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metranome or violence?

#21
lethargytartare said:
C'mon -- let's not get into critiquing the grammar and composition post...I thought people had gotten beyond that a decade ago...
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I couldn't force myself to read the original post because of the way he wrote it. So the re-write was actually helpful and very functional.

Have you explained that you want someone to follow you, tempo-wise, rather than lead? Explain this first. If that doesn't work present the metronome option. If that doesn't fly find a new drummer and specifically state during auditions that you guys will be leading the tempo.
 
#22
I don't know, I thought violence was clearly the best option. Crack the bastard over the head with an MIM Jazz V -- or preferably a Squier, I guess. Those puny little sticks drummers swing are no competition. Good ole bar brawl beats a metronome any day. Y'all are so busy fixing grammar you've missed the obvious.
 
#23
I think people don't like metronomes because they show you how much work there is to do. I really have never used them in the past except for woodwinds band in middle school. My Bass teacher (degree in Jazz Bass) carries one with him and uses it to practice with still. Every time I would ask him what I needed to work on he would say bust out the nome. Enough said.

I normally play on a Worship team with my Pastor's son as the drummer who is 14. He is an amazing player for his age, but doesn't have the discipline to sit with the meter. As a result his tempo can be erratic. I found my self holding him down and keeping him in tempo yesterday during a song as he was speeding up. He thinks he is a good enough drummer that he doesn't have to work on it. Especially now that he is into guitar and whatever else. A difficult situation as I am not the team leader and he is the pastors son after all!

Last week we had a substitute drummer. A 40 year old seasoned pro that gigs in a working local funk band. Wow what a pleasure to play with him. As they say, a band is only as good as its drummer!

I agree that it is the drummers job to keep and band locked in and everyone should cue off him and the bassist to stay locked in. Especially in a band like ours where we have me, a drummer, sometimes 3 guitards, 2 keys, and as many as 5 singers involved. We have varying levels of talent in the band. It can get really muddy if the rhythm section is loose!

The question for me is how committed are we to the groove?
 
#24
I have a buddy who does home-studio recordings, and he usually has drummers play on his midi kit, and later quantizes the drum track...which you could easily call cheating, BUT it makes the recordings sound a light-years better. And I've seen bands have that "a-ha" moment when they hear the recordings.
 
#25
Some drummers, as others have pointed out in various thread, seem to have one speed and no matter what tempo you start at, he ends up dragging everyone kicking and screamong back to that comfort zone every song. I'm a drummer and admit a lot of guys do this.

I personally think they are not familliar with the pattern enough to detect the speed changes and varations. A metronome will point out when you are out of time but I think any time spent playing along with a metronome is just you learning the pattern by repeating it over and over until you are familliar enough with the note placement you can do it at any tempo. In other words, I would bet you would get the same results if you practiced with the metronome off.

Drummers are responsible for keeping time... So is everyone else in the band..... Nobody (as much as guitards would like it) gets the luxuary of disregarding time and blaming others when you mess up all over the place.

It is possiable the drummer is board out of his mind playing through your original and speeding it up is an attempt to get it over with as soon as is possible.

-eSmith.
 
#28
I would think that by calling on a metronome your drummer is seeing it as a personal attack on his timekeeping. Thats why a drummer would take offence. The drummers role is time, I'm sure he knows that and when you start questioning it they feel your crossing a line. (not that that is a valid reaction)

I would think it would be a lot like a drummer questioning your tuning or fingering. You might not like that any better than him liking your metronome suggestions.

Aslo, it's common that the metronome suggestions get brought up in front of the whole band (who also have some time keeping responsibilities) and everyone is pointing at the drummer. I can see anyone getting defensive in that position.

I have seen bands where the bass player is falling off the beat and the guitar player doesn't seem to remember there is a band playing with him and he's speeding up and all over the place and the drummer is trying to find a way to keep those two together and at the end of the tune they are looking at him like he should have fixed it regardless of those two not even trying to play together.

I, as a drummer, have asked bands to try a click so they could finally see where they were losing time, they didn't like the idea so I don't think it's just drummers. I think anyone who gets called out on the carpet while the others want to measure his time skills is goint to get defensive.

