Reviews
Modern Drummer is the world’s most widely read drum magazine, is dedicated entirely to the art of drumming and caters to the needs of amateur, semi-pro, and professional drummers.
The Hi-Hat Footby Garey Williams
BOOK/MP3s LEVEL: INTERMEDIATE $15.99 In his new book, clinician/instructor Garey Williams tackles the oft-neglected hi-hat foot, focusing on composing different beats while keeping hat-time on various parts of the bar. Essentially a four-limb coordination guide, the book doesn’t really contain…
Buffalo Killers Dig. Sow. Love. Grow.
CD Buffalo Killers aren’t the only band today with little apparent interest in music made after 1975. But they are one of the best. On the Cincinnati, Ohio, group’s fourth album, their Crazy Horse/Big Star/Badfinger base is built upon…
Greg Skaff 116th & Park
This is jazz guitarist Greg Skaff’s third successive exploration of the classic B3/guitar/drums format—but with a difference. Although Skaff’s fat-toned hollow-body sound and swing feel are rooted in tradition, his concept is subtly informed by the modern, along with hints of…
METRIC MODULATIONS: CONTRACTING AND EXPANDING TIME WITHIN FORM, VOL. 2 BY ARI HOENIG AND JOHANNES WEIDENMUELLER
BOOK/DVD LEVEL: ADVANCED $19.99 If you’re familiar with the adventurous music that NYC drummer Ari Hoenig makes with his band as well as with the modernistic pianists Kenny Werner and Jean-Michel Pilc, then you know that Hoenig’s a wizard when…
ULTIMATE DRUM LESSONS: FILLS AND CHOPS, ADVANCED INDEPENDENCE & POLYRHYTHMS
DVDS LEVEL: ALL $14.99 EACH The Ultimate Drum Lessons series cherry-picks highlights from across the extensive Hudson DVD catalog, bringing students a “best of” playlist from a generous grouping of today’s masters. The two newest collections continue to enlighten. With…
Call of the Wild Leave Your Leather On
CD Well, Call of the Wild drummer Allison Busch sure got it right in her blog a couple weeks ago: The band’s sound definitely comes out of Motörhead, Thin Lizzy, and other straight-up, balls-to-the-wall rock outfits. This is pure,…
Solos Beast of Both Worlds
CD These can be tough times for an indie rock fan, at least those of us who are drummers. So much of what comes out these days seems like over-polite, under-ambitious Matt Chamberlain approximations, with too much compression and…
Man Forever Pansophical Cataract
CD Pansophical Cataract is comprised of two eighteen-plus-minute tracks that are in fact reduced versions of thirty- and forty-minute live performance pieces. A bit more rock-ish than what generally passes for modern classical music, but way more esoteric than…
Roxy Music The Complete Studio Recordings
From left: Brian Eno, Andy Mackay, Bryan Ferry, Paul Thompson, and Phil Manzanera CD/ALBUM/BOX SET Roxy Music covered so many bases with their music and their live approach that casual observers have often had difficulty grasping their “thing.” And…
The Wedding Present Valentina
CD/ALBUM The Wedding Present, who formed in Leeds, England, in 1985, is one of British alternative rock’s longest-running bands. They’re also among its most consistently high-quality. Singer/guitarist David Gedge still writes about the intricacies of romantic love with great…
The Smashing Pumpkins Oceania
CD Replacing original Smashing Pumpkins drummer Jimmy Chamberlin mustn’t have been easy for Mike Byrne, but leader Billy Corgan clearly made a good choice with the newbie. Similar to the way that Zak Starkey is in some ways the…
Double Bass Drumming And Power Fills Workout by Matt Sorum & Sam Aliano
BOOK LEVEL: ALL $14.99 This 125-page book taps the melodic and powerful arena-rock drumming skills of Matt Sorum (Guns N’ Roses, the Cult, Velvet Revolver) and the double bass mastery of Australian-born Sam Aliano (Slash, Gongzilla). The goal here is…
Tommy Igoe and the Birdland Big Band Eleven
Album Not a wasted bar here. Weekly residents of New York’s Birdland, this jazz big band is about action and arrangements that build and build. All is tight and punchy, and the solos deliver. Tommy Igoe drives it all…
IZZ Crush of Night
CD It always seems unfair when progressive-rock haters toss out the word pretentious as a catchall way to denounce the genre. Fact is, prog only works when the listener is utterly convinced of the sincerity of the players’ devotion…
