Studio Drummer – A Jeff Porcaro Lesson

June 9, 2014

I had the opportunity years ago to meet Jeff Porcaro on a Toto show we were backing up.  And let me say straight out, that this is not a self-stroke in any sense… It was a lesson to me.
A lesson in person-hood.
We were backing up Toto for a couple of shows…we met after our set in a quiet dressing room and he was as clear and real a human as a human could be.  No hype, no bullshit at all.

We got talking and I was struck by some key things about him.  He had a true humility and deference about him.. but at the same time he had  a supreme quiet confidence about his truly massive strengths.  Yet intuitively, he still had that honest self defacing attitude about what he perceived to be his weaknesses. “Ah my hands are weak man!” .. he said to me.  And went on!

It was a bit weird to listen to because it was him…all the hits he’d played on that I’d grown up with and the beautiful deft subtleties (and strength of hands) of his playing.  And yet he was more than happy to share the foibles LOL!

Like I said though, it was like… dude… ‘you played on much of the soundtrack of my life!  There was a real disconnect there for me that I still understand to this day.

Yet at the same time he was genuinely complimentary and interested in my thoughts.. (you can spot the fakers.)   He liked my playing and gave me the ultimate whole hearted compliment I’ve ever had as a player.  Coming from him it still is very special.

the overall thing that struck me is this.

The people that contribute most to the art or instrument can often be the most humble of people.  They would rather listen to another player and dig them ( and as a result glean from them).  I read many an article of Jeff’s where he would defer anything he did to another great drummer, such as the Rosanna groove to Bernard Purdie.  ‘ I borrowed this from this guy, this from that guy.’

Like another musical hero once said… “The more you do know about music, the more you realize you don’t know anything”.

There’s a good lesson in that.

Jeff was a great studio drummer and by all reports a very cool human too.. Listen to his Steely Dan tracks, Toto or anything Jay Graydon produced, Dire Straits, Michael Jackson, etc… on and on…he played on hundreds of hits.

 

 

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Studio Drummer – Somehow We Got An Album Out Of This Mess

June 5, 2014

This track was recorded in this arcane nightmarish fashion, check it out:

This producer (who shall remain nameless) insisted that we trigger drum sounds off of real drums.  Back then the triggering had a lot of latency and was inconsistent and problematic to say the least. That was the first massive distraction when trying to play…but it gets way better!

He wanted no toms on the initial bed.  Toms were to be fully produced and overdubbed later.  So he wanted groove, kick, snare, hat and cymbals.  So I had to play and imagine (or should I say over-think) where I would play a tom fill and what that would be.  Zero spontaneity!  He also said that I couldn’t use stand-in toms such as Simmons toms that were not producing any sound, just stand-ins so it would feel a bit more natural.  The added problem?

We were recording bass and drums as a bed  track, together, on the whole album.

Real time scenario;

I would come to the end of a phrase and try not to over-think the fact that I had no toms and I would leave a gap in the bed performance knowing that we’d be doing a tom overdub in that spot.

So get this,… I would be playing and hoping that the triggers were working properly going to the Linn drum (young folks do your homework lol) and when I’d come to the end of an 8 bar section for example I’d stop for 2-3 beats to accommodate the ‘phantom tom overdub’ yet to be, but one problem…

The bass player is playing with me live, doing a big budget session and of course there’s pressure there.  He hears me stop, ..completely stop at the end of the 8 bar section and thinks that I’ve made a mistake so he’s thrown so he stops.  After a while he understands that I’m stopping because I’m leaving space for a tom overdub but that still is a massive distraction to him as the session goes on, trying to lay down a solid good feeling track!

I swear to God that I can’t believe that we got anything that was usable and this was way before digital editing.  It still had to groove.  This was going down to 2 inch tape.  So it had to be believable.  But you couldn’t punch in on 2 inch tape unless you had a large break in the music, so it was on!  It’s a truly different world now a days.  Those kind of extreme pressure days are mostly over but they were great experience and trial by fire.

We had to work through the pressure and the ridiculous impediments put on us by this producer,.. but still try to groove and do something that had attitude and merit.

How is that for an old school recording nightmare?

