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Timing is everything.

I couldnt hear it at first , i still think it goes missing in lots of places, so i can only assume thats the way the guys mixed, not because he wasnt playing it. so i was arguing what are you keeping time to if you cant hear it?

A decent drummer shouldn't need to actually hear a beat to keep it. He just knows where it is.
For that matter, same goes for a bass-player...
 
oddly, thats not the issue here. what you say is correct. But we got stuck on pedantry instead of just playing through the song. we didnt get that far, lol. he's telling me to keep my timing on the h/h when i am saying i can't hear the h/h. In any case, the irony of the situation is that we only had one spot to disagree on, the final break and the count in. We both started to count from different spots and came to the same start. I am not here to vent or disparage my " friend". Everyone is different i accept that. Partly my fault, I accept that. I am really here to learn and see what the actual dynamics are. H/H, side stick or bass drum, which one is appropriate.
 
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oddly, thats not the issue here. what you say is correct. But we got stuck on pedantry instead of just playing through the song. we didnt get that far, lol. he's telling me to keep my timing on the h/h when i am saying i can't hear the h/h. In any case, the irony of the situation is that we only had one spot to disagree on, the final break and the count in. We both started to count from different spots and came to the same start. I am not here to vent or disparage my " friend". Everyone is different i accept that. Partly my fault, I accept that. I am really here to learn and see what the actual dynamics are. H/H, side stick or bass drum, which one is appropriate.
Let me put another perspective on this. It had nothing to do with us playing the song. We never had issues playing together. It was a disagreement on an MP3 song and what i was supposed to follow for timing. He internalised the issue where as i am happy to have been proven wrong.
 
I was a drummer long before I was a bass player and I hear hi hats in songs that sound like clicks all the time. A drummer can change the sound of his hats by foot pressure, where they hit the cymbals, how they're mic'd, compressed, material, etc., same things that control bass tone can be applied to drum tone. Also, the bass drum doesn't always start on the 1.
 
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I was a drummer long before I was a bass player and I hear hi hats in songs that sound like clicks all the time. A drummer can change the sound of his hats by foot pressure, where they hit the cymbals, how they're mic'd, compressed, material, etc., same things that control bass tone can be applied to drum tone. Also, the bass drum doesn't always start on the 1.
Yea Black, i have no issues actually playing with a drummer. Playing live i dont have issues hearing stuff. This was all over a 20yr old recording where the h/h is mixed so far down i couldnt hear it initially.
 
cb3uk. there WAS a high hat before it got mixed so damn low. i dont like the idea of blowing my ear drums out to hear a high hat. Yes i now agree its there to some extent. All he had to say was " its there so far down in the mix you can hardly hear it". I couldnt hear it at first , i still think it goes missing in lots of places, so i can only assume thats the way the guys mixed, not because he wasnt playing it. so i was arguing what are you keeping time to if you cant hear it? so its a case of chalk and cheese, and he's taken offence. i am willing to admit my mistakes, but why do people internalise it so much. I mean it was SOO SOO damn important to win an arguement you were having with yourself, lol. people are strange
Fact is, he's the drummer, he was correct, you may not be able to hear it but he can. Just call him up and tell him you were wrong, he was right. Everyone's sensitivity is set differently. If you want to keep playing with him, owning up that you were wrong can go a long way.
 
poopie a brick, there is a high hat there. Its so so so low in the mix, you breath and you miss it. I am a heavy breather, lol.
I agree, its a rather trivial matter to get all hung up about.
So as a bass player i have conditioned my brain to follow the bass drum. What is this idea about following the high hat? Especially if you cant hear the damn thing.
The drummer controls timing. He wrote you that letter because you are a giant red flag. He's a pretty smart guy to get out now.
 
Ok so my buddy drummer comes over to my place to rehearse a couple of songs. One song in particular, whitney Houston I will always love you. We have a very talented young girl who really can nail it. Anyway we wanted to get the timing right when we rehearse with her. Ist issue, i put a click track to it to measure what it is we are doing. Ist problem, it was obviously recorded on tape and the timing moves around a bit. After about an hr or so i have it all straightened out. Then my mate starts rambling on about "he keeps the time off the high hat". If you listen carefully, there is no high hat only a side stick click. Then he wants to argue that hes right and i dont know what i am talking about. "Ok, i hear what you say, but there is no high hat on the recording".
He just wrote me a letter to say he doesnt want to associate with me anymore.
*** just happened? Look, I am the first to admit i dont know it all, far from it, but is he talking in tongues, lol?

Must not have been that deep of a relationship with your drummer. I’ve always found that in most cases doing dead on copies of highly polished, highly engineered recordings with a lot more tracks than you have players in your ensemble, played by the best musicians available, is somewhat like chasing at windmills.

To get hung up over something so trivial over what technique is carrying the beat on the recording is absurd. The important thing in your case is not what is on the record, it’s way more important how your drummer is going to keep meter in your band.

Lighten up there fella. Let the guy do his job. Now, if the guy can’t do the job, that’s another ball of wax.
 
Element Zero and https://www.talkbass.com/members/hardnheavy.261763/ covered it for you: hi-hats = clock! if you don't audibly hear the hats = you hear them in your head. hats are important to hear (audibly or in your head) because they tell you exactly where the downbeat is (1 count)...without having to play the downbeat! it's pretty basic stuff and most bass players react and play to the hats without thinking about it.

you not hearing the hats in a recording doesn't mean much --- your drummer did! that's what counts! ;)
 
Another tragic death by hi hat.
Another tragic chunk of time wasted to Whitney Houston. Spending so much time and energy debating something so stupid was your first problem. Im angry with myself i spent any time reading this. :vomit: just find a pocket and sit in it. who cares if theres hi hat on the recording, YOU'RE playing it now. Geez.
 
I agree, its a rather trivial matter to get all hung up about.

Sounds to me like you were probably being a dick about it while it was happening so he blew you off.

yeah that's my response. It's probably not a reaction to the subject of the argument, but the behavior and attitude you brought to the disagreement. The drummer has probably encountered others who would rather be argue and be right than drop ego and cooperate smoothly, and knows where that ends up.

Playing nicely with others is a musical skill in my book - right up there with hitting the correct downbeat.
Something worth practicing, especially if you are not good at it.
 

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