Amazing MM solo from Guitar Center Drum Off 2016 (pro shot)

[gzarruk]

Title says it all, really. I discovered this video yesterday and have seen it maaaany times already, and love it more every time. His playing is simply amazing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJvaQ84f39U&feature=youtu.be

[goo-goo]

Very groovy and great sounding snare. 

[erwinrafael]

In typical Mangini fashion, the footwork carries the groove. 

[TAC]

Ridiculous!  I don't even see a cowbell!

[gzarruk]

Yeah, Mike's double bass work is amazing! I really enjoy his way of complementing the music with his bass drum patterns on the last 3 DT records.

About this solo, I like this one much more than the LALP one (which was also amazing). Also, I really like to see him play in a smaller version of his DT kit, not because I don't like his big kit, I love it, but because it gives me ideas on how to arrange my own kit when I finally get one.

Ridiculous!  I don't even see a cowbell!

Maybe I'm missing the sarcasm here, but, if you're being serious, the cowbell is played with a pedal by his left foot.

[YtseJam]

why does he wear safety goggles? 

[gzarruk]

why does he wear safety goggles? 

Proves you can wear anything you want and still be a beast on your instrument 
I still wish he cut down his hair a little, though. His ADTOE look was spot on, now you just see a big chunk of hair playing drums 

[YtseJam]

I really like this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oe8XKgOuNtk 

[gzarruk]

I really like this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oe8XKgOuNtk 

You mean the solo or the look? Both? 

[Sycsa]

Five minutes in a mic from a tom falls down, then he tries to put it back on, then gives up and just tosses it away. Awesome.

On the other hand, his "tractor engine" routine he ends every drum solo with is getting tiresome.

[devieira73]

why does he wear safety goggles? 

Interesting, because I don't see that many often (in fact never) and I think all the drummers should use, just in case of a piece of drum stick brokes and flies right to the eyes.

[Kotowboy]

Five minutes in a mic from a tom falls down, then he tries to put it back on, then gives up and just tosses it away. Awesome.

On the other hand, his "tractor engine" routine he ends every drum solo with is getting tiresome.

Some quite cool drum solo stuff in there and a lot of the usual stuff he does which I find really boring.

[rumborak]

On a related note, when did MP stop doing drum solos? And, did he ever say why he stopped? IIRC, he revived the practice since he split.

[Evai]

On a related note, when did MP stop doing drum solos? And, did he ever say why he stopped? IIRC, he revived the practice since he split.

He talks about it in the commentary for Live In Tokyo I believe, he basically said that drum solos take up time that could be used to play another song with the band.

[Sycsa]

On a related note, when did MP stop doing drum solos? And, did he ever say why he stopped? IIRC, he revived the practice since he split.

He talks about it in the commentary for Live In Tokyo I believe, he basically said that drum solos take up time that could be used to play another song with the band.

He played drum solos with PSMS though.

[Architeuthis]

On a related note, when did MP stop doing drum solos? And, did he ever say why he stopped? IIRC, he revived the practice since he split.

He talks about it in the commentary for Live In Tokyo I believe, he basically said that drum solos take up time that could be used to play another song with the band.

That's a good reason!  Even Neil Peart eased off on the solos on the last two tours. He actually played three short solos mostly as breaks within songs, which in the end probably added up to the same amount of time as one big solo..lol! 

[rumborak]

On a related note, when did MP stop doing drum solos? And, did he ever say why he stopped? IIRC, he revived the practice since he split.

He talks about it in the commentary for Live In Tokyo I believe, he basically said that drum solos take up time that could be used to play another song with the band.

He played drum solos with PSMS though.

That makes perfect sense then. They were lacking material to play with PSMS, so he did a drum solo to fluff up the time. After Awake, DT had no shortage of material.

[Bertielee]

How to turn a thread from an MM solo to MP doing solos. You guys are so bored?

