metronome madness

junplugged

junplugged

Taking the slow road
after seeing on the wave display how messy my drumming was and not consistently messy, so I couldn't just shift it all a little to align it with the click, I decided to try to improve and practice with the metronome.

I don't wanna edit every beat, nor do i want to loop a lot since it quickly starts to sound mechanical... I also tried sampling 5 snare hits, 5 kik, 5 HH, open closed, some crash, but still obviously programmed, also tried EZ drummer, better, but still too much programming etc.

but now I feel like I have to completely re-learn playing, or learn the play right for the first time, more likely because I can't play for long on the click of the metronome.

I try to obscure the click sound so that I know I'm completely on it, it's a weird feeling because doing that means that I have to feel it, as soon as i hear the click a little bit, I know I'm drifting off.

It's very weird since it's so hard to do for any length of time and it gets worse with each limb, and impossible with any combinations. At first I could only do it with my right hand on snare, then half the time with left, some with RH & HH, and maybe one hit only one time on 3rd session with kik, and never yet with left foot. But up to a few measures now ok with left & RH snare. Any progress at all is encouraging since it's so hard to do, I'm using eighths and any full kit pattern is a mess. obviously not my first instrument.

Anyway, does this sound right as a beginner?
 
Instead of trying to be exactly on the click, try playing with it. (Instead of to it)

Use a cowbell or wood block sound and pretend that the metronome will be in the mix and part of the music. Now play along with it, like you would if a guy was standing there playing it.

Make it part of the groove. A metronome is supposed to be the tempo, not a yardstick to measure every hit to.

Listen to the performance for timing problems BEFORE you zoom in to see how accurate your hits are against the grid. The best sounding performances are not always exactly on the grid, they are just consistent.

Practice playing with the click, not to the click.
 
Hate to sound glib but practice, practice. If you're drifting off tempo, make sure the click is loud enough to hear clearly.

Remember how many playing hours you put into your main instrument before you started to sound good?
 
After re-reading your post, it sounds like you are trying to concentrate on each limb separately. That ain't gonna work.

In most beats, the hat (or ride) is the metronome. The other hits all happen relative to the timing of the hat. It should be a fluid body motion, not a bunch of separate motions of separate limbs that need to be individually managed.

Since this isn't your main instrument, you already know how to follow a click. Any time you play with a drummer, you are following an external time source. Playing with a metronome is no different.

From what you describe, I don't think the metronome is really the problem. It sounds more like you aren't practiced enough to be able to play without thinking and managing every single move. When you can play the parts on auto-pilot, then you will have enough brain space left over to be able to line up the beat to the metronome while you are playing.
 
When people struggle with a click track, it really concerns me. This kind of stuff should just be a natural thing with a "musician". Like farview just said... damn near all music is played to a click track, no matter the instrument. The metronome is just different things. An orchestra watching the conductor wave his little stick around? Click track.

It shouldn't be this hard. It's just a guide, and it's apparently showing you how loose and sloppy you were before. If the click click is throwing you off, maybe practice along to it with an instrument you already know so you can get used to keeping time. Then try it with drums.
 
Just do it super slow. Like 40bpm. That's the key.
Speed comes quickest and won't be far behind once you can lock in at slower tempo.

If your metronome allows it to "go silent" for a few bars that's enlightening and a great feature, too. My problem is I come in just slightly early a lot. It's annoying and makes the playing sound anxious. I'm trying to fix this on the metronome. Like someone said, a lot of times that's because you don't know the part well and have to think too much or get nervous you'll botch a part before you do it -- this is because you don't know it well enough. Don't get all down on yourself. It's fixable with dedication.

Learning what your errors are telling you is a huge part of becoming good. The errors all have a message in them. Most of the time it's "slow down" or "learn the part better"....
 
Last edited:
Farview said:
Instead of trying to be exactly on the click, try playing with it. (Instead of to it)

Use a cowbell or wood block sound and pretend that the metronome will be in the mix and part of the music. Now play along with it, like you would if a guy was standing there playing it.

Make it part of the groove. A metronome is supposed to be the tempo, not a yardstick to measure every hit to.
Click to expand...

