METRIC · DRUM BEAT

The drum beat in Black Sheep (Scott Pilgrim vs. The World)

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 36-42, 55 and 71-77, and 1 more place -- 23.7% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

TEMPO
120 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
103
LENGTH
3:25
DIFFICULTY
45/100

The beat, written out

LOOP · 120 BPM
BLACK SHEEP (SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD) · BAR 36

It is played on hi-hat, snare and kick, counted in sixteenth notes. On its own it scores 67 out of 100 -- demanding -- and the thing that decides that is the speed of the hand keeping time.

The whole song is 45 out of 100, so the beat is most of what the song asks for. Get it clean and the rest follows.

How to get it under your hands

The room opens this beat on its simplest reduction, at 78 BPM, and adds the notes back a rung at a time -- 4 of them. Nothing is a matter of opinion: each rung has a tempo to reach and a gate to pass before the next one.

  1. Kick and snare, whole. The feet and the snare exactly as written, hi-hat pulled back to quarter notes. This is the part to know by heart.
  2. As written. Open hi-hat, ghost notes, accents and the crash where they belong.

Tempo goes 78, 92, 106 and 120 BPM, and the gate at each one is 8 loops in a row with no wrong note and no wobble in the time.

PRACTISE THIS BEAT →

Questions

What drum beat does Black Sheep (Scott Pilgrim vs. The World) use?

A one-bar groove on hi-hat, snare and kick, in 4/4 at 120 BPM, counted in sixteenth notes. It is written out above, and it covers 23.7% of the bars the kit plays.

Where does the beat come in?

Bars 36-42, 55, 71-77 and 79-85. The time is kept on the silence to start with, and it changes 10 times over the song.

Is the beat in Black Sheep (Scott Pilgrim vs. The World) hard?

67 out of 100 on its own -- demanding. The song as a whole is 45 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in the independence between the hands and the feet.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 103 BARS ANALYSED