Vinnie Colaiuta's greatest legend - I'm Tweeked / Attack Of The 20lb Pizza

Vinnie Colaiuta - I'm Tweeked / Attack Of The 20lb Pizza

This time, I'd like to share with you a song that was released more than 20 years ago, but which had a big impact on the music scene at the time. 

Vinnie Colaiuta

This is a solo album by Vinnie Colaiuta. The title is simply Vinnie Colaiuta! And check out the very famous trick in the first track, I'm Tweeked / Attack Of The 20lb Pizza.

The normal rock drums pattern shifts, shifts, and shifts!

This is how he plays from the beginning of the guitar theme.

(00:19-) 

Of course, the focus of your attention is the play from the 9th to the 16th bar. As you can clearly hear, the normal rock drums pattern suddenly shifts by a 16th note, and shifts and shifts and shifts. People often describe it as if the needle of a record flew off or a CD skipped due to a reading error. This is a play that I would like to try myself while listening to the 8th note clicks. I can't help but respect Vinnie for coming up with a trick that has never been done before, and putting it into practice!

If I were to score it more accurately, it would be

If I were to score this pattern more accurately, it would look like this, with a tenuto-like hi-hat and a ghost note behind it.

The hi-hat is struck hard with half-open on-beats, and is struck just a little bit on off-beats. The right hand moves in 8th, but the off-beat goes almost a ghost motion only. Therefore, the first score is not accurate in rests. That is, it has too many rest marks because it has more tenuto. Instead, the first score is written for practice to make the timing of the accented hi-hat and snare backbeat clear.

If I write it as precisely as I can, it will end up being confusing at best, like this. We hate this.

A hybrid score with ghost notes on the off-beat 8th

It might be more practical and a little more accurate if I take both to make a hybrid as follows. In addition, I colored the areas where the needle flew off the record and deviated from the normal pattern. Green indicates the accent on the fourth 16th note in a beat, pink is for the third, and blue is for the second. I wonder which score is better.

I wonder if varying time of song is not in vogue

I'm sure many older drummers are already familiar with this song. It's so famous trick that is often referred to as "that thing on Vinnie's solo album". In recent years, I don't think I've come across such an interesting time-changing trick, but maybe it's not so popular. Maybe young drummers don't understand what's so interesting or what the elderly are so excited about.

Between the sky and Jeff Porcaro - Mushanga

Jeff Porcaro - Instructional Video

We found out in the previous article that checking out drumming videos on YouTube is very useful. It's a great way to get a feel for what's going on in drum performances.

Check out the previous article:

So, as much time as I could spare, I did some chain-watching (clicking on the thumbnails after the end of the video to watch them in succession), and I found a couple of Jeff Porcaro videos, and I was particularly intrigued by this one, so I'd like to check it out in detail!

This is a recording of a valuable lesson from Jeff Porcaro: It's good to play the 16-beat hi-hat with one hand instead of two (around 7:10) and other helpful concepts are introduced. Among them, I'd like to focus on the part that explains the basic pattern of Mushanga, a song included in Toto's album The Seventh One.

Seventh One

RL sequence and accents that I can't quite get

The explanation of the pattern begins at around 12:11. Next, we confirm the RL sequence by hitting only the hi-hat. As he explains, that includes paradiddle-diddle (RLRRLL).

(13:20-)

The sequence is as he says, but what I can't figure out is: on the 3rd beat, the accent is only on the first L of L-L, and on the 4th beat, the second R of R-R. This is an idea that only a person with confidence in stick control can come up with. For me personally, this is a sequence that I would avoid because it is simply difficult to control. In the video, it looks very smooth and easy, so at first I thought it was the following sequence, but this is not the way to play the Mushanga pattern:

(Note: This is wrong)

The exquisite control of the sticks - accenting only the first L of L-L and the second R of R-R - is a true indication of his superb control skill. His smooth one-handed, accent + immediate non-accent, was analyzed as well in the past article here:

Actual Mushanga pattern

Now that we know the sequences and are familiar with it, move your hands on the drum kit and play the actual pattern in the Mushanga song.

