Incognito - She Wears Black makes women feel at peace

This time we are going to check "She Wears Black" from Incognito's album "Beneath The Surface"!

Beneath The Surface by Incognito

Richard Bailey's sophisticated drum play blows up wherever you listen to on this album. All of those are always my shining examples worthy of imitation. Also see my past articles. I have taken up Incognito several times: 

Well, here's the intro fill and the subsequent basic pattern from the beginning of this song.

He is stepping the hi-hat constantly in this fast tempo. If you try the 8th note steps with this tempo, you can see that you must move your whole body to the tempo. In the tense atmosphere that the simple electric piano creates, right & left hands and right & left feet must be coordinated and mobilized orderly. That needs more physical fitness than how it  looks.

The point here is the skillful processing of the right hand on the ride cymbal. He hits the ride cymbal's bell (cup) in quarter notes and taps the bow (flat plane area of a ride cymbal) twice with 16th notes in between the bell hits. On the whole sound of the pattern, the tone of the crisp bell in quarter notes stands out. Meanwhile the 2 bow taps resound with a low volume, making it cool and flowing groove. You can see also that the right hand needs a pretty quick movement. But he is able to make the play look easy and elegant. Yes, this is the hidden graceful motion of swan's feet beneath the water’s surface!

Still the song has a lot of plays and phrases I would like to look into. I will have to catch you some other time.

Thanks,