ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play The Ghoul on drums

97 bars of 4/4 at 150 BPM, about 2:34 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom, kick and hi-hat foot.

93 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is the independence between the hands and the feet.

TEMPO: 150 BPM
TIME: 4/4
BARS: 97
LENGTH: 2:34
DIFFICULTY: 93/100

snare through bar 1, hi-hat through bars 2-17, ride through bars 18-29, hi-hat through bars 30-41, ride through bars 42-53 and hi-hat through bars 54-65, and 4 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is a 2-bar phrase, played through bars 2-17, 38-41 and 62-65, and 1 more place -- 28.9% of every bar the kit plays. That is the spine of it; everything else is what happens around it.

    2                                3
    1.......2.......3.......4....... 1.......2.......3.......4.......
HH |----x---o---o-------x---o---o---|----x---o---o-------o---o---o---|
SD |--------x---------------x-------|--------x---------------x-x-x-x-|
BD |x-----x---x---x-x-----x---x---x-|x-----x---x---x-x-----x---x---x-|
HF |----------------x---------------|x---------------x---------------|

The Ghoul -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

6 fills to learn, played 9 times: bars 29, 33, 53, 57, 73, 77 and 3 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 39 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.

The grooves the song is built on -- B -- 2 exercises, about 24 minutes. Open above.
The grooves the song is built on -- F -- 1 exercise, about 15 minutes.
The grooves the song is built on -- J -- 3 exercises, about 26 minutes.
Through the Chorus and Part D -- 3 exercises, about 28 minutes.
Through Part D and Part F -- 2 exercises, about 20 minutes.
Through Part F and Part I -- 4 exercises, about 31 minutes.
Through Part F and Part I -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes.
Bars 30-57 -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes.
and 8 more sittings after that.

START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is The Ghoul?

150 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 The Ghoul hard to play on drums?

93 out of 100. Hard, and what makes it hard is the independence between the hands and the feet. The beat itself is 78 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

97 bars, about 2:34 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 39 exercises over 16 sittings, about 23 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 The Ghoul?

6 fills to learn, played 9 times: bars 29, 33, 53, 57, 73, 77 and 3 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 97 BARS ANALYSED