The Paradiddler » drum cover

“All My Life” by Foo Fighters, Drum Cover

Omar — Wed, 26 May 2010 03:01:09 +0000

Welcome to a ‘drum cover’ edition of The Paradiddler! This time around we’ll discuss my cover of Foo Fighter’s “All My Life”.

A lot of time had gone by between covers. I had my drums put away, so I did a lot of thinking, mostly about how I wasn’t playing!

Anyway, I started to make a list of the songs I wanted to cover (eventually). Playing covers, for me, strikes a balance of learning from the pros and making practicing (and playing!) fun.

It was fun to come up with this list because it makes you start preparing in your head how you’re going to play certain parts. Will you play it as originally recorded, or will you add a certain flavor to make it your own? Sometimes that decision may not occur during the planning stages, but during the performance itself.

But let me digress a bit. After I made my list, I decided that I would play “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, by Nirvana. I chose it more for the energy and passion that Dave Grohl exhibited when playing it, and because it’s fairly simple to play since the drum phrasing doesn’t change throughout the song. But that simplicity is deceiving.

When I sat down to play this song, for some reason my timing was all over the place! It’s my favorite Nirvana song, the energy is off the charts, but I just wasn’t feeling it.

So while I was dealing with this frustration, I scrolled through my ‘set list’ and I found the Foo Fighters’ “All My Life”. Another favorite of mine (plus another Dave Grohl connection), I decided to sit down and just play to it, and it felt good right away! It felt very natural right off the bat, and it was loads of fun to play. So I decided then and there that I would publish this cover instead.

My goal is to try to play to the original as close as possible while incorporating a few subtle changes. I like to think of those changes as how the drummer might play the song on another night of a tour. Even though he changes it up, it still sounds like him. I’m just another night on the tour. (See “A Perspective on Drum Covers”)

The main differences between my cover and the original is the splash in the middle of the song (at the end of the second verse), and during the chorus I played the ride cymbal with straight eighth notes, instead of accenting with the bell of the ride. There are other differences both in playing and with the video effects, just to change it up and make it a little more interesting. I’ll let you figure them out!

Something I did differently this time around also is to publish the video before writing the accompanying article (I usually do both simultaneously). I posted the video on a couple of drumming forums so people could see my take on the song, and give me some feedback on my playing. I got some very good feedback, and I may do it this way going forward. I’ll include the links here so you can also benefit from the observations. Of course, you the reader can chime in as well!

So that’s the scoop! Like I said before, if you have comments, suggestions, kudos , leave them here. Happy drumming!
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Girl Gone Bad by Van Halen, Drum Cover

Omar — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 22:51:21 +0000

The Paradiddler coming at you with another drum cover! This time, it's "Girl Gone Bad" from Van Halen's 1984.

This is my favorite Van Halen song. In fact, I believe this is Alex Van Halen's best recording. Although he was always one of the most powerful drummers around, I don't think his drumming stood out sound-wise from Van Halen's debut album all the way to Diver Down. HOWEVER, what a difference an album makes! It seems like Alex re-invented himself for the 1984 album. The drums were way more pronounced and up front; and those bass drums! What power. Those Ludwigs never sounded so good!

There are some things going on in this song that, at my developmental stage, I can't quite reproduce yet. For example, the triplet ride pattern he plays at the beginning and after the band jams halfway through the song, was just too much for my forearm to take. So I compensated by changing the pattern to two singles plus a triple ride pattern. 'The bar remains the same', so to speak, so I think it works out ok. I think it's a pretty creative alternative, actually (as I pat myself on the back)! Also, at the end of the song when everybody's jamming out, Alex alternates his left foot between the hi-hat and the left bass pedal. I stayed clear of that (for now) because it would just throw me off. But with all the cymbal noise, I think I could get away with it .

Van Halen is in my top five favorite bands of all time (hmm, I smell another article in my near future!). And Alex Van Halen is definitely one of my favorite drummers. I am very glad I could play some semblance of this song, because it just rocks!

