← SONGS

Slave to Nothing · Fit for a King

EXERCISE 10 OF 66
Groove N -- Part N (a two-bar phrase)
27 / 106 BARS COVERED
0 / 66 PASSED · 6 BARS LIT · IN THE PART N
COUNT-IN
CHORUS
PART N
PART V
CHORUS 2
PART AC
PART N
PART AO
OUTRO
10 groovesDNS1VAO+5Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 9
FILL · 18
LAND · 18
RUN · 3
JOIN · 9
LINK · 2
SECTION · 6
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play Slave to Nothing on drums

106 bars of 4/4 at 110 BPM, about 3:48 of playing, on crash, hi-hat, snare, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

62 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in how much of it falls off the beat.

TEMPO
110 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
106
LENGTH
3:48
DIFFICULTY
62/100

silence through bars 1-17, snare through bars 18-24, toms through bars 25-29, hi-hat through bars 30-33, snare through bars 34-37 and hi-hat through bars 38-41, and 10 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 19, 22-23 and 56, and 3 more places -- 10.3% of every bar the kit plays. This one moves around more than most: the beat is where to start, not the whole job.

    19
    1.......2.......3.......4.......
CC |x-------x-------x-------x-------|
SD |----------------x---------------|
BD |x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-xxx-x-xxx-x-x-|
Slave to Nothing -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

18 fills to learn, played 40 times: bars 18, 20, 21, 24, 25, 26 and 34 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 47 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 -- 5 exercises, about 31 minutes.
  2. Through the Chorus -- 3 exercises, about 16 minutes.
  3. The grooves the song is built on -- K -- 1 exercise, about 20 minutes.
  4. The grooves the song is built on -- N -- 4 exercises, about 28 minutes. Open above.
  5. Through Part K and Part N -- 3 exercises, about 26 minutes.
  6. Through Part N -- 6 exercises, about 25 minutes.
  7. Through Part N and Part V -- 5 exercises, about 32 minutes.
  8. Through Part V and the Chorus 2 -- 5 exercises, about 22 minutes.
  9. and 7 more sittings after that.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is Slave to Nothing?

110 BPM, in 4/4, with the time kept in thirty-second 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 Slave to Nothing hard to play on drums?

62 out of 100, a step up from a first song, and the work is in how much of it falls off the beat. The beat itself is 58 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

106 bars, about 3:48 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 47 exercises over 15 sittings, about 26 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, hi-hat, snare, 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 Slave to Nothing?

18 fills to learn, played 40 times: bars 18, 20, 21, 24, 25, 26 and 34 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 106 BARS ANALYSED