ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Blindsides on drums

155 bars of 5/4 -- not four -- at 192 BPM, 3:45 of playing on crash, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

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

TEMPO: 192 BPM
TIME: 5/4
BARS: 155
LENGTH: 3:45
DIFFICULTY: 64/100

silence through bars 1-13, toms through bars 14-19, snare through bars 20-26, hi-hat through bars 27-40, toms through bars 41-43 and hi-hat through bars 44-54, and 7 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 20-22, 24 and 26, and 3 more places -- 8% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    20
    1...........2...........3...........4...........5...........
CC |X-----------g-----------x-----------g-----------x-----------|
SD |------------------------------g-----------x-----------------|
BD |x-----------x-----x-----x-----------x-----------------x-----|

Blindsides -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

21 fills to learn, played 32 times: bars 10, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 26 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 61 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.

The grooves the song is built on -- J -- 3 exercises, about 22 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- C, BJ -- 2 exercises, about 30 minutes.
Through the Chorus -- 4 exercises, about 25 minutes.
Through the Chorus and Part J -- 4 exercises, about 20 minutes.
Through Part J and Part N -- 6 exercises, about 32 minutes. Open above.
Through Part N and Part J -- 5 exercises, about 29 minutes.
Through Part J -- 5 exercises, about 32 minutes.
Through Part J and Part X -- 6 exercises, about 24 minutes.
and 10 more sittings after that.

START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Blindsides?

192 BPM, in 5/4, 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 Blindsides hard to play on drums?

64 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 55 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

155 bars, about 3:45 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 61 exercises over 18 sittings, about 26 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

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

How many fills are in Blindsides?

21 fills to learn, played 32 times: bars 10, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 26 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 155 BARS ANALYSED