That's good advice. Picture Will Farrell guiding you!
 
I think my right hand having the best timing makes sense now that I think about it, it's the trigger on guitar and bass, so I do already have timing experience with it. Seeing those on the wave grid, they are definitely tighter and consistent, but also before the beat, but I'm not sure how much or how bad it is or if it was with a click or my crummy drumming, but I'm def gonna try to at least have more control of it.

Good comments, my ultimate goal isn't to be the click, but I def wanna be able to so I have a place to start and then at least know wtf I'm exactly doing with the timing rather than not know and not have the control.

The fun is how mind blowing it is to see progress even with space between sessions and with every single session, that happens with me with piano also, I'll work on a left hand complex pattern and not really get it then the next time, I see improvement.

I guess I def wanna be able to obscure the click sound, then see what it feels like to step in before it then after it.

I heard 4 different drummers this evening, only one used dynamics and had varied fills, I had to walk away from where I was standing because of the other guys hitting the snare like they hated it, but that's another subject....
 
If you are consistently ahead of or behind the click, it will feel the same since no one will hear the click in the song. When people are talking about playing ahead of, or behind the beat, they are talking about how the kick and snare fall against the hat/ride pattern that is keeping time. It has nothing to do with the click.

Personally, I tend to be slightly behind the click. But since I'm consistently behind it, it doesn't matter. (and I can hear it)
 
I have a dumb metronome question and will just ask here instead of starting a thread.

So if I'm playing quarter notes on the metronome at 70bmp and then change it to 1/16th notes, the tempo changes to 280. Now I understand why, 4x as many notes. But is the tempo really 280?? It doesn't feel fast at all. So are BMP always measured in 1/4 notes when determining true tempo?
 
At the risk of opening a can of worms:

The tempo depends on the time signature. In written music, the tempo is written as a number with what note gets a beat.

But that has nothing to do with setting a metronome.

The metronome generally uses the bottom number in the time signature to determine which division gets the beat.

In practical use, you just set it however you need to in order to hear what you want.

For example, a lot of the songs I used to play on drums had a lot of time signature changes, so instead of mapping everything out, I would find the tempo I liked in 4/4 and set the metronome to 1/8 note with no accent. That way I could move from 4/4 to 6/8 without the click changing.

Speaking of 6/8, in written music, the tempo would refer to a dotted quarter note. But metronomes don't work that way.

There is a reason why two time signatures threads went on for a million pages. Some of it is up for interpretation, sometimes the "right" way of doing it is really cumbersome, and sometimes it's just more important to make it work for you than it is to do it the way Bach would have.
 
Nola said:
I have a dumb metronome question and will just ask here instead of starting a thread.

So if I'm playing quarter notes on the metronome at 70bmp and then change it to 1/16th notes, the tempo changes to 280. Now I understand why, 4x as many notes. But is the tempo really 280?? It doesn't feel fast at all. So are BMP always measured in 1/4 notes when determining true tempo?
Click to expand...

There's probably two major ways you could think of this:
1. you're still in 4/4 (4 beats per measure/quarter note is a beat) at 70 BPM, but your metronome is playing 1/16th notes instead of the beat
2. You're now in 16/16 (16 beats per measure/sixteeenth note is a beat) at 240 BPM, and your metronome is playing the beat.
 
Farview said:
If you are consistently ahead of or behind the click, it will feel the same since no one will hear the click in the song. When people are talking about playing ahead of, or behind the beat, they are talking about how the kick and snare fall against the hat/ride pattern that is keeping time. It has nothing to do with the click.

Personally, I tend to be slightly behind the click. But since I'm consistently behind it, it doesn't matter. (and I can hear it)
Click to expand...
That makes sense, I never heard that before. I was figuring that if the hits from different items in the kit are not totally together, doesn't that create flams among them? You're saying no. I have to listen a for that, but I can't now, it's 2:22am!
 
A flam is when two hits are much farther out than anything that is "behind the beat" or "ahead of the beat".

Feel is still really close to on. If it's behind enough for you to hear it as a flam, it's just late and sloppy.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top