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“Future Times/Rejoice” by Yes, Drum Cover

Omar — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 05:44:38 +0000

Here's the latest drum cover from The Paradiddler: "Future Times/Rejoice" by Yes.

I haven't updated my 'Artists' page as of late, but one of the drummers I wanted to make sure made my initial list was Alan White. He's one of my favorite drummers, very unassuming, and to me, the best timekeeper in rock. At least earlier in his career, he played with so much power, but it was always controlled. I listen to such songs as "The Gates of Delirium" and "Sound Chaser", especially live, and I wonder how he had so much stamina. The guy was an animal - I love it!

I always thought that Tormato was one of Yes' most underrated LP's. It sounds somewhat unpolished, yet all members at the time (Jon Anderson, Steve Howe, Chris Squire, Rick Wakeman, and Alan White) were at such musical peaks during this period. There are some musical compositions so beautiful and complex that it might be the best 'prog rock' LP of all time, at least from a compositional aspect. Yes, I know others may disagree, maybe thinking that these guys were just way too self-indulgent, and as far as rock goes, this was way out to the side. To that I say: "Bravo for self-indulgence!" Songs like "Madrigal" and "Onward" have some of the most beautiful compositions in all of rock (if we could actually classify these songs as 'rock'). Some of the music on this LP (or CD) transcends rock - they are masterpieces of music.

Which brings me to "Future Times/Rejoice". This to me is a nightmare to master. There seem to be several time changes in the middle of a bar, and I'm very hard pressed to catch them even after several takes. At times I'm trying to count certain bars so I don't lose my place, and I almost lose it entirely a couple of times. But I held on, and I think, for the difficulty of this piece, although not perfect, I'm satisfied.

As I do more and more of these covers, I'm trying to vary the difficulty and style of song. My favorite band of all is Rush, and I could cover a bunch of their songs. But that route is too obvious (I will cover more of their songs, of course, but it has to be somewhat spectacular). Yes is my second favorite band, and I may do a couple more covers from them eventually. But I may venture into Spanish rock, heavy metal (nothing offensive though, I promise!), and even jazz. Gotta make it interesting!

Let me know what you think!
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Drum Channel’s Air Drumming Contest with Chad Smith

Omar — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 00:43:21 +0000

If you've read my three-part series on my origins (The Paradiddler, Origins), then you'll already know that, at least for the moment, I'm mostly a self-taught drummer, and I learned how to play by air drumming. You also surmised that I'm a big fan of Neil Peart, Rush drummer extraordinaire. So when DrumChannel.com came out with the "Chad Smith Air Drumming Contest on YouTube", well, you know I had to enter!

I chose a song I'm pretty familiar with, since I've been hearing it since it came out in 1982 - "Subdivisions" by Rush. In real life, I'll need a couple more drums and cymbals to play it to my satisfaction, and that's where air drumming comes in!

For now, I'm a pretty good air drummer (if I must say so myself!). My real drum playing, at least by my standards, has much room for improvement, which is a nice way to say 'it's all uphill from here'! I've gotten a hold of some drum instruction videos and documents on improving your play, and will be reviewing them extensively in the near future and letting you know what I think.

You can click on the previous link to go to DrumChannel's air drumming challenge. Of course, anyone can enter (the details are there), but if you're not, then view my video! The winner is the one with the most views by July 15, 2009 at 3pm EST. And of course, for your convenience (or mine!), I've included the video here. Tell all your YouTube-viewing friends! And thanks for viewing. Let me know what you think as well!

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Carry On Wayward Son by Kansas, Drum Cover

Omar — Wed, 27 May 2009 12:55:15 +0000

This edition of The Paradiddler features my latest cover, "Carry On Wayward Son" by Kansas.

This has always been one of my favorite classic rock songs. I pretty much learned how to 'air drum' this one a long time ago (as I'm sure many people had!). It was lots of fun to play.

There are certain passages in the song that I took the liberty of enhancing just a little. Not that it needed any enhancing, but I wanted to make it my own without sounding too different from the original (I will be posting an article regarding my philosophy on drum covers in a subsequent article).

