The Skull Beneath The Skin · Megadeth

134 bars of 4/4 at 120 BPM, about 4:28 of playing, on crash, ride, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

MetalRock120 to 149 BPM
TEMPO
120 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
134
LENGTH
4:28
DIFFICULTY
63/100
THE BEAT

One bar, and 30% of the song

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 90-96, 98-100 and 102-104, and 4 more places -- 29.8% of every bar the kit plays. That is the spine of it; everything else is what happens around it.

LOOP · 120 BPM
THE SKULL BENEATH THE SKIN · BAR 90
THE BEAT, WRITTEN OUT →
THE FILLS

Where it comes off the beat

11 fills to learn, played 22 times: bars 19, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27 and 16 more.

LOOP · 120 BPM
BAR 19 · LANDS ON BAR 20
LOOP · 120 BPM
BARS 23-27 · LANDS ON BAR 28 · PLAYED 5 TIMES
LOOP · 120 BPM
BARS 30-31 · LANDS ON BAR 32 · PLAYED 2 TIMES
LOOP · 120 BPM
BARS 46-47 · LANDS ON BAR 48 · PLAYED 2 TIMES

7 more fills are written out on the fills page.

EVERY FILL, WRITTEN OUT →
THE SHAPE

How the song is built

134 bars across 9 sections: 86 keep time, 22 are fills, 5 are stops and 10 are silent. The longest unbroken stretch of time is bars 118-132.

COUNT-IN
PART C
PART P
PART T
PART Y
VERSE
OUTRO
OUTRO 2
9 groovesAKCPTAH+4Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest

Questions

What BPM is The Skull Beneath The Skin?

120 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 The Skull Beneath The Skin hard to play on drums?

63 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 54 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

134 bars, about 4:28 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 39 exercises over 13 sittings, about 24 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 The Skull Beneath The Skin?

11 fills to learn, played 22 times: bars 19, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27 and 16 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 134 BARS ANALYSED
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