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The trouble with drummers...

S

ShadowImage

Guest
Jan 12, 2016
672
816
#1
It's always the drummers! If only we could fire them all. What are some of your experiences with drummers?

My first drummer was my best friend. Hilarious guy, taught me all about music in high school. We used to go to summer school together and spend the rest of our day writing songs. He grew up and decided to be a weed farmer which wasn't my problem until an electrical short burned down his house along with his million dollar grow operation. After several stints in jail I decided to call it quits. :whistle:

Next drummer was selling pills out of his truck and ended up in prison, next... :rolleyes:

I made great friends with the next guy who was a super fast drummer. He could play 16th notes at 220 bpm on the kick drums. We moved in together and even started a construction business. Life was good but trouble was, all those years of construction destroyed his hands and thanks to carpal tunnel he couldn't play more than 30 minute sets. :/ He ended up getting a brain tumour and mostly gave up playing. :(

Moved out to LA, got asked to join a band from a drummer/Band Leader. Guy seemed nice until he fired the vocalist, 2 guitar players, 3 bass players, had me first playing guitar, then keys, then vocals. Finally he fired me, then the fourth bass player and third guitarist quit after the third singer didn't work out. :dead:

My current drummer cancels practice last minute at least twice a month, asks me to borrow money, asks me to get him beer every rehearsal, looks for fights at gigs and last show got so blackout drunk on stage he said he doesn't remember playing some of the songs. :vomit:

So let's hear some of your experiences with drummers! :bassist:
 
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#2
The most recent drummer I've played with is always a joy to play with, because he's a great drummer with good timing, an all around nice guy, and unlike some (many?) drummers, he's a complete musician, sings, harmonies, understands basic theory, great ear.
 
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#5
One of my best friends is a dang good drummer. he was born 80% deaf and plays sooooo loud. To practice with him we all have to be mic'd and run to a monitor or headphones for him, otherwise it just sounds like noise to him through hearing aids. But once the H.A.s are out we have to remember to talk into the mic or he can't hear us which is frustrating for him.

Most recent drummer just surprised us all and abruptly quit. Still trying to regroup.
 
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#7
ShadowImage said:
It's always the drummers! If only we could fire them all. What are some of your experiences with drummers?

My first drummer was my best friend. Hilarious guy, taught me all about music in high school. We used to go to summer school together and spend the rest of our day writing songs. He grew up and decided to be a weed farmer which wasn't my problem until an electrical short burned down his house along with his million dollar grow operation. After several stints in jail I decided to call it quits. :whistle:

Next drummer was selling pills out of his truck and ended up in prison, next... :rolleyes:

I made great friends with the next guy who was a super fast drummer. He could play 16th notes at 220 bpm on the kick drums. We moved in together and even started a construction business. Life was good but trouble was, all those years of construction destroyed his hands and thanks to carpal tunnel he couldn't play more than 30 minute sets. :/ He ended up getting a brain tumour and mostly gave up playing. :(

Moved out to LA, got asked to join a band from a drummer/Band Leader. Guy seemed nice until he fired the vocalist, 2 guitar players, 3 bass players, had me first playing guitar, then keys, then vocals. Finally he fired me, then the fourth bass player and third guitarist quit after the third singer didn't work out. :dead:

My current drummer cancels practice last minute at least twice a month, asks me to borrow money, asks me to get him beer every rehearsal, looks for fights at gigs and last show got so blackout drunk on stage he said he doesn't remember playing some of the songs. :vomit:

So let's hear some of your experiences with drummers! :bassist:
Click to expand...
Remind me to never play drums with you. :blackeye:
 
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#8
Mike N said:
The drummer you see in my avatar has been back there in one band or another with me since 1995. Not the flashiest drummer I've ever played with but he's one of those guys that is like Fed Ex..... on time, all the time. I consider it an honor to be in a band with him.
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I wish I could get with a drummer like that!

