monthly drum challenge?

[liv_rong]

Lol I can’t do this but I’m going to try. Thing is with odd times is it doesn’t have to be perfectly syncopated, just semi-coherent . It

[Tadpui]

Well I tried it. And now I think that I need therapy. Sevens just don't come at all naturally to me, I can't even make it 2 bars into that part without going into total free jazz mode.

I'll keep trying though, as soon as my therapist calls me back

[Tadpui]

I just caught myself staring into the middle distance, trying to count in cycles of 7. It's still not happening. A few of the comments below the video suggest different ways to count it, and those have helped. It's still impossible to avoid occasionally wanting that 8th beat to happen and then I'm screwed.

I think that a lot of my struggle is the tempo. It's pretty brisk, and my non-drummer brain is stuck about a full second in the past through everything. I can't negotiate the time and feel changes in real-time.

This has been a fun exercise so far, and it's gotten me off of my butt to play some drums. Wait...I play drums sitting down...so I guess it's gotten me right back on my butt to play some drums. I'll play through it more over the next few nights. But I highly doubt that I'll end up with anything worth presenting before the heat death of the universe or carpal tunnel syndrome sets in.

[Armistice]

Tune I'm working on now is in 7/8, with segments in 6/8 and the occasional end bar in 5/8, or, 8/8. Thought of chucking it up here and asking for drumming suggestions, but in the end just did some programming. Interested to see how it ends up.

[liv_rong]

I am not going to do the whole thing, once through will be enough. Then it just repeats anyways.

I don’t count when I play, in fact I haven’t even watched the video. It is a challenge though for sure. I’m just trying to concentrate on the bass and the kick and going from there. I have most of my parts but it’s very sloppy. Every night I just play through 3 or so times with a few restarts lol.

[paulman]

I gave it a couple tries. I'm gonna need more. 7/8 is a bitch.

[CrowsofFritz]

I can’t play drums to save my life. Moving my legs independent of my arms is too difficult for me. I already have timing issues anyway, and it’s been exacerbated by not playing rock for the last 8 years.

[liv_rong]

And when I say I don’t count I don’t mean because I’m so good, I mean because I’m so stupid. I don’t know what time sig I’m playing in most times unless it’s 4/4 or 3/4 and even with a triplet feel I get confused as fuck. So anyways, I gave up on trying to figure that out a long time ago lol

[Greg_L]

And when I say I don’t count I don’t mean because I’m so good, I mean because I’m so stupid. I don’t know what time sig I’m playing in most times unless it’s 4/4 or 3/4 and even with a triplet feel I get confused as fuck. So anyways, I gave up on trying to figure that out a long time ago lol

Same. I can play all kinds of weird time sigs if I just play it. But I don't know what I'm playing or how to count it. Someone has to tell me "hey that was 5/9" or some dumb shit like that. And then I'm like "well fuck that, back to 4/4".

[Tadpui]

I don't find myself just going "1234567" over and over as I'm playing, but I've at least got to count it out a few times to get the feel of it. I'm not counting while I'm playing, just as a learning aid to help my brain grab hold of the groove (or lack thereof, in the case of 7/8...that shit doesn't groove at all).

[CrowsofFritz]

I once made a song that was 3/4 by accident and it was actually harder to go back to 4/4 because of the way the vocals were done. I actually had to count to do a 4/4 song...

[vomitHatSteve]

And when I say I don’t count I don’t mean because I’m so good, I mean because I’m so stupid. I don’t know what time sig I’m playing in most times unless it’s 4/4 or 3/4 and even with a triplet feel I get confused as fuck. So anyways, I gave up on trying to figure that out a long time ago lol

Same. I can play all kinds of weird time sigs if I just play it. But I don't know what I'm playing or how to count it. Someone has to tell me "hey that was 5/9" or some dumb shit like that. And then I'm like "well fuck that, back to 4/4".

I forget, did we tell you all the weird sig changes for the Regdar and Lipstick songs you've done, or did you just play through them blindly?

Spoiler Alert had that one song with the dropped half beat after the choruses.
Lipstick 2 had the song that the chorus was in 7/8 or something for no reason.

[Greg_L]

I forget, did we tell you all the weird sig changes for the Regdar and Lipstick songs you've done, or did you just play through them blindly?

I just played through them. I honestly have no idea what yall's time sigs were. I just play what I think needs to be played.

[vomitHatSteve]

Fair, well now you know that you've recorded a handful of songs with 7/8 passages as well as... I guess 4.5/4?

[Greg_L]

Fair, well now you know that you've recorded a handful of songs with 7/8 passages as well as... I guess 4.5/4?

I am a Prog God!

[Tadpui]

I am a Prog God!

Wenowdis

[Greg_L]

[liv_rong]

Getting closer on this. Won’t be great, will just feel good to get through it semi cleanly

[Tadpui]

Getting closer on this. Won’t be great, will just feel good to get through it semi cleanly

Take my word for it: my attempt will make yours look like one of the finest examples of drumming ever to grace the planet

Here it is, in all of it's glory, the full 8 minutes of a pretty bad drummer trying to keep up with this math rock track:

20210926 math rock drums-001.mp3

My favorite part is me trying desperately to feel the 7/8 on the first go-around with the ride. I got lucky and came at the right time, at least

If I kept at it, I could probably do it maybe 5-10% better (believe it or not, this is 120% better than my first attempts, as measured by a registered scientician). But I'm still full of mental mistakes like dragging, rushing, losing the bass guitar, and forgetting where I'm at. And physical mistakes like whacking my sticks together as they're on their way to different places, getting a rimshot on a tom, or just plain wearing myself out due to bad technique.

This was a lot of fun though, despite my complaining Someday, I might be able to do something like this cleanly and repeatable!

*edit* there's something goofy with the stereo balance of my overheads...I must have left a pad engaged on one of the mics or something...everything is kind of happening over on the right.

[liv_rong]

@Tadpui ill listen later when I’m home