LOOKING AT ME LOOKING AT ME LOOKING AT...

When my brother decided he was going to buy his three year old son his first drumset I thought WHY?? Thuth is when I first started playing the drum(s) I was maybe his age, maybe older, maybe younger.. Mom & dad got me a little toy snare drum with a plastic head and little spring snare on the bottom but it was a drum.. I liked it.. My influence to play drums was the marching band that would march by our house once a year and because my dad (being a teacher) was friendly with the music teacher, he would march the band by our house for marching practice so I got to see them play.. I was, however, more interested in the drum majors and their whistle commands.. I think both mom and dad thought for sure I would be the drum major.. By the fifth grade I was old enough to be a drummer, and made that clear that I would be a drummer.. So no one else wanted to be a drummer in my class and that was fine.. I figure they all heard I wanted to play drums and all wanted anything but the drums.. This was one of those times that I was glad everyone really didn't like me much.. By the time I was in junior high I had seen a new way to play the drums, a drumset played by one Mr. Larry Stoll.. Not that he played super flashy or anything it was just the way it sounded.. I started playing ice cream buckets & coffee cans.. I had quite the set.. I played it out on the back porch.. Then in seventh grade I got a drum set for Christmas.. And by the time I was in high school I was getting fairly good at playing it..

When I was in the high school band I went from third chair snare drummer to first by the time I was a sophomore.. Thinking back to the snare drum I used in the school it had the same head from when I first started playing all the way through to graduation.. I never replaced it and am not sure how old the head was, or how many other drummers played on it.. There might be those who would say "well you must not have cared the way the drum sounded" and I say it sounded fine all those years, the top (batter) head was more than likely made when heads were made to last longer than they are today.. The bottom head was never replaced nor were the snares...

I do wonder how I might have fared challenging for the first seat while she was still there, but I didn't know that I could.. I thought it was seniority, older gets the seat until they graduate.. Turns out she would be first seat only one year, she was a senior.. Same with the second seat, but she kind of lost that seat to me after Christmas because she rarely showed for pep band which was fairly important.. And I was never challenged for my first seat at all.. I think all the other drummers were content being where they were.. Second seat drummer would alternate with another kid.. The timpany player was quite content being where he was, and he was good at it..

After graduating I was after being in a rock band. And it took three years to have that come true.. Though I was in a band when I was a senior, we never gigged.. Then the guitarist from that band started another band and asked if I wanted to join.. That was a no brainer but that band would eventually fold with only maybe three practices.. Then another guitarist from the band that was together while I was in school asked if I wanted to get into his band.. I really didn't want to because the other guy had me in his band, but the other guy assured me that they had talked and he oked me playing with them.. So the week after Memorial day 1984 I went to play for this other guy.. His brother was learning bass and his friend was learning guitar.. Great a four piece band and half the members were just learning to play.. We played and sounded alright. I wasn't excited because I figured we might be a year or even two from being able to play a gig.. But to my surprise we played in October and a few more times and got pretty good fairly quick.. We should be getting better we practiced hours a day.. I mean I was used to practicing for hours.. Many hours a day.. And I had developed my own "style".. Style if you want to call it that.. I could play loud.. I mean loud.. very loud.. I raised the drums up, after the first gig when I got cramps in my leg, I needed to try something different with my drums.. I raised the seat up to its highest setting and the drums as well.. I had watched or seen drummers in pictures and the drummer from the Police looked like he all but stood up while playing.. I thought I'd give that a shot.. I had never had a cramp in my legs before that night and I never wanted that to happen again.. Playing that way I raised the drums way up.. Another reason for raising the drums up I would have less angle on the stick on the head and that would lessen the heads being dented and therefor weakened by the sicks.. The sticks would stop being broken towards the top and begin being broken in the middle, and sometimes from the inside out..

The loudness would start to be my trademark (I guess) I played rim shots on all the drums.. Every drum set an the right angle to receive the stick on it and the rim simultaneously producing a sound upwards of twice as loud and with less effort..

I think I played loud to cover up the fact that I really wasn't that good.. I had many shortcomings, but was just ready to force my ability.. By the time I was out of that band I was practicing a new technique.. Moving the cymbals to overlap each other I was able to play the ride cymbal and a second cymbal to play sixteenth notes with one hand.. Then moving a cymbal over the high hat cymbal I could accomplish the same effect there as well.. Wish I would have thought of that sooner..

When I was in high school I went through what I called a burn out period when I stopped playing the drums one summer.. That was an odd feeling to have, but I started playing again and everything was just fine.. A year after leaving the band I was in for five years I quit playing the drums again and this time it seems to be permanent.. With nearly no desire to play.. I keep the drums but haven't had that feeling to set them up.. It just.... stopped being fun..


BH