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Rocket Queen · Guns N' Roses

EXERCISE 16 OF 49
Verse 2 into Part H with the record (bars 29-36)
111 / 174 BARS COVERED
0 / 49 PASSED · 8 BARS LIT · IN THE VERSE 2, PART H
VERSE
VERSE 2
PART H
PART H
PART D
VERSE 5
PART O
CHORUS
OUTRO
7 groovesBUHDT+2Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 11
FILL · 6
LAND · 6
RUN · 1
JOIN · 9
LINK · 9
SECTION · 6
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Rocket Queen on drums

174 bars of 4/4 at 114 BPM, about 6:03 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

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

TEMPO
114 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
174
LENGTH
6:03
DIFFICULTY
61/100

snare through bar 1, hi-hat through bars 2-97, toms through bars 98-104, snare through bars 105-107, ride through bars 108-115 and hi-hat through bars 116-131, and 3 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 2-22, 28-30 and 42-44, and 3 more places -- 20.7% 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---------------|
HH |-ooooooooooooooo|
SD |----x-------x---|
BD |x------x--x-----|
Rocket Queen -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

6 fills to learn, played 21 times: bars 23, 27, 31, 40, 41, 45 and 15 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 42 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 -- 2 exercises, about 21 minutes.
  2. The grooves the song is built on -- T, D -- 2 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  3. Bars 1-28 -- 7 exercises, about 26 minutes.
  4. Through the Verse 2 and Part H -- 4 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  5. Bars 29-45 -- 6 exercises, about 32 minutes. Open above.
  6. Bars 44-83 -- 6 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  7. Bars 89-101 -- 3 exercises, about 28 minutes.
  8. Bars 94-174 -- 5 exercises, about 31 minutes.
  9. and 3 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Rocket Queen?

114 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 Rocket Queen hard to play on drums?

61 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 60 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

174 bars, about 6:03 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 42 exercises over 11 sittings, about 28 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, 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 Rocket Queen?

6 fills to learn, played 21 times: bars 23, 27, 31, 40, 41, 45 and 15 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 174 BARS ANALYSED