I've also started to include a few different camera angles and special effects that I hadn't done before. I always want to move forward, getting better every time, be it playing or video production. Of course, the playing takes precedence over everything, so that will never be compromised. I did have quite a fit with saving this video. I used Microsoft's Movie Maker (Vista) to edit the video. In the dreamy section of the video (you'll know what I mean when you see it) I included the 'Spin 360' effect, which would rotate the image full circle. This particular effect would prevent the final video from being saved! It took me a little while to figure this out, but I did. I think the video came out pretty good anyways!

Well enjoy the video, and as always, please let me know what you think! We're all here to learn, but mostly it's to have fun! Enjoy.

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Dreamline, Snakes and Arrows Live, Rush Drum Cover

Omar — Mon, 04 May 2009 01:46:46 +0000

Omar Alvarado, The Paradiddler, coming at you yet again with another drum cover. This time it's a song from my favorite band, Rush, and the song is "Dreamline".

There are a few versions of this song floating around, several of them live. Of course, we have the original from Rush's Roll the Bones record, back in 1991. I've always thought that that recording was a little 'tinny' for my taste. There've been several versions since then. Possibly my favorite one is from the Different Stages live CD. The snare drum Neil Peart had going there was so 'poppy', but very powerful.

However, I decided to go with the latest version from the Snakes & Arrows Live CD, because, well, it's the latest! I think it's more of a challenge to play something that has come out fairly recently, instead of something that has been out for many years, enough for people to digest how it was played. That makes for an easier imitation, if one were to go that route. I decided to choose the route less heard.

Now there's a little history with this song with me as well. Way back in January of this year, I entered an on-line drumming contest at FreeDrumLessons.com. I chronicled the whole experience in the article "Education of The Paradiddler". The gist of it was that "Dreamline" was the song I was going to submit. The song ended up being more difficult to play than I thought, I wasn't familiar with Movie Maker, and I ended up submitting another song instead that I only practiced once! It was better than my versions of "Dreamline" because there was no pressure.

Even though I didn't win the drum-off, I learned a lot from it. Recently FreeDrumLessons.com invited its members to submit anything they like, just for show (no prizes). The first thing that popped into my mind was to revisit playing "Dreamline". So I tried it, and after a few sessions, here's the result! I hope you like it, and as always, comments welcome (good and bad!).

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Toxicity, System of a Down Cover

Omar — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 06:46:16 +0000

Omar Alvarado, The Paradiddler, coming to you with my latest drum cover, "Toxicity" by System of a Down.

I try to approach each song I choose to cover (as of this post there haven't been that many yet) as a means to learn new things, and to challenge myself to play as closely and faithfully to the original as possible. I consider this to be the best way to respect the artist, instead of putting too much of my own spin. I may add a thing or to, either because I can't resist because it's too cool, or because it adds to the song while still seeming like the original drummer.

The first time I heard this song, I definitely determined that I wanted to play it, and figured out in my head how I would do it. But one thing's air drumming it on the steering wheel of your car, and another is figuring out all of the ghost noting! I have a newfound respect for John Dolmayan. He is a great drummer. My obsession for trying to play as closely to the original as possible drove me nuts, since the ghost noting in this song is prevalent throughout, and that's not a skill I've developed to my satisfaction yet. After many (many!) takes, I got it to a version that, at my skill level, I can live with (for now!) and post for mass consumption.

So here it is. Enjoy, and of course, I welcome all comments!

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An Invite from The Paradiddler

Omar — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 18:25:36 +0000

Hi all! Welcome to another edition of The Paradiddler.

In recent weeks, I’ve been observing more closely my playing in hopes of improving it. We all want to improve, right? It’s so gratifying when you’re able to figure out something new, or nail that part that’s had you banging your head (instead of the skins) for so long. Me? I’m just trying to get my groove on.

Maybe this applies to many of you, but I just don’t have the time to practice as much as I want to. If it was up to me, I’d be playin’ all day (or ‘all night’, as Peter Criss sang on the classic “Beth”)! That’s one whammy against me. Another one is that I spent many years without touching a drum set. Many years. I air-drummed so much that I was convinced I could just sit down and play. Well, any time I had a chance to sit behind a drum set at a music store I was rudely awakened. It’s not that I ever thought that playing drums was easy. That’s what ignorant folk say! I just felt that I understood them enough that I could at least play the songs I was familiar with.

