KISS · DRUM BEAT

The drum beat in Firehouse

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 32-33, 36-37 and 39-41, and 5 more places -- 18.5% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

TEMPO
116 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
91
LENGTH
3:07
DIFFICULTY
43/100

The beat, written out

LOOP · 116 BPM
FIREHOUSE · BAR 32

It is played on hi-hat, snare and kick, counted in sixteenth notes. On its own it scores 38 out of 100 -- a fair first song -- and the thing that decides that is the independence between the hands and the feet.

The whole song is 43 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 87 BPM, and adds the notes back a rung at a time -- 3 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. Skeleton. Only the notes that land on a beat. The point is to feel where this bar stands.
  2. 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.
  3. As written. Open hi-hat, ghost notes, accents and the crash where they belong.

Tempo goes 87, 102 and 116 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 Firehouse use?

A one-bar groove on hi-hat, snare and kick, in 4/4 at 116 BPM, counted in sixteenth notes. It is written out above, and it covers 18.5% of the bars the kit plays.

Where does the beat come in?

Bars 32-33, 36-37, 39-41 and 43-44, and 4 more places. The time is kept on the silence to start with, and it changes 11 times over the song.

Is the beat in Firehouse hard?

38 out of 100 on its own -- a fair first song. The song as a whole is 43 out of 100 -- a fair first song -- with the independence between the hands and the feet the part that decides it.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 91 BARS ANALYSED