Where we go next?

[LDGuy]

For me, at least, asking the question "why" to a lot of art is probably the most difficult question to ask, especially in music. Music is essentially pointless once you get past it's hedonistic properties, but it gets to people in such a strong way that this is ignored and the persuit of "making oneself better" is the thing that's focussed on. I've never really asked my drum teacher why i was being asked to work on a certian area of technique or musicality, but he'd probably say it was to make myself better, but i can't imagine it would go much deeper than that. The business to expoit budding musicians who want to make themselves better is a massive one, and it seems that there are loads of these people who buy these products without going deeper into the question of why.

But as a musician myself (ish!), i get pretty pissed of when people start getting all philosophical about the subject. Anything can be read into to a degree which shows it has some psycological benefit for the end-user, even something as mundane as banking or working behind the counter at a petrol station. They're all jobs; they all provide a service; they all provide income. Music is just another level of this, surely.

I hope i wont get too philosphical about it. As someone who wants to get into the business as professional, i would hope the thing would remain as pointless as it is for me now, so it can be enjoyed just for it's practical benefit, because music feels good - why can't we leave it at that? I think it's a dificult subject to approach rationally, which i guess is why the people who write books on this sorta thing aren't usually the musicians who play it...

[djmuskateer]

Originally posted by Andy Edwards:
But if you look at the last 40 years of drumming you can see drumming become more and more about control. [edit] I'm not arguing against the perfectionist approach. Just saying we may need to balance it with a bit of blood, sweat and tears.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Andy, couldn't agree with you more, but I find it SO hard to implement the idea when the red light is on. (I'd like to say well done to you for giving it a go, but in line with my other post about not feeling able to compliment pro drummers, I can't...) Bonham, Copeland, Moon etc would not have been HALF the drummers they were if they'd gone over every take ironing out the imperfections. Their spirit and pure love of drumming would have been completely contradicted by the notion of a perfect, sounds-like-its-been-in-pro-tools take.

But. Having said all that, when I do a take I just think it sounds rubbish if there are glaring inconsistoncies and errors, so I redo it, and often end up with a more consistent but rather sanitised version of the track. And when I don't for whatever reason redo the track, I just end up wincing when I listen to it because I'm pusing the tempo in the exciting parts! Its so frustrating!

So, in summary: I agree there is a problem, I have no idea what to do about it even though its something I feel passionatly about. Hurrah!

[Andy Edwards]

Muskateer.

This is exactly the problem that faces us drummers in todays artistic climate.

You can't just blame the current musical however (as people here have said)

We make the music. Our judgment is more important than our technique. When recording we should be able to see beyond our own egos to the greater artistic picture (like all the great drummers could)

Music is not all about us.