Time Line for a Rock Drummer

Ready for a read that might take you a day?

Sit back, grab your favorite consumables...and leave your troubles behind.

Back in 5th grade, I was finally able to understand the concept of bands and music and the entire world of rocknroll as it was back then. (Dinosaurs have left the earth by then.)

I'm gearing up for a summer of excitement. I'm getting my first guitar, a 1968 Yamaha semihollow body electric guitar.

I'm learning all the cool songs of that era and started my own band. I played guitar for about a year and then ran into another guitarist who had just moved to the area and he and I started trading riffs. Sadly, he was way better than I ever hoped to be and during that same time the drummer for my band quit coming to practice.

As a band we still wanted to move forward so I volunteered to take over the drum duties until a replacement was found. That never happened so within weeks I became the drummer for the band. Drumming came naturally and I was able to learn all the drum parts to our songlist in short order and we started gigging.

I have been in many locally successful bands over those last 30 years. We've gigged for as little as a handful of (loyal to the bar) patrons all the way to SRO shows backing headliners.

Along the way, I still tinkered with my guitar, if for no other reason, because it was there. I still played my handful of open chords and barre chords. Never really getting the full impact of guitar playing it was just a background hobby.

A few years ago, I had a life altering experience that made me want to sit down and write out and compose my feelings and experiences. Tremendous surges of ideas and inspirations were bursting the seams of my inner being to the point I had to get these ideas on tape or at least paper. Being a drummer by nature and trade didn't allow for much melody creation and formulation so I fell back on my old friend the Yamaha.

That guitar had never had anything done to it in the 30 plus years I've owned it. I couldn't even tell you how old those strings are. I fear they were one oxidation away from total corrosion. So it was a good stand by but not what I really needed. So for the first few months I used an old Casio keyboard to laydown my stuff. I'm NOT a keyboardist so hacking out the notes and chords was time consuming to say the least but I did get most of my ideas recorded. But still, the urge to be able to play those tunes on a guitar still was eating at me.

So I broke down and purchased a Squier Strat pack from Musicians friend in Jan. '05. That was the beginning of my quest for the perfect guitar. I had that pack for almost 9 months. In getting familiar with that new guitar and opening a new world of music creativity for me I plunged in head first and haven't looked back since.

The song producing has slowed some due to other life activities but still is a major player in my everyday existence. I've acquired huge amounts of musical information thanks to all of you here on GN. THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I've also become very intimate with the guitar and have had the pleasure of owning and playing many very nice guitars. Over the course of the last two years, I've owned the following guitars....

Schecter C-1+
EPI Tommy Iommi SG
EPI SG Studio Les Paul
EPI Les Paul Studio
EPI Les Paul Custom - Still have
Fender Light Ash Tele
Fender MIA Deluxe - Still have
2 Squier '51's - Still have
PRS Tremonti SE
PRS Custom 24 - Still have
Stagg A/E - Still have

I also own a Washburn 4 string electric bass.

During this tenure with my guitar fetish, I have still been gigging with the Rock n Roll bands as their drummer up until the end of '06. I had gotten fed up with the lack of professionalism with my last RnR band and quit. At the same time, a conversation developed with a country/country rock band and I was immediately put into the roll of drummer for the band Dani Lynn Howe - http://www.dlhband.com .

Now this was a stretch as their song list included 40 + songs I'd never heard nor played or had any familiarity with them. So I was way out of my comfort zone attempting to fill the last drummers shoes who'd been with them for many years. I was thrust into the spot light within 30 days of joining the band and had to gig with them at least 30 days sooner than our time line had been. Each week I would get closer and closer to having the songs learned and able to perform with the band. To this day I'm not completely at ease yet, due to the fact that certain parts of certain songs are still unfamiliar to me. Sadly, this makes me dread practice and gigging since I'm not ON MY GAME with this band. As you may have read in other threads, I'd seriously thought about throwing in the towel since I hadn't felt I'd been measuring up. I mean this band has been playing these songs since for the past 20 years and could play them in their sleep. As could I given a Rock song.

Last night another milestone ocurred with this band. I was bummed about going to practice fearing more humiliation in not being completely ready for rehearsal. As it came to pass, the guitarist decided to put together a list of older classic rock songs to add to the mix of my already foreign set lists. However, now the shoe was on the other foot. The songs he introduced to us last night were songs I'd already played in bands previously. Funny, cause now I get to watch the others sweat while trying to learn these songs from my realm of the music world.

So after 6 months of soul searching whether or not to stick it out with this band, I actually had a blast a practice last night since I already knew the songs and had no stress to be up to par with the rest of the band. So now that this learning curve has settled down, I can refocus on my current love affair with the guitar.

With that said, I should be able to get on track with my music projects and bore the crap out of you with my stuff I'll be populating on Hear Here.

And mostly, thank you to everyone who's befriended me and helped me or just said "Hi" on occassion.

Thank you, also for allowing me access to this great home!!!!!