-eSmith.
 
#31
A metronome would work in the long term if you have the patience to stick with one drummer for a while. However, if you need a drummer now, I would suggest that you go out and find an experienced, well trained drummer with a good sense of tempo control and dynamics.

Oh, and Mungi, thanks for the repost. It's so much easier to read with proper spacing and punctuation.
 
#32
My band, the guitarist keeps speeding up and dragging us along, so I and the drummer decided to just stick to our guns and hold the tempo.

It worked great, I heard him having to follow us, and the singer was raving at how much better the tempos for the songs were.

Guitarist started making comments about getting the drummer a metronome, haha…

I hear it again, and we’ll have a discussion.

:)
 
#36
lethargytartare said:
C'mon -- let's not get into critiquing the grammar and composition post...I thought people had gotten beyond that a decade ago...
Click to expand...

No, no, let's keep reinforcing grammar. At least for a few more years. We have a common language and it's easy enough to understand the format. Give us maybe ten more years before we devolve into grunts and slurps. Please.

Metronome, yes! New drummer that doesn't need one, better.
 
#37
Munjibunga said:
Well, I'm a bassist who is totally dedicated to a songwriter/guitarist with whom I play. We met in a bar cover band a couple years ago. That didn't last long, and the two of us have worked on his originals and covers and played together since then.

We picked up a drummer. Personally and musically it wasn't the best match, but it did help us to get our band together. Well, we decided to dump him after one too many head bumps and have been looking for the next one. We're getting some great gigs and folks really like us, but the drummers that we have used seem to want to speed up our songs. The first drummer was a lot more able to follow us and we had a great show, but he wasn't able to be there for the next one so we practiced with another guy we know who is in a real popular local band. It went fine, and it seemed that we were all on the same page, but when we went for the gig it seemed like he just decided that our songs needed to go way faster and he pretty much just took the lead. In his band this works just fine but ...

Anyway, after listening back to the recording, I told my guitar player my best idea (in my old school ways), which was that I was going to have to hurt one of 'em. We live in a pretty small northern California area, so everybody would know about it and either drummers wouldn't play with us or, if they did, they wouldn't mess with me (the tempo nazi).

Well, my band mate thought a metronome might be a better option! Okay, so is it rude to measure a song, set the metronome, and put it in front of the drummer? I don't know about the norm, but we really don't need someone to lead us, we need someone to follow us. For now I promise not to punch any body. Any suggestions? Thanks.
Click to expand...

So that god-awful mess the OP left was English?!? Thanks Munj.
 
#39
bombpop14 said:
Tempo Nazi's/grammar Nazi's breath a little...

Tama makes a really cool unit that stores BPM's our drummer uses. It's not that he speeds up but it helps him remember the optimum tempo's.


http://accessories.musiciansfriend.com/product/Tama-Rhythm-Watch?sku=442776&ZYXSEM=0&src=3AGGWXX2
Click to expand...

This is exactly the unit that my drummer uses and runs it into his in-ear monitors. We use it at practice and on stage.

A couple points I forgot in my first reply - now the ENTIRE band can figure out if we're playing at the wrong tempo, even by a couple of bpm. We're so used to playing the songs at exactly the same tempo.

Also, when we collect the video of our shows, we can sync the video up to the studio recordings, because it is always at exactly the same bpm. We can edit video between different shows and it syncs up. We haven't done this yet, but we're filming everything we can so that we can roll our own video. With our meager video skills, it'll be infinitely easier knowing that all the performances are at exactly the same tempo.

Again, if I ever find myself in another band and they won't use a metronome, I'm out. Same for guitar tuners.
 
#40
Munjibunga said:
Well, I'm a bassist who is totally dedicated to a songwriter/guitarist with whom I play....
Click to expand...


Thank you, thank you, thank you, Munjibunga. You're a much more determined reader than I am. I gave up hoping I'd figure this out twenty words into the post. I gave up caring five words in.

OP - get a copy of "The Elements of Style" and read it every six months. Please.

Now, what was this about?
 

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