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Ride The Lightning · Megadeth

EXERCISE 5 OF 131
Groove AB -- Part AB
65 / 241 BARS COVERED
0 / 131 PASSED · 22 BARS LIT · IN THE PART AB
PART A
CHORUS
PART AB
PART AF
PART AB
PART AB
CHORUS 3
OUTRO 2
15 groovesCAFABMG+10Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 19
FILL · 35
LAND · 35
RUN · 4
JOIN · 21
LINK · 4
SECTION · 12
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Ride The Lightning on drums

241 bars of 4/4 at 154 BPM, about 6:12 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

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

TEMPO
154 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
241
LENGTH
6:12
DIFFICULTY
62/100

toms through bars 1-12, hi-hat through bars 13-135, kick and crashes through bars 136-139, hi-hat through bars 140-147, ride through bars 148-152 and hi-hat through bars 153-184, and 2 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 13-16, 18-19 and 39-40, and 15 more places -- 14.6% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    14
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
HH |o---o---o---o---|
SD |----x-------x---|
BD |x-------------x-|
Ride The Lightning -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

35 fills to learn, played 54 times: bars 12, 20, 21, 34, 37, 38 and 48 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 95 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 -- C, AF -- 4 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- AB -- 2 exercises, about 25 minutes. Open above.
  3. Through Part A and the Chorus -- 7 exercises, about 34 minutes.
  4. Bars 20-220 -- 3 exercises, about 19 minutes.
  5. Through the Chorus and Part G -- 3 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  6. Bars 34-75 -- 6 exercises, about 31 minutes.
  7. Bars 41-214 -- 5 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  8. Through Part J and Part M -- 4 exercises, about 23 minutes.
  9. and 18 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Ride The Lightning?

154 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 Ride The Lightning hard to play on drums?

62 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 26 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

241 bars, about 6:12 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 95 exercises over 26 sittings, about 26 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, 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 Ride The Lightning?

35 fills to learn, played 54 times: bars 12, 20, 21, 34, 37, 38 and 48 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 241 BARS ANALYSED