Back to OP : it's a very MM drum solo with some cool things and others not so much. All in all, MM has a groove I don't feel. Btw, drum solos have a tendency to bore the hell out of me and this one is no exception.

B.Lee

[Kotowboy]

Every time a MM solo threatens to be catchy and something you can nod to

It jettisons it and instead he plays 16th bass drums whilst hitting the China and floor tom

For 32 bars.

[Bertielee]

Every time a MM solo threatens to be catchy and something you can nod to

It jettisons it and instead he plays 16th bass drums whilst hitting the China and floor tom

For 32 bars.

Sums it up perfectly for me as well. Because his beginning is kinda groovy, but then...

B.Lee

[rumborak]

I'm listening to it again just now, and yeah, his drum solos are often of the layered kind, where he will start out with some pattern on one hand, then add an entirely different pattern on the foot, and then do random in-beat tom and crash hits. The exercise then is to be amazed that you can focus on each hand separately and still hear the original pattern, i.e. he didn't simplify it.
Truth be told, it is never not impressive, that's for sure. But it's very similar to Rusty Cooley in its approach.

[gzarruk]

I think it's fun to see how people complain that he overplays at his solos and also complain that he simplifies some MP songs.
When it comes to solos, MM is just having a great time using his super chops. When it comes to actually playing the songs, he tries to play what's best for the song and not overplay some stuff there, always trying to serve the song. That's what really matters, imo.

[rumborak]

I don't think it's a matter of over or underplaying. Look at Hell's Kitchen; the problem isn't that he's playing too much or too little, he's playing it way too rigidly. It completely sucks the life out of the tune.

[gzarruk]

I don't think it's a matter of over or underplaying. Look at Hell's Kitchen; the problem isn't that he's playing too much or too little, he's playing it way too rigidly. It completely sucks the life out of the tune.

I think it's a matter of time (no pun intended) untill he gets more comfortable playing it and then he can change the way he plays it. My bet is that he put much more effort/time working on the IAW songs and ACOS, and I think he nailed it on these songs, specially ACOS.

[Kotowboy]

I'm sure people will disagree but based on the way he talks about drumming . . . I don't think he feels the music at all . .. if a song is in 6/8 he's thinking of all the ways he can subdivide 6 over 8

and split it up between limbs and tonal variations.

I've never heard him say anything like " Well this is a medium 5/4  feel so I just laid down a backbeat and just grooved along with the song "

It's pretty much always " Well the song is in 5/4 so that means I can play 3 over 16 with my feet and 2 over 4 with my hands and swap over every 9 bars ... "

[Architeuthis]

I think it's fun to see how people complain that he overplays at his solos and also complain that he simplifies some MP songs.
When it comes to solos, MM is just having a great time using his super chops. When it comes to actually playing the songs, he tries to play what's best for the song and not overplay some stuff there, always trying to serve the song. That's what really matters, imo.

This! 

[gzarruk]

I'm sure people will disagree but based on the way he talks about drumming . . . I don't think he feels the music at all . .. if a song is in 6/8 he's thinking of all the ways he can subdivide 6 over 8

and split it up between limbs and tonal variations.

I've never heard him say anything like " Well this is a medium 5/4  feel so I just laid down a backbeat and just grooved along with the song "

It's pretty much always " Well the song is in 5/4 so that means I can play 3 over 16 with my feet and 2 over 4 with my hands and swap over every 9 bars ... "

That's not fair to say considering that most drum parts on TA are groove-oriented and not flashy/crazy polyrhythmic stuff.

[erwinrafael]

I'm sure people will disagree but based on the way he talks about drumming . . . I don't think he feels the music at all . .. if a song is in 6/8 he's thinking of all the ways he can subdivide 6 over 8

and split it up between limbs and tonal variations.

I've never heard him say anything like " Well this is a medium 5/4  feel so I just laid down a backbeat and just grooved along with the song "

It's pretty much always " Well the song is in 5/4 so that means I can play 3 over 16 with my feet and 2 over 4 with my hands and swap over every 9 bars ... "

See, this I think is a misunderstanding and is going the way of a caricature.