(14:02-)

Where X-shaped notes are placed on the toms' pitches, they indicate that the toms' rim (frame) should be hit and ticked. Occasionally, the X-shaped notes may be hit on the toms' surface instead of the rim, but those are not shown in the score above. Either way, it doesn't matter since the toms are played softly here with ghost notes.

Ergonomically friendly pattern

In this pattern, with its impressive toms, you don't need to be very conscious of where the accents are located, which we checked in the previous section using only the hi-hat. Rather, the actual Mushanga pattern is easier to understand in fact. It is very reasonable that the 2 notes of the 2nd beat are R-R instead of R-L, and the snare backbeat accent on the 3rd beat can be hit with the left hand. We hear the complex flow of sound with all the toms and hi-hats on the drum kit, but we don't have to get into any uncomfortable postures. The pattern is a sort of ergonomically friendly.

If you take a closer look at his playing, you will notice that unlike typical super drummers, he doesn't seem to be very flashy in his appearance. But now you know attracting attention with appearance is not the essential requirement of a super drummer. You just have to be able to express yourself in the form of art. It's okay if those who understand music understand you. It's okay if those who understand music don't understand you! I would like to play music with such a carefree attitude, as long as people allow me to.

No more failures at Jeff "Tain" Watts: San Jose Jazz Fest!

He is the drummer on the Wynton Marsalis song in the last article, and now he's back to play for us! His name is Jeff "Tain" Watts!

For the previous article, click here:

Jeff "Tain" Watts: San Jose Jazz Fest

Let's check out this performance from the San Jose Jazz Fest: 

He started off with a two-handed cowbell-strumming Latin groove. It's very lively. I want to copy this at all costs! So, I decided to copy it, and here's what I got!

(0:00- etc.)

From my first impression, I was surprised that he was not filling the cowbell with 16th notes all over. It's a sort of hard to understand the actual procedure of this two-handed cowbell pattern in the video.

There is a big hint in the second half of the video!

In the second half of the video, he plays the same procedure with right hand cowbell and left hand snare. If you bring your left hand on the cowbell in that pattern, you should be able to make the first pattern above. Thanks for the help! Here's the pattern for the second half of the video, where the procedure is easier to see, and I included the RL sequences too:

(3:01, etc.)

But still, it may be a bit confusing because a score cannot include drummer's appearances in video. The key point of this pattern, which is clearly visible in the video, is that the right hand goes back and forth between the cowbell and the floor tom. This is always kept in the cowbell pattern. You will be able to get closer to him once you play this right hand pattern as a base line and filling the spaces with your left hand:

Fortunately, this hint helped me figure out the procedure, so I went back to the first pattern and wrote the RL procedure as follows. I think I can manage to copy it now!

(0:00, etc.)

Whether or not to give up the Latin clave feel

Also, if you look at the left-footed hi-hat, it is a bit anomalous and jumps up the difficulty of this pattern. It's not a major element that forms this groove, so it can be omitted, though. However, it is still a rhythm that should be played to create a Latin clave (ostinato) feel. The fact that it can create a Latin-style clave feeling makes the coordination of the limbs proportionally more difficult, which is a problem.

Other nice patterns

There are other patterns with different accent positions for the snare: the second 16th note on the 1st beat and the snare accent on the 4th beat. The left hand occasionally glances at the hi-hat instead of the snare.

(3:17 etc.)

There's also a nice pattern with a ride cymbal and a closed rim shot.

(1:32 etc.)

It's nice to see a lot of drum close-up videos.

It's nice to have a video because it reveals the steps and settings. If you only have the sound, it is sometimes difficult to understand the specific procedure or the idea behind the phrase, so you need to put down a hypothesis of what the setting is and you need to strongly visualize in mind how it is played. In the Jeff's phrase of this article, it would have been hard to tell from the sound alone that the cowbell and floor tom were so close together that the right hand was constantly moving back and forth. If I had been able to see more close-up drumming videos when I was younger, I wonder how many detours I could have avoided. I envy digital natives who have easy access to videos of musicians playing! This is a heartfelt thought that I have written about many times in this blog.