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This Means War · Avenged Sevenfold

EXERCISE 9 OF 44
Fill at bar 44, 84, 110 and 234 (a small one)
191 / 255 BARS COVERED
0 / 44 PASSED · 4 BARS LIT · IN THE CHORUS, OUTRO
CHORUS
OUTRO
7 groovesFBS10ZS5+2Fill into the next barFill that ends a sectionInto the next partStop / hitRest
GROOVE · 8
FILL · 11
LAND · 11
RUN · 1
JOIN · 6
SECTION · 6
WHOLE SONG · 1
ABOUT THIS DRUM PART

How to play This Means War on drums

255 bars of 4/4 at a walking 90 BPM, 11:20 of playing, on crash, hi-hat, snare, high tom, mid tom, floor tom and kick.

37 out of 100 -- a fair first song -- with the independence between the hands and the feet the part that decides it.

TEMPO
90 BPM
TIME
4/4
BARS
255
LENGTH
11:20
DIFFICULTY
37/100

snare through bars 1-6, kick and crashes through bars 7-8, toms through bars 9-10, hi-hat through bars 11-167, snare through bars 168-176 and toms through bars 177-180, and 4 more changes after that.

The beat

The beat the song is built on is one bar, played through bars 11-25, 29-43 and 45-50, and 28 more places -- 70.9% of every bar the kit plays. Learn that one and the song is very nearly finished.

    12
    1e+a2e+a3e+a4e+a
HH |o---o---o---o---|
SD |--------x-------|
BD |x---------------|
This Means War -- the groove · x hit · o open hi-hat · g ghost note · r cross-stick · X accent

The fills

11 fills to learn, played 23 times: bars 9, 10, 26, 44, 51, 60 and 17 more.

What the course does

It cuts the song into 32 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 -- F -- 8 exercises, about 32 minutes.
  2. Through the Chorus -- 9 exercises, about 30 minutes. Open above.
  3. Through the Chorus -- 4 exercises, about 29 minutes.
  4. Through the Chorus -- 5 exercises, about 30 minutes.
  5. Bars 165-184 -- 5 exercises, about 27 minutes.
  6. Bars 182-219 -- 9 exercises, about 31 minutes.
  7. The whole song -- 4 exercises, about 23 minutes.
START THE COURSE ↑

Questions

What BPM is This Means War?

90 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 This Means War hard to play on drums?

37 out of 100 -- a fair first song -- with the independence between the hands and the feet the part that decides it. The beat itself is 10 out of 100; the rest of the number is everything around it.

How long is the drum part?

255 bars, about 11:20 at the written tempo. The course breaks it into 32 exercises over 7 sittings, about 29 minutes each.

What do I need on the kit?

crash, 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 This Means War?

11 fills to learn, played 23 times: bars 9, 10, 26, 44, 51, 60 and 17 more.

READ OFF THE SCORE ITSELF · 255 BARS ANALYSED