Discalimer! Before continuing dear reader, please be aware what follows, is a very long series of posts, likely to be of zero interest to anyone who other than drummers. For that matter, I will not be surprised if other drummers don’t go the distance! But if you’re interested in learning about the clinical OCD habits which trap many musicians, then this is a good psychological insight.
Taking Two Feet on a Misguided Journey
In the Beginning…
If I am brutally honest, I never really saw the attraction of two bass drums. When I received my first drum set at age 14, all the drummers who had made an impression on me played only one bass drum, whether it be Ringo, Ian Paice, Roger Taylor or Phil Rudd. I knew drummers such as Neil Peart, Chester Thompson, Cozy Powell and Keith Moon all played kits with two bass drums. However, my undeveloped ears and insufficient exposure to the back catalogues of their respective bands meant I was none the wiser to the sound of two bass drums rumbling under the mix.
My juvenile conclusion was, extra bass drums were purely for show and therefore, I must always remain unimpressed whenever I witness a drummer sitting behind more than one. For a start, how did anyone manage to play their hi-hats without a foot on the pedal?
The first time I witnessed two bass drums in a live setting was December 1981 at an Ozzy Osbourne gig (including the genius that was Randy Rhoads). Whilst it was lifelong double-bass practitioner Tommy Aldridge playing for Ozzy on that tour, it was actually Pete Barnacle with unfortunate support band Girl who gave me my first live double-bass experience.
Girl were having a bad night opening for Ozzy, taunting their decidedly ‘glam’ androgynous appearance with a crowd of mostly male, aggressively heterosexual Scousers. Despite the audience-to-band hostilities, I managed to focus on the action behind the kit and noticed the drummer’s use of two hi-hat stands and two pairs of hi-hat cymbals -pre-dating the invention of the remote hi-hat pedal and the ‘X-Hat’ by at least five years. With one pair of hi-hats set to a closed position on the stand positioned to his right, the drummer was able to execute open-handed hi-hat patterns whilst freeing up his left foot for the extra bass drum. Whilst this was most unusual and innovative for 1981, my limited perception gave me no cause to think I should be getting into doubling up on the bottom end. Besides, I could barely play one bass drum to suitable proficiency.
Being the Diary of a Madman album tour, Ozzy Osbourne’s wife had not long fired the rhythm section of Bob Daisley and Lee Kerslake, who had recorded (and co-written) the album. However, with no mention of them on the record sleeve, I assumed (mistakenly) it was Tommy Aldridge playing on the recording.
Side one of the album opens with Over the Mountain, which starts with an explosive two-bar drum fill based around classic hand-foot triplets. As a bedroom-dwelling teenager with a cheap record player matched with equally poor speakers to interpret the limitations of vinyl, trying to work out exactly what was being played remained impossible. All I knew was, that opening drum fill was massive and way beyond my capabilities.
In a packed, musty-smelling Royal Court Theatre, Ozzy opened his set with Over the Mountain. My first taste of the Osbourne show was Tommy Aldridge pummelling the two-bar triplet drum fill on his white Sonor double-bass drum kit. Believing it was Aldridge on the studio recording, I assumed the recorded drum fill must have been the same double-bass trickery he was using at the gig. It would be 20+ years before I discovered:
- Tommy Aldridge did not play on the album.
- The drum fill was played with just one bass drum.
- Lee Kerslake was the drummer on the first two Ozzy albums.
During this formative period, I witnessed a few gigs where two bass drums featured on the stage, but my ears weren’t developed enough to comprehend how, why, or what exactly was being played.
Completely out of my depth, the easiest answer for me was to file double-bass drumming under the category, ‘gimmick’. It would be another 12 years before my ears became receptive to the idea.
Neglecting My Feet
When I started playing drums there were no directives for bass drum technique. It was a case of simply sitting at the kit, placing a foot on the bass drum pedal, and seeing what happened. It was fairly easy to make an acceptable sound with the natural pivot of the ankle and the upward/downward movement of the leg. But no ‘science’ was applied and most of us just got on with playing the music. After all, there was already enough to occupy any young drummer with trying to make the hands sound good.
In comparison, 21st-century drummers know the importance of exploring and dedicating time to foot technique in a way my generation didn’t. Foot technique has become a ‘science’ and has caught up with hand technique in terms of analysis and study. This exploration into foot/leg ergonomics has enabled the modern drummer to develop technique which will skilfully transfer to even the most basic of pedal designs. In comparison, my generation were caught up in a belief system of spending lots of money on the latest cutting-edge pedal design, in order to miraculously transform our technical prowess overnight.
This caused me a long journey of wasted time and money, plus a serious amount of frustration.
In Pursuit of the Perfect Pedal
As expected, my first bass drum pedal came with my first drum kit. A very basically engineered Maxwin model with virtually no adjustments bar the spring tension. This broke within the first 18 months of ownership, to be replaced by a much better (used) Tama pedal. This served me well and I was only tempted away from it by the reputed benefits of the almost legendary (made in England) Premier 252 bass drum pedal. These did not turn up on the second-hand market so I had to suffer the pain of buying a new one from my meagre art college student’s budget.
With its one-piece ‘floating’ extra-long footboard and a direct-drive steel cam-linkage, the 252 felt different to the conventional design pedals I already knew. Seeing as I had no definable foot technique to adjust, the switchover was quite neutral in terms of ‘feel’. I plodded on with the oversized chunk of British steel for the next six years, enjoying its reliability and near-silent performance. But my advancement in foot technique remained static.
The truth was, I was in a rut, tired of being a poor musician bouncing around the Liverpool music scene with bands who never got further than ‘bridesmaid’ status. By 1990, I had walked away completely from the original music scene and thrown myself head-first into the professional cover-band circuit. I needed the change as much as I needed the money.
With the Premier 252 still rocking under my right foot, I managed about 18 months in my diversion as a ‘show band’ drummer. Having endured the boredom of its treadmill, I had at least made some decent money and rediscovered my need to play original music again. But the sort of music I wanted to play remained a mystery.
This would change when I was unexpectedly exposed to the tasteful playing of Paul Geary, drummer from hair/glam/funk-metal band, Extreme.
It was during a particularly depressing 1991 summer residency at a holiday park in Great Yarmouth when I heard their second album, ‘Pornografitti’. My band’s keyboard player had it on all the time in his caravan and I was immediately hooked. After a trip to a Norwich record store I returned with my own CD and played it on repeat until the season finished in September.
It’s not an understatement when I say it was that one album which essentially gave me hope beyond the mental torture of the holiday park experience. Being so profoundly affected, I made tentative plans for a regression back to my rock music roots upon my return to civilisation.
[End of Part 1] Join me for part 2 of this series, when I fall down the rabbit hole of buying new gear to establish a new identity.