Subrick's Picks: A look At Up & Coming Drummers – Pick 3
Written by: Richard “Subrick” Lowell
Creatures of the night, are you prepared for the feast? Subrick here once again with more picking to do. Thankfully it isn’t picking of the nose, or of the ass, as that would be gross. Before we get into the video I’ve chosen, I’d like to give you my brief thoughts on the Dream Theater drummer audition videos. Despite my hatred of reality television, these 20 to 25 minute clips were very well put together, and made me interested in who the new drummer will be (hint hint: everyone and their dog knows it's Mike Mangini). Something that I noticed, as well as a lot of other people I’ve talked to, was that the 2nd episode featured very little of Derek Roddy’s audition. Derek himself gave the reason for this, being the audio of his audition was corrupt. That’s why the few seconds we actually see of D-Rod playing with Dream Theater is very rough in the audio department. I think the one thing that could come out of this is that younger drummers who see this clip and have never heard of Mangini, Lang, Roddy or Wildoer (and the others that auditioned), could see Derek as being inferior to everyone else they auditioned. Unlikely, but still possible. Anyway, onto the video of the week.
For your chance to be featured, all you have to do is post a video of you drumming to YouTube, Vimeo or whatever video site you prefer, and embed the link on this website in the SD Videos section. Nothing more, nothing less, but you do need to be a registered member of our site to post.
There are three categories on which I base my selections: Playing Ability, Production Value, and Kit Sound. All three are pretty straight forward, but here’s what I specifically look for with each category.
Playing Ability: I look to see if a player is technically sound; timing is good, endurance and power are up to par, among other, more miniscule things.
Production Value: I prefer to watch video from a good quality camera, or studio quality. By studio quality, I don’t mean the greatest production sound ever recorded. I classify studio quality as a drumming performance recorded with microphones and/or triggers. Electronic kits are very much encouraged (especially when using less conventional samples). Now, if you have sound quality that isn’t as good, that doesn’t mean you won't be included in my selection process. Everyone is eligible to be featured.
Kit Sound: One of the most important characteristics! We all have read Eyal Levi’s article about why drum performances are always sound replaced these days. For those who haven’t, the basic gist of it is because drummers don’t know how to tune their drums. Considering that many drum videos I see on YouTube involve players that have really bad sounding kits, it seems rarer and rarer that drummers actually tune their drums. Meet all three of these criteria, and you have a shot to be featured. You could be playing the most radio friendly Disney pop imaginable, but if I feel your video meets these criteria, you could make the front page.
This week’s winning video is by Gee Anzalone. For the first time in this article’s history, a cover is being featured. Gee’s cover is 'Through the Fire and Flames' by DragonForce. Yeah, I know, DragonForce sucks, you suck for liking them, blah blah blah. I like them and I like Gee’s cover of their song. Gee plays on a mic’d up Tama Rockstar 5 piece kit; he uses a beautiful sounding Mike Portnoy signature snare, which is fitting because he looks a hell of a lot like Portnoy. Some of his cymbals are UFIP brand, which makes me like him even more because I think UFIP needs more attention. His videos are at studio quality, all mic’d up and mixed nicely! The video is in 720p HD, filmed on a Zoom H4. Something I love about this video is that he adds his own little things in there. I’ve always been big on drum covers being as much about the individual performing the piece, as well as the drum track he’s covering, so improvisation is a big plus in my book.
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Gee’s links:
That shalst be it for this installment of Subrick’s Picks. In keeping with my cheap plugging nature, feel free to subscribe to my Youtube channel and follow me on Facebook & Twitter. Subrick out!
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