Big Drum Thump

Hmmm….What do you get for the drummer who already has everything? Maybe Protection Racket‘s new Drum Mat Bag. From the press release:

Ask any drummer, “what is the first thing you do when setting up”, and they will tell you, “put down my drum mat”. The drum mat, the unsung hero of any drummers set up, like any piece of equipment, needs to be protected from the elements, easy to carry and store, quickly identified and secure when packed up.

The new Protection Racket Drum Mat Bag is 100% waterproof, super lightweight and comes with a draw string entry, keeping your mat secure and tightly rolled when packed away. The central carry handle makes it easy to move about, in comparison to the more usual “under the arm” carry job!

Made of tough abrasion resistant nylon, the Protection Racket Drum Mat Bag includes a clear white panel for name and contact details. It comes in two sizes, Single Bass (2m x 1.6m) at an unbelievable £12.99 [$26] RRP and Double bass version (2.75m x 1.6m) at an incredible £13.99 [$28] RRP.

A whole lot of fans think so (nearly 13,000 so far have petitioned to have Death Magnetic remastered…and you know how goddamn lazy people are about activism), but Lars predictably disagreed yesterday on Blender‘s blog:

Listen, there’s nothing up with the audio quality. It’s 2008, and that’s how we make records. [Producer] Rick Rubin’s whole thing is to try and get it to sound lively, to get it to sound loud, to get it to sound exciting, to get it to jump out of the speakers. Of course, I’ve heard that there are a few people complaining. But I’ve been listening to it the last couple of days in my car, and it sounds fuckin’ smokin’.

Somebody told me about [people complaining that the Guitar Hero version of Death Magnetic sounds better]. Listen, what are you going to do? A lot of people say [the CD] sounds great, and a few people say it doesn’t, and that’s OK. You gotta remember, when we put out …And Justice for All, people were going, ‘What happened to these guys, this record? There’s no bass on it. It sounds like it was recorded in a fuckin’ garage on an eight-track.’ And now …And Justice for All is sort of the seminal Metallica record that supposedly influenced a whole generation of death-metal bands. The difference between back then and now is the Internet.

The Internet gives everybody a voice, and the Internet has a tendency to give the complainers a louder voice. Listen, I can’t keep up with this shit. Part of being in Metallica is that there’s always somebody who’s got a problem with something that you’re doing: ‘James Hetfield had something for breakfast that I don’t like.’ That’s part of the ride.

I will say that the overwhelming response to this new record has exceeded even our expectations as far as how positive it is. So I’m not gonna sit here and get caught up in whether [the sound] ‘clips’ or it doesn’t ‘clip.’ I don’t know what kind of stereos these people listen on. Me and James [Hetfield] made a deal that we would hang back a little and not get in the way of whatever Rick’s vision was. That’s not to put it on him – it’s our record, I’ll take the hit, but we wanted to roll with Rick’s vision of how Metallica would sound.

Looking out for all of us drummers-on-the-go (not to mention all of us drummers-living-in-small-apartment-buildings), HQ Percussion has unveiled the RealFeel Bass Drum Practice Pad. It’s designed to work with both single and double pedals, and it can fold flat to fit in any travel bag or even a backpack. The foam rubber beater pad was selected for its resistance to wear, soft and unobtrusive sound, and its realistic rebound that will allow drummers to practice foot technique without compromising the feel they’d obtain from a real drum. Hell yeah! It retails for $79.99.

Primarily known for its line of budget acoustic drums, Performance Percussion has entered the sub-$1,000 electronic market with the new PP900E. The kit features five drum pads, a kick pedal, and three cymbal pads (including a hi-hat pad and control pedal). The drum module comes with 215 high-quality voices and 20 preset kit sounds. The entire package retails for about 800 bucks, but we did find one U.K. store selling it for $662.13. At that price point, you’re going to be sacrificing a whole lot of sound quality and feel…but it beats the hell out of playing on telephone books.

Before he made a name playing drums in Alkaline Trio, Derek Grant went by the name of Reaper and sang for a band called Dead End. He says on his MySpace page:

For a period of about three years I answered only to the name Reaper. My hair style changed slightly, but I still retained all of the b-movie mentality of those early days (I ask myself now, has it ever gone away?) The tapes I had made found their way into the hands of some older musicians who wanted to start a band, and so Dead End was born….I continued to write new material and when we could, we would borrow devices to record. Thus, documenting the rise of Reaper—through puberty and beyond (you can actually here my voice change throughout these recordings.) After a few short years of playing parties, roller skating rinks, and punk clubs the band drifted apart.

He recently found some of those old Dead End tunes and has made them available for free download here. The MySpace entry also includes artwork and a short synopsis of each song.

[via Buzznet]

Our dude in the trenches caught some surreptitious iPhone pics of Tokyo Police Club’s gig at the Fonda. Drummer Greg Alsop was a little too busy to stop and smile.