Talents Are Made Of This: Our Drummer Plays the Tiny Drum Machine Like a Video Game

After the morning Good Friday Mass, our drummer Wieke and I were talking about the popular video game “Guitar Hero” and the Stand Alone Drums that you can buy and play it like a pro.  For our jamming session right after the Mass that Cynthia, Wieke , and I have attended, our guitarist Jason has brought along a tiny drum machine to experiment at my humble home studio.  If you are curious about how it looks like, here is one.

Both Jason and I were quite skeptical on what this tiny machine can do.  Here is our dilemma: Recording at my home studio allows us to have a much better control over the sound quality but there’s no drum kit; jamming at a rented standard studio comes with drums but the recording is lousy.  Besides, my home studio is a more conducive environment to discuss and experiment on the different song arrangements.  And here is another dilemma.  It seems hard to get a live gig that provides a drum set.  Like an upcoming performance that I’ll share more once the detail is finalized.  Jason and I have talked about the possibility of using a drum machine for years but somehow, neither of us has managed to pull it off.  I don’t have the talent.  He doesn’t have the time.

I wish I could share the video our band manager Selrol has recorded as we witnessed the magic fingers of Wieke dancing over the tiny key pads live.  While the band played our usual set, she fed us with the beats that if I were to close my eyes, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between the way she plays a real drum set and this tiny drum machine (note: sound-wise, of course I can).  All of us were speechless. Not in a million years can I the songwriter be able do that.  I would love to have that talent though.  I shall start with “Guitar Hero”.  Maybe talents are made of this.  The kind of effortlessness.  My personal thought is that if we put time into nurturing what our talents are, we may be able to do something great.

So all of a sudden, recording a decent demo album at my home studio can be a reality; performing live with live drum beats without a drum set can also be a reality.  I’m excited, on what we can potentially do in a very near future.  We, or rather I, tend to be over optimistic right after our jamming sessions.  Having said that, I have a good feel on this.