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Dark Matter · Steve Vai

EXERCISE 6 OF 46
Groove I -- Outro
51 / 128 BARS COVERED
0 / 46 PASSED · 6 BARS LIT · IN THE PART F, PART I, OUTRO
PART F
PART I
OUTRO
OUTRO 2
5 groovesBIFS2S3Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 3
FILL · 14
LAND · 14
RUN · 2
JOIN · 5
LINK · 3
SECTION · 4
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Dark Matter on drums

128 bars of 4/4 at 126 BPM, about 4:04 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

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

TEMPO
126 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
128
LENGTH
4:04
DIFFICULTY
55/100

kick and crashes through bar 1, snare through bars 2-4, silence through bars 5-9, toms through bars 10-13, hi-hat through bars 14-29 and ride through bars 30-31, and 12 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 2-4, 60 and 62, and 7 more places -- 22% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    2
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
CC |x---x---x---x---|
SD |----x-------x---|
BD |x-x---x-x-x---x-|
Dark Matter -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

14 fills to learn, played 65 times: bars 10, 11, 12, 13, 22, 23 and 59 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 31 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 -- B -- 3 exercises, about 20 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- F -- 2 exercises, about 19 minutes.
  3. The grooves the song is built on -- I -- 5 exercises, about 27 minutes. Open above.
  4. Through the Outro and the Outro 2 -- 3 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  5. Bars 3-24 -- 7 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  6. Through Part F and Part I -- 6 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  7. Bars 28-73 -- 6 exercises, about 31 minutes.
  8. Through the Outro 2 -- 6 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  9. and 2 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Dark Matter?

126 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in sixteenth notes. The room plays it at any tempo from a quarter of that up to the written one, against the record where the record can follow.

Is Dark Matter hard to play on drums?

55 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 29 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

128 bars, about 4:04 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 31 exercises over 10 sittings, about 25 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, 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 Dark Matter?

14 fills to learn, played 65 times: bars 10, 11, 12, 13, 22, 23 and 59 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 128 BARS ANALYSED