← SONGS

Fortress Down · Loathe

EXERCISE 10 OF 43
Groove J
59 / 105 BARS COVERED
0 / 43 PASSED · 3 BARS LIT · IN THE PART D
CHORUS
PART G
PART D
PART L
CHORUS 2
PART R
PART L
PART W
OUTRO
9 groovesBLRGD+4Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 13
FILL · 2
LAND · 2
RUN · 4
JOIN · 10
LINK · 3
SECTION · 8
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Fortress Down on drums

105 bars of 4/4 at 143 BPM, about 2:55 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

63 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in how many notes a second it asks for.

TEMPO
143 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
105
LENGTH
2:55
DIFFICULTY
63/100

kick and crashes through bar 1, hi-hat through bars 2-17, toms through bars 18-20, hi-hat through bars 21-29, snare through bars 30-41 and hi-hat through bars 42-57, and 7 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 10, 12 and 14, and 10 more places -- 12.4% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    12
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
HH |X-x-X-x-X-x-X-x-|
SD |----x-------x---|
BD |--x---x---x---x-|
Fortress Down -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

2 fills to learn, played 6 times: bars 97, 98, 99, 100, 101 and 105.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 40 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 -- D, L -- 2 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- B -- 2 exercises, about 19 minutes.
  3. Bars 11-43 -- 2 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  4. Through Part G and Part D -- 3 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  5. Through Part D -- 3 exercises, about 31 minutes. Open above.
  6. Through Part D and Part L -- 3 exercises, about 21 minutes.
  7. Bars 27-43 -- 4 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  8. Bars 40-74 -- 6 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  9. and 4 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Fortress Down?

143 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 Fortress Down hard to play on drums?

63 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in how many notes a second it asks for. The beat itself is 49 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

105 bars, about 2:55 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 40 exercises over 12 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 Fortress Down?

2 fills to learn, played 6 times: bars 97, 98, 99, 100, 101 and 105.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 105 BARS ANALYSED