Nobody's Talking About This Influential Drum Funk Beat

First things first - grab your free transcription here.

Ever wonder what’s going on when Chris Dave plays with The Drumhedz on Tiny Desk, or Snarky Puppy play songs like Thing of Gold? Or Adam Deitch plays…many things that Adam Deitch plays?

I wondered too, and it reminded me of my interview with Stanton Moore last year, and our discussion about the low-key influences of Afro-Caribbean rhythms on New Orleans music. Stanton wholeheartedly endorsed the idea that “clave”, as we know it from music like Son and Salsa, exists in New Orleans music too, and brought up Ziggy Modeliste and The Meters as an example of that throughline.

Here’s my conspiracy theory - if the DNA of clave influenced the meters, it’s not crazy to think a lot of the funk and soul beats downstream of them also carry that lineage.

All of this is a bit tangential to a concept I probably didn’t invent, but that occurred to me listening to these more modern artists like Chris and Adam. Funk Claves. Instead of playing straight 8ths or 16ths, you essentially play a “clave” with the lead hand. It can be a literal clave, or it can be looser. (The clave you’ll hear Chris playing sounds like a 2-3 oriented “son” clave.)

Whether “clave” is just a descriptive word that helps us orient these funk beats, or hints at a more fundamental lineage, these beats are fun to practice on the drums, and they’re a very useful tool for many musical situations. Which is why it’s mysterious to me that we’re not hearing more about them. (Is somebody somewhere teaching a “Meters Beat”?)

Anyway, in today’s video, we delve into all of that, and show you how to play them.

Hope you enjoy!

Internet Drummer vs Real Jazz Jam Session

What happens when an “internet drummer” turns up at a real jam session?

Will all those hours in the practice room translate into real music with humans, or will everything fall apart after the requisite 30-carefully-edited-seconds that are the stock-and-trade of today’s Tiktok drum universe.

Last Friday, I decided to test it out.

I went to Smalls, possibly the world’s most famous jazz jam session, which livestreams everything to audiences of thousands on YouTube, to test my mettle. Would I fold as soon as things went “off script”, or would I “dig deep” and find my footing.

Of course I’m 98%jesting. Sitting in in jam sessions is a mundane act thousands of musicians of every stripe do every week. It’s something my students do with regularity. And it’s something I used to do a fair bit earlier in life. But it’s also true that I’ve on a roughly-ten-year hiatus from playing for real audiences with real huans onstage. And that there were some questions in my head about whether I’d have “cobwebs”, or if I’d be able to “get back on the horse”.

And for fun, I decided to take my camera to my very first foray back into live music. Where there was a genuine possibility I’d forget a tune, or lose the form, or get stage fright.

This video is also not just about me attending a single jam session, but rather a bit of a “confessional” about my first baby-steps into my return to playing live, and my burgeoning idea to start a band. I’ll talk about why I’ve come to believe it’s important to play live, why I quit, and why I stayed away for so long.

If you’re interested in the very mundane act of my sitting in at a jam session, great! If you’re interested in my thinking about what purpose live playing serves for musicians, great! Either way…

Hope you enjoy!

The BIG Thing Most Drummers Get Wrong About The Kick Drum

First things first - grab your free show notes here.

This week we have a block-and-tackle kick drum lesson.

Little metaphor: stand-up comedy. As I’ve heard on countless comedy podcasts, you’ll start killing in most situations many years before you get on top of all the reasons you might bomb. Until you’re like ten years in, there’s always the possibility you might bomb and not know why. It’s simply impossible to get on top of so many facets in this complex system of mood, material, room acoustics, crowd makeup, etc. in a way that you can engineer success in a short period of time.

And so it is with the kick drum.

And this is why I, and my students, continue to make discoveries long after most of us can be assured of a decent kick drum performance in most situations.

But what about when you suddenly start getting “extra” sounds between your intended strokes? You can go years without that, then suddenly somebody changes something about your pedal, and all of a sudden it’s “double bouncing”.

So I thought it was time for my pretty-close-to-annual check-in on the kick drum, to deep dive on the thing I’ve realized is the culprit for so much suffering: the spring tension.

Why does it all come back to spring tension?

How do you tell if your is set ideally?

What does that mean for technique and setup?

And how do you stop those pesky accidental ghost strokes.

We’ll get into all of this in the video.

Hope you enjoy!

Thomas Pridgen - Creativity Is a Choice

Thomas Pridgen is a firebrand, and a controversial figure. He speaks his mind, and doesn’t sugarcoat or apologize for his opinions. He speaks like he plays, and it’s no mystery why he’s cut a path that’s hewed closely to those of his peers, but which is distinct and individual. If it takes gumption to walk at 90 degrees to the road everybody else takes, it takes real gumption to walk the road at 15 degrees.

Throughout my conversation with Thomas, you’ll hear me digging for that motivation - how important is it to differentiate yourself, how do you chart a creative path and take influence from others without “copying them”. How do you manifest the discipline necessary to become world-class on this instrument, and still have a rebellious, whimsical personality. (Answer, as nearly as I can calculate - be fueled by something.)

Thomas is also not shy in his opinions about today’s “online” culture of drums. It’s sometimes difficult to figure out where people draw the line: is it ok to have an instagram if you also play gigs in real life? What if you mostly make videos but your heart is only 15% “clout-chasey”, and 85% pure? Our mutual lack of fear at digging in our heels about our roles fueled maybe the most interesting exchange I’ve ever had with a guest - one in which I tee up the opportunity to take me down as an avatar for that “online drumming”, and Thomas declines acerbically, saying “I wouldn’t tell you anything.”

But what’s impressive about Thomas is his lack of desire to impress. In any situation, social or musical, you’re going to get the same Thomas - one who doesn’t pull punches, isn’t afraid to push his technically impressive playing to the breaking point for a musical goal, and relishes being in “deep water”, as he was in the Zildjian Live, in which he was learning the music on-the-fly.

Bottom line - Thomas is maybe the best muse I’ve yet encountered. Most useful person to picture if I’m feeling “meh” about practicing. When he looks you dead in the eye and says “I always needed to make sure noone could f@#$ with me on these drums”, you start thinking “am I really giving this my all?”

I wager you’ll feel the same way after listening to this interview.