 

All 100% true.  Just another crazy experience in the studio…  Ocean Sound, Vancouver

 

 

 

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Studio Drummer – Hi Hat Can Be A Very Musical Instrument

May 3, 2014

The hi hat is a ‘musical instrument’ so treat it like one, approach it like one.

 

*FIRST RULE IS DO NOT BOUNCE YOUR FOOT ON THE HI HAT WHEN YOU ARE PLAYING A CONSISTENT CLOSED OR SEMI CLOSED HI HAT PHRASE.*

 

When we were touring with Toto I got the chance to stand at the back of the stage and watch Jeff Porcaro play.  The stage was at about my head level since there were risers toward the back of the stage so my head level was right at his foot level.  I’ve always loved his textures. He was a beautiful studio player with great nuances in his playing, truly one of the all time greats.  His kick foot was a slamming heel up technique!  It was a beautiful fat kick presence but his hi hat foot?

 

Heel down and his foot was dead still!

 

If he was playing a closed or semi closed pattern on the hat his foot never moved unless he was making very subtle and specific adjustments.  That was a great lesson to me.  I also got to meet Jeff and hang a bit.  He was an awesome guy, very humble!  He also gave me the greatest drumming compliment of my entire life.  He said to me “your time is a motherfucker man!”  We lost a lot of music they day we lost him.

 

So what you’re doing by bouncing your foot is constantly changing the tension of the hats, which is affecting the sound and emotion that you’re producing. 

 

Think of a piano player. You don’t see a piano player stomping on the dampening pedal or keeping time on it either.  The pedal serves a specific function on both instruments, in our case it’s tension and cymbal decay. 

Of course if you’re playing something that involves opening or closing or if it’s a foot hat pattern then this rule doesn’t apply.

 

But creating a high end, very consistent kick, snare and hi hat groove involves being very much aware and in control of the hi hat subtleties and texture!  The same of course applies kick and snare and to ride cymbal technique and all the subtleties surrounding that as well.

 

I’d encourage you to study some great players here. Steve Gadd is another outstanding example. Listen to the use of the hi hat and his command of the instrument.  Also listen to the great players use of tip and shank techniques utilizing the sticks to create different groove soundscapes.

 

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Studio Drummer – DAW Recording – Beware of Editors

March 31, 2014

*YOU’LL RUN INTO EDITORS THAT ‘KNOW JUST ENOUGH TO BE DANGEROUS’ WHEN IT COMES TO DRUM EDITING.*

 

 I’ve had songs and performances sent back to me that were slaughtered by someone editing the drum performance who didn’t know enough about what they were doing. 

 

Drum editing is almost an art form. There are many ‘ins and outs’ pertaining to it.   I’ve had engineers or editors edit my tracks that have slightly shifted things out of time and made entire performances sound stilted and awkward if not just plain terrible at times. 

 

Other common mistakes that occur in editing are cymbal decays being cut off, bass drums being cut off or lost because they often fall just a fraction before the downbeat of the click.  These are most common since editors

   edit drum performances on ‘a grid’ so that the tracks align to a certain  beats per minute or bpm.

 

These editing mistakes were committed by professional people quite often too.  I’ve even had them come back at me afterwards saying that it was my fault in my performance!

That’s a terribly frustrating situation since it is completely out of your hands at that point.  A bad editor has the ability to destroy your performance and sully your reputation at the same time.

 

*SO TAKE PRECAUTIONS TO GUARD YOUR PERFORMANCES.*

 

I would recommend a couple of things here.  If you’re going into an unfamiliar studio to record bed tracks bring with you one or all of these things.  A blank CD, a blank DVD, a cassette and a hand held recording device.  Once the song is recorded ask the engineer or producer if they’d mind if you had a rough mix copy of the bed tracks. 

 

One of these formats they are bound to have.  And if they don’t have that capability use your hand held recording device.  That way you have a record, you have evidence if you will, of the track and your performance as you left it.

 

I always keep rough copies of the tracks I do for people these days for this very reason!   I’ve had a number of occasions where this has not only saved my reputation but has helped to narrow down the cause of the problem. 

One very memorable occasion of this happening was the result of a very good musician who happened to be a really bad editor. He was skewing my tracks without realizing it.

