Drummer Nikhil Talwalkar is currently 20-years-old and based in NYC. He has played with bands including Anal Stabwound, Bludgeoned, Malignancy, Putridity, Cerebral Effusion, Relics of Humanity, Dead and Dripping, Indecent Excision, and Theurgy! This kid absolutely rips… We can’t wait to see just how far he goes.
Nikhil Links:
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@nikhilt9671
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/_nikhilt
Drum-Cam: Malignancy @ Mutilated Fest 2025 Brooklyn, NY: https://youtu.be/NPcCON00KoM
Anal Stabwound: https://analstabwound.bandcamp.com
Nikhil Talwalkar Interview:
SDM: How old were you when you started playing?
Nikhil: I started playing drums when I was around 3 years old. I joined my local School of Rock when I was 7 and remained there for 10 years. When I was 12, I started learning guitar and found an interest in death metal through the internet with bands like Cannibal Corpse, Necrophagist, and Brain Drill. Learning metal drumming was a means to supplement what I was writing on guitar. There are some truly terrible recordings of the 12-year-old-me incarnation of Anal Stabwound (my current one-man project) sitting on my hard drive. Maybe I will release those one day, haha!
SDM: Did you play in a school band or any drum corps?
Nikhil: Yes! I played in jazz band for all 4 years of high school. Being forced to practice sight-reading and improvisation was a very rewarding challenge. I also played percussion in Wind Ensemble my senior year which helped a lot with my reading.
SDM: Who are your top 5 metal influences?
Nikhil: I’ve found the most inspiration listening to Lille Gruber, Mike Heller, Eihar Unamuno, Matt Kilner, and Mike Hamilton.
SDM: Who are some of your other favorites?
Nikhil: Too many! Lyle Cooper, Florent Duployer, Gabriel Valcazar, Elliott Hoffman, Davide Billia, KC Howard, Alfie Vienneau, Jon Engman, Daniel Osborn, Alex Cohen, Daniel Smoo, Polwach Beokhaimook, Jordan Varela… I’m sure I’ll be kicking myself for forgetting some names.
SDM: Let us know 5 bands in your current personal rotation.
Nikhil: The past few months I’ve been listening to a lot of Iniquitous Deeds (Incessant Hallucinations), Internal Suffering (Awakening of the Rebel, Chaotic Matrix), Deeds of Flesh (Path of the Weakening, Reduced to Ashes, Crown of Souls), Cerebral Effusion (last 3 full lengths), and Unbirth (Fleshforged Columns of Deceit).
SDM: What do you do to warm up before a show?
Nikhil: I like to start warming up at least half an hour before a set. I’ll spend 5-10 minutes on my practice pad playing single strokes (16ths at around 150 BPM) with as little tension in my hands and arms as possible. I know I can move on when it feels like the motion is carrying itself and I’m relaxed enough that I can feel the hits resonating up through my arms. I’ll then throw on a metronome starting at 280 BPM and switch off between 4 bars of quarter note triplets and 4 bars of eighth notes, increasing up to 300. Some of the Malignancy material is in the 320-340 range, so for those gigs I’ll do a more dedicated hyper-blast warmup. For that, I start at 160 BPM (320 half time) and play quarter notes in 6/4, gradually adding a groupings of 4 16th notes at the end until the full bar is 16ths. I’ll repeat this until I get up to 170/340 BPM.
SDM: Do you read music? Whether you answered yes or no, please tell us how it might have affected your playing.
Nikhil: Yes I do! I can confidently say that reading music allows me to transcribe, conceptualize, and internalize material much faster. The shorthand I use for charting songs uses traditional notation. On a more artistic level, I feel that being able to read and write music helps me with compositional awareness. Being able to write out or see a section on paper helps me to both capture as much detail as possible and to be able to zoom out and focus on the larger form without worrying about having to hold all of the detail in my mind.
SDM: Can you tell us about the gear you use?
Nikhil: Here’s what I typically use…
Pearl Export series kit: 8”, 10”, 12”, 16”, 22” kick
DW Collectors Series Titanium Snare: 14″ x 6.5″
Sabian AAX X-Plosion Hats 14”
Paiste Blast China 14”
Zildjian A Custom Fast Crash 16”
Sabian Paragon Splash 8”
Sabian AAX Dark Crash 16”
Sabian AAX Raw Bell Dry Ride 21”
Sabian AAX Holy China 17”
Trick Bigfoot Pro-1v w/ Footblaster triggers and Axis beaters
Roland TM-2 trigger module (sens 28, thresh 7, retrig cancel 5)
SDM: If you could give one piece of advice to younger drummers, it would be…
Nikhil: Your technique should be efficient enough that you can dedicate a substantial part of your focus to thinking about composition and form rather than just surviving the song. It is nearly impossible to think like a composer when you are straining yourself or not playing confidently. This is so especially important with extreme metal where surviving the song is often at first a feat in itself, but also because drums are the instrument that both outline the structure and play off of it. You, as a drummer, are responsible for understanding the composition well enough to be able to effectively communicate it to an audience. This matters even more when you are hired to play someone else’s music. Putting this into practice starts by being more mindful while you are playing, which can be extremely difficult if you are used to sets being a blur of adrenaline. Take mental notes of where you are straining yourself, try to hear how it affects the song on a larger scale, and practice hearing ideas in your head before you play them. The goal is to get to a level where you are relaxed enough that you have enough mental bandwidth not occupied by pure physicality. This way you can not only think of an idea, but think of several, and be able to argue with yourself in real time to choose the best one given the context of the entire song. If you are playing music that has absolutely no improvisation, this still applies—your time-feel and articulations should be looked at with the same level of scrutiny. Love the music enough to care!
SDM: Who gave the best live performance you’ve ever seen?
Nikhil: A time in recent memory where I was blown away was seeing Krallice at Maryland Deathfest this year. It was one of the most captivating performances I’ve seen—Colin playing synth with his left hand and percussion with his right was unreal, and closing with Crystalline Exhaustion… a true experience!
SDM: Aside from drumming, what else do you like to do?
Nikhil: Programming has been a source of great inspiration for me recently. I’m currently finishing up a sandbox-style digital modular synthesizer, something that has consumed much of my life over the past few months, haha. A bit difficult to describe without a demonstration but I’ll be showcasing it online soon! This semester I’ve also been getting back into playing jazz guitar and taking lessons which has been great!
