sigh when a conversation starts with "Hey are you the drummer!"

hold on, let me guess the next words...
???

 

[mikyok]

hold on, let me guess the next words...
View attachment 93651???

and they think they're so original

Or they give you a run down of their drumming career in a failed attempt to sit in!

 

[PorkPieGuy]

I'm always aloof with the audience at gigs. I'm polite if an audience member approaches me before or after a show, but I make no effort to engage anyone in the crowd, and I usually attempt to flee the facility as soon as my gear is packed. I have a wife and a kid. My goal is to get home, not to loiter and mingle. Drumming hasn't been a social vehicle for me in a very long time.

I don't know that I'd call this tendency shallow. I have a good reason for upholding it. I'll let readers decide.

I'm the exact same way. When the gig is over, it's like I get a fire lit under me to get out of there as quickly as possible. If it's really early, say a 1-4 gig in the afternoon and my band mates want to eat supper after packing up, then I'm all for that. However, if it's an evening gig, I high-tail it out of there ASAP. If my wife is with me, we are like a well-oiled machine getting my stuff packed up. We work together very quickly. If it's a bigger stage with lots of room, we can get my stuff completely torn down and in the back of the truck in less than 10 min. The only thing I don't skimp on is the "dummy check" which is what I call the final walk-through after everything is packed up.

 

[Big Ratamacue]

I refuse to schlep around a double pedal because I know I’ll never use one on a gig. But because of this I’m neglecting my double bass education.

Absolutely agree with your call.
I hate lugging gear. I worked for a while to get the double bass part in Hot For Teacher consistent on a single kick pedal just to cut out that piece of gear. That's the only tune I play that could possibly call for a double pedal, so forget it.

 

[roncadillac]

I have this thing about all pieces being from the same manufacturer. For example: I'm currently driving a pearl midtown but all my hardware is Tama... It drives me crazy. I literally want to spend $300+ to replace perfectly good hardware because it doesn't say Pearl when my drums do.

Drum heads: if 1 single head on my kit is from a different company I can't focus on playing.

Cymbals: I have to have all the same company or it throws me off, currently Zildjian.

It's all mental, I know, but it doesn't have to be logical to be real!

 

[C.M. Jones]

I avoid drum solos at all costs, there's a band I play with that does 'Wipeout' and I really don't like playing it.

I'd rather play Peggy Sue which is wipeout with words attached!

We're twins in this regard. I've been drumming thirty-six years and have never played a solo live. I simply see no reason to do so. Drums are made to accompany, not absorb the spotlight.

 

[roncadillac]

We're twins in this regard. I've been drumming thirty-six years and have never played a solo live. I simply see no reason to do so. Drums are made to accompany, not absorb the spotlight.

Last two projects I've been in the band leader called for a solo (sometimes mid song live without warning) and I rarely, if ever, oblige.

One time I literally stopped playing for the 8 measures he wanted me to solo over and kept time with my left foot hi hat while staring at him directly in the eye then gave him the finger on the '3' of the last measure and gave a snare hit pickup on the '4' of the last measure to que everyone else back into the chorus.

 

[C.M. Jones]

Last two projects I've been in the band leader called for a solo (sometimes mid song live without warning) and I rarely, if ever, oblige.

One time I literally stopped playing for the 8 measures he wanted me to solo over and kept time with my left foot hi hat while staring at him directly in the eye then gave him the finger on the '3' of the last measure and gave a snare hit pickup on the '4' of the last measure to que everyone else back into the chorus.

Ha! You practically walked off the job and picked up a picket sign when expected to solo. I'm impressed. Never submit, man.

 

[J-W]

We're twins in this regard. I've been drumming thirty-six years and have never played a solo live. I simply see no reason to do so. Drums are made to accompany, not absorb the spotlight.

