Very strange, since I seem to have been tired this entire weekend. Since I am up though, I could at least do something that is a bit productive. That's the modern condition, isn't it? If you are aware, you must produce! Strange and perverse really…………when do you get a chance to breathe?
But I do have some catching up to do, its been months since I have had the time to write in this little blogspace of mine.
Some unexpected and interesting things of late, no the least of which is that I now have behind me here in the studio an entire electronic drum set, complete with and extra set of pads, here for me to play with.
How the heck did that happen? For once, its not like I went out and bought another instrument, which is usually the case. No, this was a lot cooler than that.
A few years ago at work we had a contractor in for some time named Ivan Jones who as it happens is a drummer. Nice guy, one of things you say, yeah, lets get together sometime cause of course I am crazy about drums. I was also really interested in the Roland SPD series of drum pads, where you can play drums quietly! What a concept.
Anyway, we never managed to hook up, and sorta lost touch until a month or so ago when Ivan dropped me an email and asked hey, what's up?
As it happened, the email was a response from when I had been really interested in the Roland pad I mentioned, and I was still keen on buying one. Turns out that Ivan had one, along with a couple of extra pads and a kick drum trigger. This was in addition to his really large acoustic kit and a complete other set of electronic drums. Nice to know I am not the only person to spend my extra cash on instruments!
So we tossed a few emails back and forth, and Ivan offers to lend me his SPD pad, a kick trigger and a couple of extra pads. He said, hey I'm not using them anyway, so go ahead.
Of course, this is amazing to me, since I have very seldom lent anyone any of my instruments, since the times in the past that I did, every single time they came back broken!
Ivan came over a couple of nights later with this whole kit, and I got a mini lesson on playing the drums. I never realized how much of the drums is getting the sticks to bounce off the heads, quite a realization for me.
Of course I wanted to show Ivan what Jeff and I were doing with the pieces we are working on for the CD. I played one for him, and in about 10 seconds or less, Ivan says – the snare is late. I thought, really? So we spent a few minutes adjusting it, and sure enough, it was. It made a real difference in the feel of the piece. My next thoughts: shit, I really ain't a drummer, and wait! I have one next to me in the room here, maybe this is what Jeff and I need?!?
This ties into the struggles I have been having programming the middle eastern drum beats. Its not that they are tremendously complicated, but doing this on little pads, not on skins, is really a challenge, not to mention I am trying to play all the parts myself. Quite difficult to say the least.
Not being shy about anything, I asked Ivan if he might be interested in helping out a bit with the rhythms that I have been having trouble with. I am quite pleased and surprised that he says, sure. Now, what is most interesting about this is that Ivan is a died in the wool hard rock drummer, in the Terry Bozzio vein. I can't imagine what could be more remote from that with what we are trying to do, but Ivan actually digs the songs. As he has told me many times since then, what he plays is not at all the sum total of what he listens to.
Of course I have to run this by Jeff, but he is cool with it – after all, we both know we aren't drummers, and how could this hurt?
I give Ivan some of the tracks to listen to so he can come up with suggestions. Actually, he comes up with a doozy: he wants to bring his whole electronic set over here, because he feels naturally that once he learns the rhythms, it would make much more sense to play them in live rather than do the mouse thing.
I gotta agree. So that is why I have almost no room down here now, but what the heck, it's a damn drumset! Not only that, Ivan also brought over a choice Parker Fly – the only new body shape in the last ten years for a solid body guitar that I have liked at all, and a Steinberger headless bass. Can I quit my job and just stay home and play all this stuff now???? Please??????
Last week Ivan Jeff and I got together and Jeff brought over some recordings for Ivan to listen to, and I had already made him copies of the two drum rhythms CDs that Jeff and I had been working from to cop the middle eastern rhythms. Its one thing to get the beats, but you also have to know how they fit in with the music, so now Ivan has a huge dose of new stuff to listen to.
At this point, its all open ended. Ivan is on the end of a grinding spate of work, and hasn't had much time to sleep, let alone work on learning a whole bunch of new music. I am hoping he's had a bit more time to work on this in the past week, but I am not sure.
What I am sure of is that I have met a very good, generous person here, a good musician, and that is worth a lot to me. I realize again how much I have been cut off, not working with other musicians, just doing it all alone. I don't know how this will work out, with Jeff and Ivan and I, but why not be positive? I know for certain that I am learning new things about music once again. That always has been, and will be, a totally great thing for me.
I don't want much, after all: just the whole damn thing. Let the drums play my man, let 'em play!