Been gigging with a backing track and no drummer with my solo project... really sucks the energy from the live performance :/
 
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#9
All I can say is, I've worked with my share of incompetent, deranged, meter challenged and clueless drummers to last me 3 lifetimes.
When I find one that has the opposite of those characteristics, I try to stick with them.

I wonder if bass players are the bane of drummers on TalkDrums.com?
 
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#11
BassCliff said:
Hi,

In the late 80's I fronted a band with my best friend/drummer. He left his girlfriend and ran off with my wife. I kind of miss him. (True story!) :roflmao:


Thank you for your indulgence,

BassCliff
Click to expand...

Wow! I thought that only happened to me! My first wife cheated on me with my drummer. Same deal. He was a great drummer. Her? Well....I don't miss her.
 
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#13
Current drummer is excellent. Understands volume and dynamics. Fun to talk to. His only quirk is he always need to go to the bathroom just as we are going back on stage.
My favorite drummer story is back from my days on the road. We were playing a hotel in Virginia and the drummer had his girlfriend along. They got into a big argument. He went for a walk in the empty field behind the hotel to cool off and decided that all his troubles were caused by talking so he decided to take a vow of silence. Having solved his problem, he went back to the hotel restaurant and sat down with a menu. Then the waitress came by and said, "What'll you have?"
 
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#14
Gravedigger Dav said:
Current drummer is excellent. Understands volume and dynamics. Fun to talk to. His only quirk is he always need to go to the bathroom just as we are going back on stage.
My favorite drummer story is back from my days on the road. We were playing a hotel in Virginia and the drummer had his girlfriend along. They got into a big argument. He went for a walk in the empty field behind the hotel to cool off and decided that all his troubles were caused by talking so he decided to take a vow of silence. Having solved his problem, he went back to the hotel restaurant and sat down with a menu. Then the waitress came by and said, "What'll you have?"
Click to expand...
What happened next?
 
#16
I've had good luck with drummers; I haven't run into any flaky stick-bangers yet (knock on wood). There are 2 that I am no longer in bands with, but we keep in touch and still work some recordings, writing, and jamming going on. I can count on either as a sub (and vice-versa with them and their current gigs), and we're always open to doing something again when the right scenario presents itself.

It's guitarists that I'm always wanting to fire. Just haven't had a whole lotta luck there. Finding a really solid, versatile one without a bag full of issues is like snipe hunting lately. I know... I ask too much.
 
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#17
Only one drummer sour note for me, I played with an instrumental reggae band a few years back (SlowPokeNTurtle, by SlowPokeNTurtle) and after a weird falling out at a gig between the drummer and one of the guitarist, the drummer sorta fell off the map for a summer. just after we had gotten back in touch and were going to get things rolling again, he died just a few days short of his 30s birthday. Big. Fat. Bummer.

Other than that, I've had pretty good luck with drummers. One of the guys I played with for many years (and I play guitar on a metal side-project with him still) is one of my best friends, has been with me through thick and thin, is a really solid drummer with a background as a sax player and guitarist also has a full musical foundation, plays sax in a 7-piece funk band and recruited me to play bass with them a couple years back. That band was without a drummer for a while, so he basically sat in on drums for rehearsals but we haven't played a gig in a good long while. We recently found a new drummer who's got a really good pocket, put the time in to learn all the songs, is humble / easy to work with. We hope to start gigging again soon.

I just started playing with another group with a guitar player I played with a few years back. The drummer is someone who I've played with a couple times before on some sessions with the aforementioned guitar player. He's not a full-time pro but he could be. He always plays the right thing, never plays the wrong thing. Like seriously, perfect, tasteful, just right, every time. And he's a nice unassuming dude. So we're just starting, it's a singer-songwriter-based rock (for lack of a better word) vibe, but with a ben-harperish groove to it. Seems like this will be another good rhythm section match...