 

FINALLY…

 

I would recommend that if it’s a performance that you really care about or if you have concerns about then ask if the engineer/producer/ artist would mind if you sat in on the editing session. 

 

Often times they won’t have a problem with it if you’ve shown yourself to be respectful and low maintenance and your concern is for the ultimate good of the material.

 

Either way these approaches give you some insurance against the editing sabotage that can unwittingly occur.

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Studio Drummer – DAW Recording – Increase Your Studio Ability

March 30, 2014

*AS A RULE, RECORDING FULL TAKES WILL INCREASE YOUR STUDIO ABILITY.*

 

I find that most producers today, given the ease and the speed tend to record in sections instead of entire takes.  As a result there are a whole generations of players, studio players included that have never been subject to one of the toughest skills that a session player was once required to have and still should possess.

 

This of course means your utmost execution and musicality throughout the entire piece of music. It also means precision against a click track and correct reading and interpretation of the chart in front of you.  And on top of this it means that bringing the fifth element, the quintessential element being your outstanding style and interpretation.

 

And don’t forget that tape has not gone away completely especially on very high end productions. 

 

*THERE ARE PRODUCERS AND ENGINEERS THAT STILL SWEAR BY THE SOUND OF TAPE.*

 

 They swear by it because of what’s called tape distortion, a certain tape compression and distortion that happens with analog tape that sounds sonically huge to the ear.  So as a studio drummer you should have the skills needed to play entire takes if you’re called for one of these sessions!

 

*LET’S TALK ABOUT DRUM EDITING.*

 

Of course with the advent of extremely powerful digital recording platforms many borderline performance issues can be adjusted or rescued with time shifting and quantization.  This can work well in your favor although as I was saying earlier you wouldn’t have had that luxury 20 years ago and nor would you if you were called into an analog recording situation today!

 

Digital editing, as well as having many advantages also has large and inherently dangerous disadvantages to you as a player that you need to be aware of.  This is something I’ve encountered many times in my business.

 

See coming post with more on this topic…

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Studio Drummer – DAW Recording – ‘What You Played Is What You Played’

March 30, 2014

*WHAT YOU PLAYED IS WHAT YOU PLAYED.*

 

In fact, on most formats of tape machine, especially the highest end of multi tracking tape machines, you couldn’t ‘punch in’ either or there were very limited areas where one could punch in to a track.  It would have to involve silence or an actual pause in the music.  It was often a very pressure filled setting.

 

I was working with Bob Rock the famous producer/engineer, recording drums for the second Idle Eyes record at the infamous Little Mountain Sound studios in Vancouver.  It was the center of the world for rock recording in the 80’s.  Bryan Adams, Aerosmith, Motley Crue, Bon Jovi, David Lee Roth, the Cult etc recorded huge albums there.

 

 

It was also a world famous studio for drum sounds.  Fantastic drum sounds, so much so that artists would come from around the world just for that sound.  But Bob didn’t like to punch at all.  It had to be full takes for him.  That shows you just how much things have changed in the world of recording.

 

A funny little story there – we were just finishing up that record when a bunch of very rock and roll looking dudes show up at the studio and Bob says to us “Yea that’s this band Bon Jovi, I have to record their record next week and I just feel burned out right now.”  That ‘album’ was Slippery When Wet which sold about 10 million copies and launched Bon Jovi and Bob Rock into the stratosphere.
 

On this topic of full takes, I remember on an album for WEA records we were having trouble with a certain tune that just wasn’t feeling the way the producer wanted.  Again it was entire takes of the song over and over. 

 

Today it would just be done in sections and edited together or by punching in on sections, but not in those days.

 

It was an added dimension of pressure that the session musician had to learn how to handle.  The anxiety at times could be literally overwhelming.  However, it is a very good exercise even today to at least practice playing songs as entire takes.  If you’re in a recording situation I would strongly recommend that you push to record this way as well. You may very well be expected on a recording session to be able to read down and play an entire take.

 

Of course the producer and the artist are going to ultimately dictate how things get laid down.  But if you are given a say in the matter and are comfortable with it then I would recommend doing it this way.

 

Stay tuned for more posts on this topic!

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