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A Steady Decline · After The Burial

EXERCISE 1 OF 49
Groove E -- Chorus (a two-bar phrase)
0 / 185 BARS COVERED
0 / 49 PASSED · 37 BARS LIT · IN THE CHORUS, CHORUS 2, CHORUS 3
PART B
CHORUS
CHORUS 2
PART D
CHORUS 3
PART V
OUTRO 2
12 groovesEAEBDV+7Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 15
FILL · 4
LAND · 4
RUN · 5
JOIN · 10
LINK · 1
SECTION · 9
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play A Steady Decline on drums

185 bars at 155 BPM -- fast, and 4:46 of it without a break -- on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

62 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in the independence between the hands and the feet.

TEMPO
155 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
185
LENGTH
4:46
DIFFICULTY
62/100

snare through bars 1-28, hi-hat through bars 29-34, snare through bars 35-42, hi-hat through bars 43-58, kick and crashes through bars 59-76 and hi-hat through bars 77-100, and 11 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 29-34, 43-58 and 77-80, and 1 more place -- 20.4% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    29                                               30
    1...........2...........3...........4........... 1...........2...........3...........4...........
CC |x-----------------------------------------------|------------------------------------------------|
HH |------------o-----------o-----------o-----------|o-----------o-----------o-----------o-----------|
SD |------------x-----------------------x-----------|------------x-----------------------x-----------|
BD |x-----------------------x-----x-----------x-----|------x-----------------x-----x-----------------|
A Steady Decline -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

4 fills to learn, played 4 times: bars 84, 104, 133 and 168.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 44 exercises -- the grooves, the fills, and the joins between sections, which is where players actually come off -- and puts them in the order a teacher would. Each one opens on a reduction you can already play and adds the notes back a rung at a time, with a tempo to reach and a gate to pass before the next.

  1. The grooves the song is built on -- E, K -- 2 exercises, about 26 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- B -- 2 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  3. Through Part B -- 3 exercises, about 24 minutes.
  4. Through the Chorus -- 2 exercises, about 18 minutes.
  5. Bars 59-144 -- 3 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  6. Through Part K and Part M -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  7. Bars 75-105 -- 7 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  8. Bars 81-169 -- 3 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  9. and 7 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is A Steady Decline?

155 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in thirty-second notes. At that speed the thirty-second notes are the whole difficulty, so the room will take it down to a quarter of it and climb back.

Is A Steady Decline hard to play on drums?

62 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 49 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

185 bars, about 4:46 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 44 exercises over 15 sittings, about 25 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick. That is most of a full kit; the part moves around it rather than sitting in one place.

How many fills are in A Steady Decline?

4 fills to learn, played 4 times: bars 84, 104, 133 and 168.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 185 BARS ANALYSED