How can a drummer be awesome if they're not keeping time? It's sort of their only job, right?
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Things that surprise you about other musicians...
- Thread starter glocke1
- Start date
How can a drummer be awesome if they're not keeping time? It's sort of their only job, right?
I don't know, I think keeping time is everyone's job in a band really. Drummer's need to keep time certainly but they do a lot of other things like accent the chord changes, build tension and release, add dynamic contrast etc.
What I find puzzling but not exactly surprising is how few players I find that don't know how to improvise or refuse to do it. I realize it's something learned but I started doing it so long ago it seems weird to me.
I'm constantly amazed at the level some people consider acceptable. You know, good enough.
What surprises me is the amount of Guitarists who don't understand music theory, intervals, major vs. minor, etc
I play with a very talented Guitarist. The way he explains the Baseline to me is rudimentary; "the first and second dot on the E String", or "go up one fret", then gets frustrated because I moved a half-step towards the bridge, when he meant go down a half step. No biggie, but it's a majority of the people I gig with. Metalheads!
I play with a very talented Guitarist. The way he explains the Baseline to me is rudimentary; "the first and second dot on the E String", or "go up one fret", then gets frustrated because I moved a half-step towards the bridge, when he meant go down a half step. No biggie, but it's a majority of the people I gig with. Metalheads!
First off, my point here isn't to criticize others, so if it looks like thats what Im doing, it isn't.
That said, there are a few things I notice about other musicians that surprise me, in no particular order.
1) Metronomes....the number of people who play instruments that don't use one of these and never have used one is surprising. I get guitar players complaining that they can't feel upbeats naturally. My answer to them is to "get a metronome"...9 times out of 10 I'm met with
2) Ears....Growing up, I had access to tuners, but the teacher I was studying with at the time was adamant about NOT using them. Instead he would reinforce tuning to a piano and using my ears to tune by harmonics. While I have a tuner in my gig bag, to this day i ever so often just ask the piano player or guitar player to throw me a G and I'll use that to tune. Again I get the, and I realize that these guys more than likely cannot tune by ear.
Theres probably other things, but those are the two biggest...
Metronomes and tuners are readily available for free today. Available in almost any cell phone by default. My biggest gripe is the other way, is that when guitarists THINKS they have tuned up to a guitar tuner apparatus, then they turn it off, and starts to play, they're still out of tune and can't hear it.
I have this motto: The second worst thing I know of is people having to tune up (into any device) on stage in front of the audience between two songs. The thing's that is even worse - i e the worst - is when they carry on playing AFTER that and still are out of tune. I e they don't pay attention to their floating tremolos on their Floyd Rose equipped guitars, that must be retuned, touch-up, and retuned again. They haven't got it that while you tune one string, you're pulling the neighboring string out out tune in one go. They simply don't get it, because they have bought the guitar with a locking tremolo JUST because "it stays in tuning when dive bombing" and they think it's their perfect crutch.
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The majority of all these YouTube videos with people flailing away and shredding away, with their Floyd Rose systems are actually out of tune. Especially those "instructional" ones. They either have no clue, or are resting their picking hand palms over the bridge so much that you're pulling the floating bridge down, and DO NOT HEAR IT!
Music teachers (mainly classical) who start all the students off with reading music when they are in elementary school, as if reading music, because it's so important, is developmentally appropriate for kids that young. Think about it: When did you first learn to read a graph? Because written music is a very difficult graph.
You are correct. This is that is not the "Nashville" system. Some call the system of labeling chords with Roman numerals the "Roman System" (not because it was invented by the Romans but because of the numbers) or the "Traditional System" or the "Classical System" or the "Figured Bass System". This is the system I learned as a music major in college.
This. Plus 1000. +Agree, double plus good. Agree. My experience. That's why I favor working with younger cats. I am STILL open. I've even played electronica, and house type music LIVE together with DJ's although I was 48 years old...I have even found out a way to mimick those acid "Roland 303 Bass" lines on a fretless bass plugged into some distortion and envelope filter...people looks at me, as I was crazy or insane.
Because everything surrounding classical music is written ???
I got better rythm once I started to read music in a more involved way. It isn't that difficult.
^This.
We supported a (cover) band tonight that has been around for about 30 years. Our guitarist knows them from back then and said they are still playing the same songs. Some of them sounded particularly tired because they have no doubt played them at every gig. Add to that they didn't always play the correct chords or capture the feel of the song and it didn't make for inspiring listening. We stayed for about half their set before we hit the road, had they been better (a lot better) I would certainly have stayed until the end.
They complained that we had played half their set and were struggling to fill their set with songs we hadn't already played. Had they shown us their setlist before we played we could have skipped those songs as we have enough to do more than 2 gigs before we need to start repeating any. We like a bit of variety and rotate songs so we don't get too complacent (or bored)!
Kind of a red flag to me, even when playing in metal bands, if someone only likes metal. Most of the people I play with like a big variety of music. When my metal band went on tour, we listened mainly to rap/hip-hop in the van. A couple of us also play in folk bands.
But that numbering system isn't from Nashville. It's much older.
It helps at a long rehearsal. Also live, I play better if I'm relaxed beforehand. There are degrees of stoned. Obviously nobody is going to play better if they're so stoned they can't stand up.
It's the Roman Numeral system. Or traditional system. Whichever, it's quite old in classical.
Most likely.
Ugh, I can't stand playing with people like that. Nothing personal, and often they're great people, but it's just too frustrating to me. Even the guitarist in my band who switched over from drums made a huge effort to learn what the actual notes on his instrument were, and how to describe a riff in actual notes and/or "half step" or "whole step." Also "up" means a higher note. Not a lower one. While I can appreciate some folks who play good music despite knowing zero theory, I can't play with them. It's just not enjoyable for me because mentally it's like banging my head against a wall. Easily the single most annoying and surprising thing about other musicians.
I don't expect everyone to have a degree in composition, but I at least expect people I play with to know what I'm talking about if I say "It's in F# minor."
In elementary school.
Sometimes what seems "good enough" to you is someone else's very best effort. All of us were pretty underwhelming at some point.
One from me:
Musicians who don't take care of their instruments. Like who don't do any maintenance whatsoever. Never change strings, never fix problems with their drum kit, leave output jacks loose and constantly causing problems, never clean anything, etc.
I have met several people like this and just don't understand. I get that some people don't have sentimental attachment to their instruments like I do, but even the dudes who view them "as tools" (a mindset I also don't understand) take care of their things, right? Or at least you'd expect that. But it's all too common, it seems, for musicians to just not care about the state of their gear.
Musicians who don't take care of their instruments. Like who don't do any maintenance whatsoever. Never change strings, never fix problems with their drum kit, leave output jacks loose and constantly causing problems, never clean anything, etc.
I have met several people like this and just don't understand. I get that some people don't have sentimental attachment to their instruments like I do, but even the dudes who view them "as tools" (a mindset I also don't understand) take care of their things, right? Or at least you'd expect that. But it's all too common, it seems, for musicians to just not care about the state of their gear.
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