I'm recording a singer-songwriter / drummer-multi-instrumentalist who I've become friendly with through local music channels. The drummer is more or less a full-time pro and is another one of those always-plays-the-right-thing-every-time kind of guys. The two of them do a lot of live shows and sometimes have a keyboard player with them, and we sort of agreed that I'd come on board be the "regular" bassist on bigger-room gigs where they want a full band. Maybe biting off a teensy bit too much for me to chew between these 3 bands and my full-time job and serious video-game habit... But I've always loved playing with him. He used to host and open mic and i'd come down towards the end and the two of us would lay down grooves for a freestyle rhyme session that ended the night, we've worked on several recording projects together...

So yeah, pretty seriously good drummer luck/karma over here. I think maybe it has something to do with just having entered my 40s rather than my 20s. The people i'm playing with are a bit older too, been through enough drama to know how to avoid it... And I've been through enough that I avoid people who will create it and caused enough that I know how not to most of the time.
 
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#18
Gravedigger Dav said:
Current drummer is excellent. Understands volume and dynamics. Fun to talk to. His only quirk is he always need to go to the bathroom just as we are going back on stage.
My favorite drummer story is back from my days on the road. We were playing a hotel in Virginia and the drummer had his girlfriend along. They got into a big argument. He went for a walk in the empty field behind the hotel to cool off and decided that all his troubles were caused by talking so he decided to take a vow of silence. Having solved his problem, he went back to the hotel restaurant and sat down with a menu. Then the waitress came by and said, "What'll you have?"
Click to expand...

I have played so many bars in Virginia with a "field out back". I have an old photograph somewhere of a field out back of "Cap'n Joe's" in South Hill VA with probably 150 wild turkeys in it. I was only 15 when I started playing in clubs with guys who were all in their 30s. During set breaks I had to walk off the stage and out into many of those fields so that bar owners wouldn't get in trouble having a teenager in the club. At that very place, Bill (Joe's son and bartender) would literally meet me at the stage at the end of every set and walk me right out the side door. I would take off walking and he would say "That's far enough" when I had crossed over what he thought was his property line. If it was raining I had to go straight to the band bus. He wasn't a jerk. Laws regarding such things are pretty stiff in VA. So he was just looking out for his business.

Back on topic, the drummer in that same band was also the main lead singer. He was a machine. He would get WASTED drunk during the show. However, he wouldn't miss a single beat or lyric. He was dead on perfect the whole show. At the end of the show he was too drunk to stand up from his drums. It was pretty amazing, actually.
 
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#19
Something about drummers, mine is not as exciting as others. I spent the majority of my playing time in church. We even had drummer issues in church. 1 guy donated a nice set, he only knew 1 beat, I think he hit the 'holy water' a few times before church. Another played every song like a drum solo, our nerves were shot after every service. Make it worse, his mother sang on the praise team & thought it was wonderful. Another had just started playing, was improving, come to find out she had a girlfriend, she was asked to quit. But to say this, I played with this guy & he was perfect, like playing with a metromone, never overplayed, played different styles with ease.
 
#20
two fingers said:
I have played so many bars in Virginia with a "field out back". I have an old photograph somewhere of a field out back of "Cap'n Joe's" in South Hill VA with probably 150 wild turkeys in it. I was only 15 when I started playing in clubs with guys who were all in their 30s. During set breaks I had to walk off the stage and out into many of those fields so that bar owners wouldn't get in trouble having a teenager in the club. At that very place, Bill (Joe's son and bartender) would literally meet me at the stage at the end of every set and walk me right out the side door. I would take off walking and he would say "That's far enough" when I had crossed over what he thought was his property line. If it was raining I had to go straight to the band bus. He wasn't a jerk. Laws regarding such things are pretty stiff in VA. So he was just looking out for his business.

Back on topic, the drummer in that same band was also the main lead singer. He was a machine. He would get WASTED drunk during the show. However, he wouldn't miss a single beat or lyric. He was dead on perfect the whole show. At the end of the show he was too drunk to stand up from his drums. It was pretty amazing, actually.
Click to expand...
It was Lynchburg. At the time it was a Holiday Inn. I know it is no longer, but I don't know what it became. It would have been 1975 that I played there. I played there with a couple of different bands from 1972 to 1975.
 
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