Mangini does not really consciously count when he composes and plays drum parts. "The numbers are always in my head," which means the counting is already intuitive out of a strict practice routine. Instead of conscious counting, he sees patterns (or shapes as he calls them) where he can visualize how these patterns fit into the overall structure of a song. A good example here is the intro of Surrender to Reason, where he did different versions of the fast roll, and one of them clicked with James LaBrie as the one that is best to use, and it was only afterwards that they counted it as an odd-metered roll of a 29 over 5 polyrhythm.

When he gives interviews and explains in numbers, though, that is the teacher Mangini trying to explain to the lay person (or to the ordinary drummer) what he is doing. You can not tell a student "just groove along" "just feel it" or something like that because it does not mean anything. But when you explain in numbers, that is, you tell the student to play this then subdivide to so and so, then the student will understand what you mean and know how to play it. That's why he always comes off as if he is always counting when he does the interviews. He wants people to understand what he means.

About the groove thing, I think it's really largely a function of not getting used to listening to polyrhythmic drumming. I mean, I hear the groove in a lot of Mangini's drumming, but I think it's because I am exposed to polyrhythmic stuff as I am immersed in world music. Latin drumming, for example that of Horacio Hernandez which Mangini pointed to as a huge influence, has a lot of those polyrhythmic stuff that some might consider un-musical.

[Architeuthis]

Awesome post erwinrafael! 

[Bertielee]

I'm sure people will disagree but based on the way he talks about drumming . . . I don't think he feels the music at all . .. if a song is in 6/8 he's thinking of all the ways he can subdivide 6 over 8

and split it up between limbs and tonal variations.

I've never heard him say anything like " Well this is a medium 5/4  feel so I just laid down a backbeat and just grooved along with the song "

It's pretty much always " Well the song is in 5/4 so that means I can play 3 over 16 with my feet and 2 over 4 with my hands and swap over every 9 bars ... "

See, this I think is a misunderstanding and is going the way of a caricature.

Mangini does not really consciously count when he composes and plays drum parts. "The numbers are always in my head," which means the counting is already intuitive out of a strict practice routine. Instead of conscious counting, he sees patterns (or shapes as he calls them) where he can visualize how these patterns fit into the overall structure of a song. A good example here is the intro of Surrender to Reason, where he did different versions of the fast roll, and one of them clicked with James LaBrie as the one that is best to use, and it was only afterwards that they counted it as an odd-metered roll of a 29 over 5 polyrhythm.

When he gives interviews and explains in numbers, though, that is the teacher Mangini trying to explain to the lay person (or to the ordinary drummer) what he is doing. You can not tell a student "just groove along" "just feel it" or something like that because it does not mean anything. But when you explain in numbers, that is, you tell the student to play this then subdivide to so and so, then the student will understand what you mean and know how to play it. That's why he always comes off as if he is always counting when he does the interviews. He wants people to understand what he means.

About the groove thing, I think it's really largely a function of not getting used to listening to polyrhythmic drumming. I mean, I hear the groove in a lot of Mangini's drumming, but I think it's because I am exposed to polyrhythmic stuff as I am immersed in world music. Latin drumming, for example that of Horacio Hernandez which Mangini pointed to as a huge influence, has a lot of those polyrhythmic stuff that some might consider un-musical.

Look, I'm not a drummer, but I've heard a lot of things and while I didn't say that MM was not grooving at all, I said that I did not feel his groove. I love what John Macaluso does on the drums and, but I may be wrong, the guy is also versed on polyrhythms and latin percussion. When I hear him play, I can always feel his groove. Unfortunately, it rarely happens when I listen to MM. The problem, I think, is that MM is more of a drummers' drummer and because of that, he often loses me. Yet, maybe it's more because I'm a melomaniac than a musician.

