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Better Than You · Metallica

EXERCISE 21 OF 77
Groove Q
105 / 192 BARS COVERED
0 / 77 PASSED · 2 BARS LIT · IN THE CHORUS 2, PART J
PART E
PART I
CHORUS
CHORUS 2
PART B
PART I
CHORUS 3
PART AG
PART B
PART J
11 groovesKBIAGE+6Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 19
FILL · 12
LAND · 12
RUN · 1
JOIN · 13
LINK · 10
SECTION · 9
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Better Than You on drums

192 bars at 160 BPM -- fast, and 4:48 of it without a break -- on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

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

TEMPO
160 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
192
LENGTH
4:48
DIFFICULTY
59/100

toms through bars 1-21, hi-hat through bars 22-37, toms through bars 38-45, hi-hat through bars 46-61, toms through bars 62-69 and ride through bars 70-85, and 8 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 22-24, 26-28 and 46-48, and 6 more places -- 8.9% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    22
    1.......2.......3.......4.......
CC |x-------------------------------|
HH |--------x-------x---g---x---g---|
SD |--------x---------------x-------|
BD |x---------------x-----------x---|
Better Than You -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

12 fills to learn, played 22 times: bars 20, 21, 45, 69, 85, 108 and 16 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 64 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 -- I, C -- 2 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- B -- 2 exercises, about 25 minutes.
  3. Bars 1-42 -- 7 exercises, about 35 minutes.
  4. Through Part I and the Chorus -- 2 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  5. Through Part I and the Chorus -- 7 exercises, about 37 minutes.
  6. Through the Chorus 2 and Part B -- 2 exercises, about 22 minutes. Open above.
  7. Through the Chorus 2 and Part B -- 4 exercises, about 24 minutes.
  8. Through Part B -- 2 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  9. and 11 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Better Than You?

160 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 Better Than You hard to play on drums?

59 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 60 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

192 bars, about 4:48 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 64 exercises over 19 sittings, about 27 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 Better Than You?

12 fills to learn, played 22 times: bars 20, 21, 45, 69, 85, 108 and 16 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 192 BARS ANALYSED