I guess I'm too old school. When I was learning how to play my influences were players who believed in conservation of energy in movement. Everything was fingers and wrists, things stayed down low, unless you were reaching for things in the set. Somewhere along the line all this arm movement and flailing and stick height came in. It seems funny, actually, because so many of these players have everything in their sets very low in height.
I would actually like to see a breakdown of the style at slower speeds. Everything happens so fast in these patters it is difficult to discern exactly what is happening. This far I have not found anything of an instructional nature on the web. Even the gospel chops site is all about visual performance near as I could tell.
To certain degree, maybe to a large degree, I do not find this type of playing particularly musical. It is certainly percussive. The inclusion of so much bass drum work, for me, tends to lessen the melodic nature of fills, even if it is just a four piece set. The accolades talk about how boring 'typical' fills are and the extra inclusion of bass drum notes spices things up. I don't know. From Ginger Baker, to Palmer, to Billy, to Tony, and certainly Max and the older giants I just hear a lot more music in the fills. Some of these guys, like Pridgen and Boswell, are just wild and frenetic. And Boswell can play keys, apparently, so he has knowledge of phrasing to some degree. They all play fascinating s-k-h beats. Then the fills go all frenzied. A definite contrast of extremes, if nothing else.
Home