B.Lee

[rumborak]

I don't buy the "you're just not hearing it" argument. Hell's Kitchen has no polyrhythms or whatever, all it needs is a simple groove, one so simple I would argue every average drummer can lay down. My theory is rather that he trained himself to make all these snappy movements (what with tensing his back muscles and all), and when combined with the click track, he kinda sounds like a drum track himself.
If anything, I would argue HE doesn't hear what he lost with that approach.

[erwinrafael]

The back muscles tense only when he's playing high speeds and he needs to use the big muscles for movement. He does not do it for simple beats.

Why is Hell's Kitchen being interjected in my comment about the comment on the polyrhythms in the drum solo? It's a different context. In the case of HK, what was lost was the playful hi-hats by Portnoy which many of us associate with the song. But later videos that surfaced in YT show that MM might be trying something different for the song, experimenting with ride patterns and changing the bass drums.

EDIT: This video was taken last Friday. It still does not have the trademark hi-hat in the original MP version. But it has shaken off a lot of the stiffness that we heard in the vids of the first coupld of nights. The bass drum is so Mangini and the fills are very confident.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gYZBj2mSssQ

[jakepriest]

The programmed drums on Periphery's first album groove two times as much as Mangini on any DT record.

[goo-goo]

I'm sure people will disagree but based on the way he talks about drumming . . . I don't think he feels the music at all . .. if a song is in 6/8 he's thinking of all the ways he can subdivide 6 over 8

and split it up between limbs and tonal variations.

I've never heard him say anything like " Well this is a medium 5/4  feel so I just laid down a backbeat and just grooved along with the song "

It's pretty much always " Well the song is in 5/4 so that means I can play 3 over 16 with my feet and 2 over 4 with my hands and swap over every 9 bars ... "

See, this I think is a misunderstanding and is going the way of a caricature.

Mangini does not really consciously count when he composes and plays drum parts. "The numbers are always in my head," which means the counting is already intuitive out of a strict practice routine. Instead of conscious counting, he sees patterns (or shapes as he calls them) where he can visualize how these patterns fit into the overall structure of a song. A good example here is the intro of Surrender to Reason, where he did different versions of the fast roll, and one of them clicked with James LaBrie as the one that is best to use, and it was only afterwards that they counted it as an odd-metered roll of a 29 over 5 polyrhythm.

When he gives interviews and explains in numbers, though, that is the teacher Mangini trying to explain to the lay person (or to the ordinary drummer) what he is doing. You can not tell a student "just groove along" "just feel it" or something like that because it does not mean anything. But when you explain in numbers, that is, you tell the student to play this then subdivide to so and so, then the student will understand what you mean and know how to play it. That's why he always comes off as if he is always counting when he does the interviews. He wants people to understand what he means.

About the groove thing, I think it's really largely a function of not getting used to listening to polyrhythmic drumming. I mean, I hear the groove in a lot of Mangini's drumming, but I think it's because I am exposed to polyrhythmic stuff as I am immersed in world music. Latin drumming, for example that of Horacio Hernandez which Mangini pointed to as a huge influence, has a lot of those polyrhythmic stuff that some might consider un-musical.

Look, I'm not a drummer, but I've heard a lot of things and while I didn't say that MM was not grooving at all, I said that I did not feel his groove. I love what John Macaluso does on the drums and, but I may be wrong, the guy is also versed on polyrhythms and latin percussion. When I hear him play, I can always feel his groove. Unfortunately, it rarely happens when I listen to MM. The problem, I think, is that MM is more of a drummers' drummer and because of that, he often loses me. Yet, maybe it's more because I'm a melomaniac than a musician.

B.Lee

Ark - Burn the Sun is a great example of Johnny Mac's drumming. The album oozes in groove and there's a lot of polyryhtms going on.

[bosk1]

The programmed drums on Periphery's first album groove two times as much as Mangini on any DT record.

You need to knock off those types of comments.  Aside from being completely asinine, that is nowhere in the neighborhood of respectful or constructive, and as such, it violates forum rules.