While that is one approach, it's not the only one. To each his own, but to say drums were made to accompany is pretty shallow. In many genres, even cultures, it's the main instrument......sometimes the ONLY instrument.
Personally, I prefer music that, while having all around musicianship, is heavily driven by the drums. While I can appreciate the roll that guys like Charlie Watts, and Phil Rudd bring to the table, I find the repetition to be quite boring. But on the flip side, I don't like "overplaying" either. For me, there is a delicate balance. There's a time for the spotlight and a time to sit back.
My favorite music contains polyrhythms and polymeters. This allows the drums to be interesting even when only accompanying.

 

[mikyok]

We're twins in this regard. I've been drumming thirty-six years and have never played a solo live. I simply see no reason to do so. Drums are made to accompany, not absorb the spotlight.

Precisely! I had to do a recital at uni and that put me off solos for life.

Got the loud, fast phase out of my system a long time ago.

 

[C.M. Jones]

While that is one approach, it's not the only one. To each his own, but to say drums were made to accompany is pretty narrow minded. In many genres, even cultures, it's the main instrument......sometimes the ONLY instrument.
Personally, I prefer music that, while having all around musicianship, is heavily driven by the drums. While I can appreciate the roll that guys like Charlie Watts, and Phil Rudd bring to the table, I find the repetition to be quite boring. But on the flip side, I don't like "overplaying" either. For me, there is a delicate balance. There's a time for the spotlight and a time to sit back.
My favorite music contains polyrhythms and polymeters. This allows the drums to be interesting even when only accompanying.

I don't disagree entirely. Though drums are an indispensable rhythmic foundation to any instrument they accompany, I don't believe drum parts should remain blandly supportive, at least not in all instances. I don't fault other drummers for enjoying solos. I'm just not one of those drummers. Soloing departs from my cognitive orientation to drumming. It's not that I can't solo; it's that soloing on a drum set seems analogous to using a hammer on a screw. It's just not something I do.

 

[J-W]

Ah ha! I guess I'll have to add to the "most shallow thing I do regarding drums" as not paying attention to the subject at hand. I was too focused on the "accompanying" comment and completely overlooked the fact that you were talking about soloing. My apologies.
I too am not a big fan of drum solos. Especially the long, drawn out solos. A few seconds, or even minutes are fine with me, but the majority of solos I hear, I want to be over before they're even halfway through.
As for soloing myself, I've done it reluctantly. I wouldn't take one unless I'm pressured by the audience and I kept it short. Fortunately, I had worked out enough ideas so as not to be caught on the spot, and to not do the same one each time, but I prefer to just skip over that part of the show and my band members have always been aware of that. Unfortunately, sometimes the audience demands one and I've felt obligated. I certainly didn't flip them off in defiance, even though in hindsight that probably would have been acceptable considering the genre.

 

[Juniper]

I'll never buy Tama or Yamaha drums

Not even sure why as they are each great drum manufacturers and I've played some of their sets that sound brilliant, I just don't feel anything for them.

 

[GetAgrippa]

I can't really relate to the "shallow" "deep" conundrum because I like "streaming" it just flows-right through deep or shallow-so it "cuts" right to the heart of the matter or deviates to another matter-anyways it keeps on flowing and streaming endlessly It has no beginning or end-beyond space-time and matter-because "It's just my imagination running away from me" in my best Mick voice LOL. Well I've been toying with this for awhile because I find toms annoy me. And I want to just drop toms altogether. Playing along with Nate fearless flyers where he has no toms-till recently now he's got a bunch of them LOL. Anyways I enjoyed playing that and just added my floor tom for a long time till added a mounted tom again-but really I'd just like to drop all of them but the floor tom. I've always been amazed how little you actually play them on gigs-least my experience and how when I add rolling tom fills to songs-mehhhhhh. Now I practice rudiments on snare and toms-fun combinations of Joe's Killer left hand snare and right hand on toms-sounds cool-as does a triple stroke roll or buzz rolls between them. But really accents on floor tom and a fill between snare and floor is enough-the high tom in particular has been annoying me. Like some personal vendetta cause I dropped the 10 in for the 13 in-however I soon tired of the 13 ,which I was more fond ,and went back to the lil 10 in-dang aint' drum relationships complicated LOL. That's why I want to drop both and just stick with a 14 or 16 floor toms. Course I could compromise with 14 and 16 floor toms combo-dang I haven't explored that option or maybe twins tuned differently. My GrandDaddy Beall divorced my grandmother and lived with these two twins-which I'm not sure if romantic with both or just one-but anyways he like twins. So it could be ticket. See streaming baby LOL.

