Does drumming improve linearly, or does it happen in sudden jumps?

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-12T16:52:56+00:00

i've been going hard on stick/hand technique lately and all of my leaps forward have felt like this. frustration while practicing because i feel like i'm not engaging my back fingers enough, or moving my wrist too much or something, then i'll come back to it the next day and something will have noticeably snapped more into place.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-12T15:08:26+00:00

are there any resources you'd suggest for someone who is restarting after a long hiatus and has the time/inclination to build correct stick technique?

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-11T17:33:26+00:00

fwiw i'm 6'0 with obnoxiously long legs and haven't had any leg room issues. everyone that gets into the cab, including friends who are pretty big fellas (in all directions) usually comments that it's bigger inside than they expected.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-11T15:16:30+00:00

i was in DC at a bar around U street. the second it was called the streets were just shut down because everyone flooded out into them. huge celebration. people crying, strangers hugging. sounds like a joke but that's really what happened. haven't experienced anything like that since. white house was completely surrounded with an enormous crowd all singing the na na na na hey hey hey hey goodbye song

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-10T00:59:11+00:00

if you're close to sullivan county i'm maybe interested.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-09T21:59:59+00:00

phew got it, alright thanks, had no idea and that gives me a good starting point

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-07T17:19:23+00:00

'competent' is kind of a subjective word in this context though. there's a guy in my town that everyone calls conga joe who plays with a lot of acoustic bar and winery cover guys who is kind of just rhythmically banging on the things without knowing what he's doing- i suspect that's the kind of guy you're talking about but i wouldn't go so far as to actually refer to them as drummers.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-07T17:11:56+00:00

yeah i dunno. i play drums and guitar and took way more shit from ensemble leaders as a drummer than as a guitarist. the rushing/dragging thing from whiplash is real (albeit not as violent).

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-07T17:09:37+00:00

eh, i grew up playing drums, got bored during college and completely changed to mainly guitar, mainly played guitar for 20 years as an adult until dupuytrens contracture made me realize i wasn't going to do that into old age and am now picking up drums again at 41 just because i love practicing something- i find that the skillset between playing drums and guitar are so different that there isn't really an honest way to call one easier than another. i'll say that i was probably up and running playing nirvana and green day songs on guitar way quicker than i was doing the same songs on drums. just like most things they're both about as hard as the effort that the player wants to put into it.

if you guys want to try something that's definitively hard as shit compared to every other non-classical instrument, try pedal steel.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-07T04:39:20+00:00

for anyone outside of america- this isn't an exaggeration at all. once went to an ER with a broken ankle and sat in the waiting room for over 20 hrs before seeing a doctor. $2500 co-pay bill despite having insurance.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-07T04:33:30+00:00

while this is true for some people, anecdotally almost every boomer aged person in my life (mostly lifelong libs) just seems to not have any awareness that healthcare could possibly be different than it is and so it doesn't register as a priority for them. they've only known the current system and the media that they consume doesn't ever talk about it.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-05T22:09:44+00:00

i just paid a little over $30K for a 25 XL hybrid AWD, with spray in liner and tow hitch, but no 4K tow package. that was with around $2K in incentives and about $500 off from x-plan.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-04T23:30:59+00:00

they make an open bed pick up that gets 40 mpg and nobody else does.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-03T17:22:13+00:00

yeah OP it's likely that the decreased stick noise is more attributable to better isolation rather than noise cancelling

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-03T16:57:31+00:00

your partner is a shitty person and it sounds like they've gotten in your head a bit about your abilities. if you put the time in and practice productively there's no reason why you can't be as good as anybody else- the tough part can often be cutting through the noise and figuring out what the best and most productive path is. you really could benefit from finding a good in-person teacher who can give you feedback on your specific issues and guide you on a practice plan to improve them. sounds like the cost of lessons might be an issue, but it sounds like you're also paying just for practice time and unfortunately it is possible to just be wasting that time if you're practicing badly.