But of course, there’s more to it than that. For starters, kits at a store are not positioned to your preference, so since I had no clue what my preferences were, I was, well, lost! Also, I had no sense of bounce, so playing was erratic. I may have been playing rudiments, but only because it was in the song I knew, not because I knew I was playing them. And oh yeah! I never took lessons (gads).

Anyways, I’ll write another article soon about how I got to where I am now, but suffice it to say that I now have my kit, and I love it, and I still don’t play it enough! Plus the fact that I refuse to play it after dark (and that’s yet another story), well, the ‘end is listless’. But since I do have my drums, I play as much as I can, trying to develop a groove, but I have a ways to go yet, for sure. That’s where you come in…

I recently recorded myself playing “Limelight” by Rush (my favorite band). Any Rush song is challenging (heck, any song is challenging!). I’d like you all to critique my playing. That’s right, I’m exposing my wounds for you all to heal. I wasn’t looking for perfection, but I just wanted to view myself so I can check myself (‘before I wreck myself’). And by the way, everyone should record themselves so you can see your flaws, and work to correct them. You might not ever know you’re doing something wrong unless either someone’s watching you, or you’re watching yourself! I’ve definitely noted some things I’m doing wrong, habits I’m developing that I need to correct, so I’m working on it.

Lemme get you started. One thing that’s important is some good headphones! I noted that my timing was off at times, and it was due to the not-so-good headphones. It doesn’t matter how much you turn up the volume, if you have really cheap headphones with weak sensitivity, your drum sound may overmatch what you’re hearing, hence the problem with timing. I’m going to go for the Metrophone headphones, since they include a built-in metronome, and I can kill two birds with one stone, per se. That’s one thing that will improve my playing. (You can obtain these and other music goodies from the music affiliates in the sidebar, if you're reading this at the web site).

Although this has less to do with technique, another thing I need to do is to add a dedicated ride cymbal. Currently in my kit I have a Sabian 18” crash/ride cymbal. I like its sound as a crash, but for me, its ride sound leaves something to be desired. It just sounds like a crash being used as a ride, instead of having a distinct ride sound. That being the case, I’m concentrating on when to crash the cymbal during ride beats, and at least for me, that’s too much to concentrate on! Once I add a ride (oh, and maybe a china as well ), I will be able to focus more on the song that on the kit.

Anyway, how about you? You have any suggestions? Please watch and let me know! It’s a free-for-all, and maybe others can see your suggestions and take something to their kit that they can improve on. I hope you enjoy it!

Interesting? Then pass it along!

Education of The Paradiddler

Omar — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 23:34:47 +0000

Welcome to another edition of The Paradiddler.

Recently I partook in an online drumming contest. This contest was hosted by FreeDrumLessons.com, and basically the premise was that you could submit a video of yourself playing to a song, or editing the drums entirely out of a song and supplying the drumming yourself. There were several categories, including rock, metal, jazz, etc. I saw this as an opportunity to showcase my skills. It didn’t come out exactly as planned, however!

Let me digress a bit. Although I love drumming, there were many years where I didn’t have any drum set at all. I just recently purchased a drum kit, where for over 20 years (since I was a teenager) I didn’t have one at all! So you can imagine how rusty I was trying to play and record myself and submit something somewhat respectable. But I viewed this as an opportunity to start a timeline of progress for myself, to put myself under a little bit of pressure, and see what came out of it.

I’m not a seasoned drummer by any means. I’m sort of like that college basketball coach who was never good enough to join the team as a young lad, but could coach basketball and even win some tournaments. Or the sportswriter who, similarly, was never good enough to play high school football, but is such a student of the game that later becomes one of the most respected sources on the subject. I’ll let you, the reader, determine for yourself if I know my stuff drumming-wise (or, at least, that I can write about it), and I’ll keep writing about it, but at the same time now that I have the equipment it’s time to play!