 

[Seafroggys]

I refuse to buy any head that's not Remo. There were two minor exceptions.

About 8 years ago or so, I went to GC to get some bottom heads for this drum set I was tuning up for live performance (it was an old Pearl set that I had been using for teaching, smaller 4 piece, didn't want to lug my regular set to a show so chose to take this). I went there specifically for bottom heads...and they had no clear ambassadors! But they did have clear G1's. I didn't want to drive across town to another shop, and it was also running a little late in the day, so I just bit the bullet and got them.

And then about 5-6 years ago, I bought a Super Kick II for my bass drum on my main drumset. My rationale, I had been using Powerstroke 4's, both clear and coated, for years, and I switched over to a CS Dot for my bass head for a couple years, and it was a freaking cannon but I had to add additional muffling to make it usable (something I never do!). I was never 100% happy with the PS4's. But I remember back in high school, one of the drum shops gave me an Aquarian catalog (I didn't know anything about Aquarian), at the time they had a 'recommended heads' list for different types of music, and for their 'classic rock' set they had the SK2 on bass drum. I kinda grew out of that little phase, but I always remembered that. So I gave it a shot.

It was too muffled for me. Not a huge fan, sadly.

So back to PS4's it was.

 

[gish]

A lot of the previous posts used to apply to me in my younger days. I feel like I’m in a low fi, no frills period of my drumming journey. Shared kits not set up optimally for me? Weird acoustics? A gig that should be packed but we’re playing for 10 people? I find myself at a stage currently where I enjoy challenges that used to drive me crazy. I see challenging scenarios as opportunities, where I used to see them as obstacles. I think all real musicians are very self critical; the ol “I’ll never be able to play like that guy”. But hopefully at some point we realize what our strengths are, and don’t stress to much about our weaknesses, which we all have. Feel good about what you do well, play to your strengths, and enjoy yourself. Very liberating.

 

[NouveauCliche]

I'm always aloof with the audience at gigs. I'm polite if an audience member approaches me before or after a show, but I make no effort to engage anyone in the crowd, and I usually attempt to flee the facility as soon as my gear is packed. I have a wife and a kid. My goal is to get home, not to loiter and mingle. Drumming hasn't been a social vehicle for me in a very long time.

I don't know that I'd call this tendency shallow. I have a good reason for upholding it. I'll let readers decide.

I'm the same way...and I do it because I'm married (and she's way out of my league) so mingling too much after shows leads to problems.

The exception is when I have friend that come to a show - then I'll hang out with them and it can be a lot of fun.

I detest backline kits and using other drummer's gear. I almost always volunteer to supply the kit even if it means staying until the end of the night while other bands use my stuff.

I've been saddled with beaten-down, raggedy-ass gear too often to let that happen again if it doesn't have to.

I'm sort of the opposite - I hardly ever play close to where I live so I'm living on backlines - that's lead me to really dislike lugging my own gear around. I have a cymbal bag with a bunch of backline essentials in it - but when I do play my own kit it always feels like I should go back to playing sax lol.


I guess shallow minded wise - I like a set up that is aesthetic from an audience perspective - so I'll adjust kits to have higher cymbals at sharper angles than I used to - plus there's this whole #highcymbalgang thing started by Forest Rice that even Jojo Mayer made a post about haha.

I also hate beater kits - for personal use and ownership I mean. I don't get the appeal of owning a junky set.