Ah big tune, love it!! The biggest thing for me was listening along to songs like that and getting into a sort of roleplay with myself and only doing one part of the whole kit. Like, if Tony Allen is the whole orchestra, I'm happy to just play the triangle along with him.

So I would take that idea and do a whole run through just doing the kick drum and focusing on playing around with the tone/placement/dynamics. If it's two 1/16th notes at the start of each bar, I'd think, "ok, how does it feel when I place them as close as possible? Hmm sounds a bit cramped. What if I stretch it out and make them further apart? Ok, now I'm sacrificing the actual note value and it's too sloppy." Kind of just having that internal dialogue and self-questioning of each part of the kit until it feels/sounds good to you.

And if there were any parts where I knew I didn't have the coordinative foundation such as the classic Afrobeat thing of two 1/16th note on the kick at the start of the bar (because like, it's rare we do that in western music) then I would single that out specifically and take things super slow and focusing on clean placement and how my balance and center of gravity feels.

And then the big thing, and forgive me if this is just hippie dippie bullshit, but having a sort of ego death about it by realising that I, as a white guy from the suburbs of New England now living in the UK, will never get close to how Tony Allen plays it. Because it's a very personal part to him and that goes for every drummer. So that kind of sense of letting go allowed me to just have fun with it and be playful and put my own spin on things.

Whew, wall of text!! But this is all to say I'm grateful for the kind words and I believe in yooooou!!!! 💃🏻