During that time of ‘no drums’, I did spend a lot of time, especially from a video sense, observing how drummers, well, drum. Drum and cymbal placement, grips, fluidity, styles, brands, equipment, on and on. Let me tell you, I’m an incredible air drummer! I’m sure all of us are. But let me tell you, that actually was a valuable thing to me. Every chance I got I went to the music stores and tried out some of the drums there, just to see if I could actually play what I “aired”, and many times it was pretty good – considering I had nothing to practice on.

Lots of what I “aired” was Neil Peart, so I was very familiar (at least in my head) with how he played a lot of his songs. Fast forward a few years, and we now arrive at the FreeDrumLessons.com Drum-Off. Well here was a chance for me to put a static stamp on my progress, see myself for the first time, and critique at will.

The song I chose for the contest was “Dreamline”, not the original from Rush’s Roll the Bones release, but from their Snakes and Arrows Live CD. Lofty goal for one who hadn’t played so much! But I thought I was familiar enough with the music that I could at least pull off a respectable performance. So while listening to my mp3 player, I recorded myself playing this song three times. Then came the synchronization problems.

Afterwards I viewed the videos, and of course there were flaws, big ones, on all three! I had to borrow the recording equipment because the camera I had wasn’t good enough, so I was a little pressed for time. That was the first mistake: too much pressure on myself. I had to relax! And I didn’t give myself enough time to make a quality recording. I ended up using Microsoft’s Movie Maker program to synchronize the mp3 of the song with the video of myself playing to it. Again, I didn’t give myself ample time to obtain a program that was better at synchronizing the audio with the video.

Not that Movie Maker was all that bad. For the most part, for most users it suffices. But it was difficult for me to fine-tune exactly the point where the songs on both audio and video would be in perfect sync. Since they weren’t, many times it looked (or sounded) like there were two drummers. That won’t win you many drum-offs! The deadline for video submission was looming as well, so my recording and editing options were getting slim.

In the meantime, just for fun, I decided to record myself play a couple of other tunes. One was “Crawl Away” by Tool. I had heard it a few times, and I really like the song, so without ever practicing it before, and to also test the video equipment I was using and its placement, I went ahead and recorded myself playing it. There were several miscues due to the unfamiliarity of not having played it before, but it was fun. I wasn’t playing very hard, especially for a hard rock song, but again, I was just trying to get a feel for the equipment and how I would ultimately position my drums and cymbals for the performance. If you want to see it, I posted it on YouTube at the following link:

"Crawl Away", performed by The Paradiddler

The other song I recorded myself playing was another Rush tune called “Malignant Narcissism”, from their Snakes and Arrows CD. Again, I did it just for fun. After synching the video with the audio, I noticed that, actually, it wasn’t that bad! This song I had practiced before, although probably not nearly enough to submit for a contest (at least to my standards). But the synchronization between audio and video was pretty good, and I didn’t really lose time during the song. It actually came out better than my three “Dreamline” recordings! After looking at it, I decided to submit this video instead.

I wasn’t expecting to win the competition or even be a runner-up (as a matter of fact, neither did I win, nor was I a runner-up!). My main reason, actually, was to let people know a little about me, and hopefully they would take an interest in TheParadiddler.com (I’m so selfish!). Having others view my playing was just a bonus, and an enjoyable one, and I actually give thanks to FreeDrumLessons.com for providing this vehicle for exposure (and fun!).

This experience has taught me (or reminded me about) a few things (humility for one!). Seriously though, some of those things are:

The need to practice
The better you know your recording equipment and editing software, the less likely you will short-change your performance
Give yourself time to get it right
Don’t expect anything except to learn and get better – anything additional is a bonus
Relax, and have fun!

Yes, even if it sounds bad in the end, just have fun! That’s what The Paradiddler always says. So until the next online drum-off, practice, practice, practice! And enjoy the ride.

Oh! I almost forgot. For your viewing pleasure (and critical eye too!), here’s my entry to the drum-off. Feel free to comment on what you think. There will be better recordings in the future, and I’ll enjoy every minute of the journey.

Interesting? Then pass it along!