Drumming for The shadow of Ketil Vestrum Einarsen

I think there is this Idea that all ones ideas should be these isolated Icebergs of immaculate beauty and artistic clarity. I wish it was like that. I am a lot simpler than that. Im more of a creative plumber than anything else. A lot of my computertime nowadays seems to be spent chatting away aimlessly with either Ketil (Vestrum Einarsen) or Jacob (Holm-lupo) in Norway. We bounce ideas and snippets of songs. Trying to figure out where we are going with his whole music thing. The other day Jacob sent me a link to the first UK album.

The dreaded 80s octoban

I hadnt heard it since the early 90s. I was surprised to hear how extremely dated it sounded. Bill Bruford was doing his early rototom stuff and it just had that weird feel and sound to it. Another thing that is really interesting about Rototoms is that sound pretty awful acoustically but record really well...When recording ideas for Ketils album Im letting all of these influences, sounds and ideas bleed in. Ive consciously broken up my playing using very few cymbals. I very seldom hit single hits on the snare drum and I avoid the 2 & 4. This opens up for using small tight drums that cut thru and are tonal and sharp....remembering my conversation with Jacob about UK I decided to get rid of the Hihat and throw in a 12" Rototom there instead. I do all the 8 note stuff with shakers and tambourines instead so that it can be edited sharper for effect.

A tambourine pile

Yesterday I recorded the drums for the third track on the album...weirdly enough called #3 for the timebeing. I started thinking about my childhood and the drummers I liked and as a kid I loved Duran Duran. Roger Taylor was my favorite drummer. He always looked like he was struggling. But always overdubbed these cool accents on rototoms.

One of my childhood heroes with a rototom.

The track starts with a really quiet opening section so I decided to do something extreme for a prog song....played brushes. I love the sound even though I am always struggling when recording. It has to have that feel. Then I started thinking of another of my favorite drummers Stewart Copeland and brought out one of my Octobans and built the 16th note rhythms around that configuration. As I am avoiding the snare on the 2 and 4 I built a sort of tambourine pile on the hihat stand that plays that part. 

So it all came from hearing a bit of UK and thinking about what drummers I liked as a kid. 

Today Ill be working on a new Tom Doncourt track and the Akaba album will be mastered at Cutting room.

NP: Björk - Biophilia

(Drumming and) Manipulating time like the chunky kid in Harry Potter.

I have played drums for 30 years now and its still terribly fun to do but somewhere along the way (probably around 1998) I realized that I probably wasnt going to be "the drummer" or end up on the cover of Modern drummer. I was never really that great and I always preferred playing with bands and music I liked. Around that time I also bought my first keyboard and my awareness and focus started to moved beyond my battered old Sonor phonic plus kit.

When we recorded Make Believe with Pineforest Crunch at EMI studios in Skärmarbrink, Stockholm.
I was talking to the engineer, the legendary Pontus Olsson and told him.

"My dream is to be a studiomusician and play drums on recordings"

He promptly solo´d a very odd and slightly off fill and commented.

"So...you want to be a studiodrummer, eh? Well...that fill wont help"

At the end of this year I have been drumming on a bunch of different albums and I must say that it is really fun. I like combining drumkits, cymbals and different drumheads. Creating combinations. My focus has obviously changed a lot. I think a lot about how the drums will fit in the final production more than how to showcase my chops (which are few and far between) in the most flamboyant way possible.

Another thing I really enjoy is overdubbing percussion. There is so much to do when it comes to percussion on recordings. It is very similar to keyboards in a way. Just by adding one hit you can change the atmosphere and feel of a song. By adding 16th notes you can create an illusion of the track being faster and quarternotes will probably make it feel "heavy". Manipulating time. Like Magic. Like the chunky kid in Harry Potter. Or Gandalf. Or Doctor Who. Or Richard Dawkins. Like the smart guy in the wheelchair with the weird boxy voice. Manipulating time.  

Here is a little film of me adding some Rototoms to a Carl Hasselrot track. The idea is that Im playing a bunch of different phrases so that he can move them around as he likes. Just to give the track a bit of a push....when needed.

Rototoms are also really interesting is that they sound so much better when you back off from them and get a bit of room but sound horrible and flat while you are playing them. Also I was a big Miami Vice fan as a kid.

Have a great monday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t615AFnapEU