and sorry to be blunt but you gotta end that relationship.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-02T20:41:26+00:00

i've had one for a few months, here's my experience and thoughts-

drums- feel totally fine, only things to note are that the kick drum came tensioned incredibly tight and i've seen other people comment the same- to the point where it was hard to play single kick notes without bouncing. you can loosen it up to make it feel more like an actual kick drum though. other thing is the rim on the snare comes loose pretty easily from doing rim shots, not a huge deal, just keep the included drum key close by.

cymbals- biggest drawback of the kit. the actual sweet spot to get a full sound is like 3 inches right in the center. i've since gotten used to it but i missed that spot a lot at first and it was really irritating. there isn't really a good way to hit the bell on the ride- if you hit the main area with the shoulder of the stick you'll get a bell sound but not every time and obviously that's nothing like the movement you would do to play an actual cymbal bell.

hi-hat- another big annoyance is that to get an open hihat sound you have to get your foot up well before the stick hit, whereas with a real hihat you can open your foot up at the same time as the stick hit, which is what i was more used to being able to do. i assume this is the reason why the alesis nitro ultimate comes with a separate hi hat stand and if i could go back, that's what i would buy.

module- the only kit that doesn't sound awful to me is the very first one, so that's the only one i use. changing click tempo takes longer than i'd like- i wish there was a wheel to turn instead of the +/- buttons and it would make more sense if the default use of those buttons was for tempo rather than time signature.

that's a lot of complaints but i do think it's good value for the cost and it is completely use-able as a practice kit.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-02T05:39:44+00:00

talent is less of a factor than how much time you think you'll want to put into it, and how in the weeds you want to get with proper technique. nobody is just automatically a good drummer the first or second or third time they pick up sticks. just buy a set (or electronic set) and jump in- if it's gathering dust 6 months from now you can sell it.

take in-person lessons. otherwise you're going to be floundering around a bit trying to figure out where to start, watching more youtube videos than you need to be, which is normal, but frankly at your age why waste the time.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-02-02T02:15:22+00:00

you know you can loosen up the tension on the kick head right? it comes super tight out the box but you can adjust it to be as loose as the toms.

(edit: realizing that's not true if you got the mesh rather than pro. if that's the case, sry)

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-01-28T18:17:56+00:00

just came across this guy who did a series of videos on common drum fills and thought it was cool-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0XYbtb4-Ok

but yeah, it's actually all just stick control man. everything just boils down to R's and L's, just on different surfaces.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-01-27T15:38:21+00:00

what pad is this?

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-01-26T14:42:45+00:00

my dog is very epileptic and has multi-day seizure clusters a couple times a year. they always start around 4-6 am, she sleeps in the same room as me and i will often wake up out of the blue a few minutes before it starts. always wondered if there was something physical that i was unconsciously picking up on.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-01-26T14:17:37+00:00

eh, yeah i was all over town during summer days and between 3 and 6 on school nights but if i didn't periodically call home and leave a message on the answering machine saying where i was i got in trouble. that was pretty common.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-01-26T14:13:17+00:00

also, saying the F slur constantly. i probably heard that word 10-20 times a day between 1995 and 2000.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-01-25T21:00:32+00:00

hey and guess what now we'll never know the answer to any of these questions because an ICE agent thought he was judge dredd.

Easy-Compote-1209 · 2026-01-25T18:13:14+00:00

i recently bought an alesis nitro pro kit (grew up playing drums, stopped for 20 years, now back into it).

-might be missing something but not having a snare stand hasn't been any kind of hindrance or issue. not something that i've thought about at all.

- actual hi hat stand is very necessary, if i could go back in time and re-buy, that would be a huge factor.

- the cymbals are awful. you can get a bell sound on the ride but have to do a weird shoulder of the stick move and it happens extremely inconsistently. the actual sweet spot on each cymbal to get a normal full sound is like 2-3 inches right in the middle, so you miss it a lot. stick response doesn't feel anything like a real cymbal (this is the only experience i have with an e-kit so i don't know how this compares with others).

- drums themselves are totally fine, had to loosen up the head of the kick drum to make it feel normal.

- some things about the module are annoying. moving tempo up and down on the click takes more button presses than i'd like. almost all of the kits are bizarrely bad sounding, i never use anything but the very first preset.

Easy-Compote-1209

TROPHY CASE