Bass Drum and Snare are flamming

JacoFett

Junior Member
Hello, I was recording on my friends electronic drum kit the other day and when I went back and replayed it I realized that if my bass drum and another drum were being hit at the same time they were flaming. I just wanted to ask if there were any exercises or something I could do to fix this.
Sorry if there is already a thread about this.
 
Put on a click and practice hitting them at exactly the same time on the click. There's not really a trick to it, just practice so that you don't flam when you really want to hit em at the same time.
 
Thanks, but do you mean just hitting the snare and bass drum at the same time aas the click or to play beats or both?
 
Both. Work in simultaneous strokes into your grooves, make sure it's accurate. I would also just do some straight ahead with each click, too.

Not flaming when hitting two kit parts at the same time is actually harder than it sounds... Comes with lots of practice and practical application of playing the drums.
 
The fact that you are hearing it is the first step. Once you can hear it while doing it, you can then begin to work on correcting it.

The best way is to play slow grooves, really paying attention to how it sounds. Concentrate on making consistent motions that are repeatable, like the regular swinging of a pendulum. There is safety in consistent motion.
 
Create a bunch of different things where all you're doing is playing unisons.

Really though, what I would do is record myself practicing the bass and snare unison groove very slowly until it's perfect. Once it's perfect (that is, one it's internalized), I would very slowly begin speeding it up, making sure to internalize each new tempo - at least when I reach a new temp that makes me flam again. I would do this until I could do it "in my sleep."

Edit: Dave Weckl shows an excellent unisons exercise in his How To Practice video from his A Natural Evolution series.
 
Last edited:
Suggestion: while practicing unisons, also practice different dynamics. In other words, hitting your snare softly from an inch high is a very different thing than hitting hard from a foot high. Different timing, movement, etc. To be tight when playing drumset, you need to be able to hit multiple limbs simultaneously on all your instruments (drums, cymbals) at all dynamic levels.
 
Metronomes are your friend, homie!

In my first year of university, a professor pointed out to me that I did that exact same thing. So he told me to practice to a metronome. Very slowly. And record it so you can listen back and fix it later on. And slowly speed up the click. That should help, it solved the issue for me!
 
I have to agree with everything that's been said. A variety of speeds and dynamics is going to be the best play. Use a metronome and rather than using your ears use your sense of touch, feel them hitting at the same time.

Use combinations of LH/RH, LH/RF, LH/LF, RH/RF, RH/LF.

Repetition is key :)
 
Our old friend Anthony gave an exercise he learned from Steve Smith. It's been a while and I can't find the thread, but think it involved playing all four limbs in unison, starting at a really slow tempo. Electronic kits are a great way to test this because all the surfaces can sound the same.

It's hard. Very hard. Takes practice. And it's worthwhile, because those tendencies to not play unisons cleanly can cause problems with your ability to groove and make the time feel good.
 
Our old friend Anthony gave an exercise he learned from Steve Smith. It's been a while and I can't find the thread, but think it involved playing all four limbs in unison, starting at a really slow tempo. Electronic kits are a great way to test this because all the surfaces can sound the same.

It's hard. Very hard. Takes practice. And it's worthwhile, because those tendencies to not play unisons cleanly can cause problems with your ability to groove and make the time feel good.

Just had a go at this. It's not too difficult for me until I try it at fast tempos, then it's kinda crazy hard to keep clean! Thanks for the reminder... Great exercise.
 
Our old friend Anthony gave an exercise he learned from Steve Smith. It's been a while and I can't find the thread, but think it involved playing all four limbs in unison, starting at a really slow tempo. Electronic kits are a great way to test this because all the surfaces can sound the same.

It's hard. Very hard. Takes practice. And it's worthwhile, because those tendencies to not play unisons cleanly can cause problems with your ability to groove and make the time feel good.

glad you remembered it

;)
 
or, don't worry about it. just don't hit anything together, unless you WANT to flam. or work hand or foot with a metronome while independently playing "around" the click with whichever appendage you want to work with (so to speak).
 
like others have said...metronome and record your playing...

...that mneans take the time to listen to the recording critically.

Preferably, have a device that can play back slower than the recording speed so you can really pick it apart.

I purposly like to have some space between my bass and snare peak velocities...but always be able to control it.
 
or, don't worry about it. just don't hit anything together, unless you WANT to flam. or work hand or foot with a metronome while independently playing "around" the click with whichever appendage you want to work with (so to speak).

Some grooves are best played as a flam between the snare and kick. If flamming is what's coming from you naturally naturally right now get into it, practice flaming until you're comfortable with it, don't try to turn it off.

Once you're comfortable executing a groove by flamming the snare/kick, playing both together will come easy... and you may even realize it doesn't sound as good as a flam beat.
 
Once you're comfortable executing a groove by flamming the snare/kick, playing both together will come easy...

This may be true for some but it was emphatically NOT true for me.

Maybe because I came from a rudimental background, there wasn't much room for unison hits in my practice routine; it was always flams. When I noticed I was unintentionally landing "off" when trying to do unison hits on the drum set, it was something I had to specifically practice for a while.

Others' mileage may vary.
 
I would suggest listening to Panama by Van Halen. I have to do a beat almost just like that in one of my band's original songs. I'll hit the bass drum on the quarters with a standard 4/4 money beat for two measures, then hit the 8th note before the one on the third measure.
 
There's a collection of unison exercises in Dom Famularo's book, "It's Your Move". He calls them "combinations."
 
Back
Top