Die By The Sword · DragonForce

182 bars at 160 BPM -- fast, and 4:32 of it without a break -- on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

Metal150 BPM and up
TEMPO
160 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
182
LENGTH
4:32
DIFFICULTY
80/100
THE BEAT

One bar, and 22% of the song

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 9-11, 27-29 and 39-40, and 10 more places -- 21.5% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

LOOP · 160 BPM
DIE BY THE SWORD · BAR 10
THE BEAT, WRITTEN OUT →
THE FILLS

Where it comes off the beat

25 fills to learn, played 39 times: bars 4, 8, 12, 13, 17, 18 and 33 more.

LOOP · 160 BPM
BAR 4 · LANDS ON BAR 5
LOOP · 160 BPM
BAR 8 · LANDS ON BAR 9
LOOP · 160 BPM
BARS 12-13 · LANDS ON BAR 14 · PLAYED 2 TIMES
LOOP · 160 BPM
BARS 17-18 · LANDS ON BAR 19 · PLAYED 2 TIMES

21 more fills are written out on the fills page.

EVERY FILL, WRITTEN OUT →
THE SHAPE

How the song is built

182 bars across 20 sections: 92 keep time, 39 are fills, 15 are stops and 19 are silent. The longest unbroken stretch of time is bars 20-25.

PART L
CHORUS 3
PART L
CHORUS 4
PART S13
PART AB
PART AK
OUTRO
OUTRO 2
11 groovesELABIS13+6Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest

Questions

What BPM is Die By The Sword?

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

Is Die By The Sword hard to play on drums?

80 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 80 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

182 bars, about 4:32 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 62 exercises over 17 sittings, about 26 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, 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 Die By The Sword?

25 fills to learn, played 39 times: bars 4, 8, 12, 13, 17, 18 and 33 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 182 BARS ANALYSED
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