As the end of the year grows near, so does the end of the first season of The Torch. With only one more issue left after this, I thought it'd be fitting to do a little something special! Instead of our usual three-person cast, today we'll be featuring four drummers. Ranging everywhere from punk to fusion, hard rock to death metal, we've sampled flavors from across the Midwest; Chicago natives Tiny Kingdoms, Milwaukee's own American Zeros and American Bandits, and the Toledo based Blood of the Prophets!

Meryl "LJ" DeWitt: How old were you when you first started playing? What was your first drum set? 

Jake Newling (Tiny Kingdoms, Gardens): I picked up the drums when I was 13, and it actually happened by accident. When I was in middle school, my group of friends came up with the idea of starting a band, even though none of us had any idea how to play an instrument. Everyone else refused to play the drums, so eventually I just said I would do it. It ended up being a great decision. The first kit I owned was a Sound Percussion four piece kit. It came with a set of hi-hats and a ride cymbal that sounded like trash but the kit itself wasn't all that bad. 

Ben Boswell (American Zeros): Like any great urban legend, the origin story is always a bit fuzzy. I honestly cannot remember a time that I wasn't playing drums and that's not my 20's talking. I have pictures of me at super young ages in diapers playing. How the story goes is my father was in a band in the 70's called "Cheaters Proof" and unlike modern parents, the concern for my hearing was back burner to ability to find a babysitter, so I was at every band practice. When they took breaks my dads drummer would pop me up on the drum stool. I'm talking about 4-5 months old here. My dad told me that they would have records playing during break and that it was his drummer that noticed that I wasn't just whacking the drums with my sticks but I was actually trying to play the drums to match record. Putting the fills in where the drummer on the album did and hitting the crash cymbal as well as crossing sticks to play the hi-hat/snare. He tried to convince my dad I wasn't just "messing around," that I was actually picking out and understanding the drums and the basic function of playing. Fast forward to my first birthday and a present from my dad's drummer; a little 4 piece junior drum set (like in the song remains the same) where the bass drum became a future 12" tom on my next kit. So to make a long story short I officially start playing at 12 months old when I got my first drum set; a 1/2 scale Remo red sparkle drum set.

Ryan Roberts (American Bandits): I was 13 when I first started the drums. My first drum set was a Pearl Export 6-piece black on black. I still have it!

William Clark (Blood of Prophets): I started playing at 4 years old I got a little "toy" kit for Christmas, and just went from there. I beat the crap out of that thing. I broke most of the heads and played on rims for about a year or two! Haha

LJ: Through trial & error in your career, are there any mistakes you would warn young drummers to be cautious of?

Jake: I think a mistake a lot of drummers can make when first beginning to play is developing the mindset that you don't have to practice too much, or becoming complacent with the skill level you get to. You should always practice! The drum set holds an infinite amount of possibilities and it's so important to always continue expanding your vocabulary on the instrument. 

Ben: I like to consider myself self taught, yet I did do a stint for about a year with a drum instructor when I was 4, and of course through concert and symphonic band in High school as well as being part of jazz ensemble in High School. All those experiences taught me so much but I was always more advanced than my instructors (except when I was 4), they were only there to get for me what I needed when I said I needed it and I would teach myself. With this came, as you put it, a lot of trial and error. Unfortunately that trial and error lead to a lot of bad habits that I have spent the last 10 years of my life trying to break. 

There are, I believe, three things that prevent a drummer from making the transition between good to great and that's Physical, Mental and Ability. The greats have all three in spades and if you only have two you can't be great. Unfortunately I am a firm believer that if you don't have the given natural ability you will never reach "great" status. Mental and Physical can be learned. Don't get me wrong, if you practice hundreds and if not thousands of hours you can become really really really... really good. You will never be great. I'm not trying to be a buzz kill or anything, I just see a lot of new drummers that play because they love it get frustrated because they are missing that elusive great quality that is only recognized by other drummers, and the common listener or even other musicians don't even notice. If you understand that not everyone can be the top 1% of the top 1%, then when you are in that 99.9% range that's pretty damn good as well, and you should be happy, not frustrated, because there is nothing you can do to get to that point.

When drummers come up to me for pointers I try to stay well clear of ability and the things my ability allows me to do that others can't. Just like they might have an ability that I can't do-- like blast beats, I can not do blast beats. I've tried, but not happening. I stick to the physical and the mental end of becoming a great drummer. Holding the stick properly, the proper tilt of your toms and cymbals, the height of your drum throne and how that changes over time and the music you play. I could probably write a whole book on those aspects and way to many examples for a simple interview, but basically on drums you need to find balance. You need a solid bass just like an athlete and the "athletic stance," that balance that allows you to move left, right, forward or back effortlessly with a fluid motion. This is achieved in two things: throne height and pedal placement. There is no tried and true position other than the dreaded "what feels good to you." Everyone's body is different. What might work for your idol might not work for you, but if you feel uncomfortable than you will play stiff, and either sound like garbage or hurt yourself over time. From that you can set your Tom height and pitch, which, again, is different for everyone but is true for everyone no matter what they do. Proper height and pitch of the Tom will be the difference between blowing out Tom heads in a month or having heads last for years no matter how hard you hit. Trust me, I hit pretty hard and I don't break sticks or skins, or crack cymbals all because of proper height pitch and placement. I challenge for anyone to watch any of the many videos I have posted on YouTube and tell me I don't hit hard. I also hit soft when needed and can control my dynamics but when I'm in a section that requires me to bring it I'm not holding back.

The last part is Mental. As soon as you think you are great... You're done, that's it, you will never get any better. I listened to an interview with Neil Peart explaining how much he plays and practices and how he is always trying to reinvent himself. That, folks, is a great drummer. The guy that's jamming with the local metal band that thinks he is Gods gift to musicians will never be great. Besides checking your Ego at the door you mentally have to have patience and stubbornness at the same time. A difficult fill pattern is that; difficult. I just did a studio session where in the drum room with the click I felt like I nailed the fill. It was by far a difficult 3 beat fill requiring some cross patterns across my Toms to my floor, working off a quad bass/snare conversation but dang it I nailed it. Then I heard my producer say "take it from the measure before again, you rushed the end," then after I played it again I hear a click in the headphones. "Rushed the beginning this time." This is where the stubborn patience comes in. I played that fill more than a dozen times, sweating and panting by then end, where I needed a break all to capture a moment in time that would be gone in a second and a half. You could listen by ear to every take and you would never hear what was wrong with the take until you see it put up on the computer screen click grid and it isn't perfect. When you are recording it needs to be perfect especially when, like me, you are trying to get an organic recording not using quantization or samples. If it isn't perfect then it can't be moved without messing up the decay in the overheads and a bad recording. You can't get frustrated and you have to be stubborn enough to know you will get it.

Ryan: Be cautious of time wasters and poor practice methods. I’ve spent too much time over the years jamming mindlessly instead of focusing my effort on new concepts. If what you’re playing sounds good, you’re probably not practicing.

William: Mistakes I would warn young drummers of would be, being closed minded to new ideas. One mistake I made personally early on was avoiding things I found difficult, such as keeping the hi-hat going with my left foot while working the kick with the right. Later on this made jazz type rudiments hard for me. Meshuggah uses a lot of pedal hi-hat over the drum patterns, and I struggle with playing some of their material due to this.