Arix-Arix would love some help pretty please :)

[Alix]

I have a terrible confession: after 7 years of playing I'm STILL petrified of improvisations, because I'm petrified of sounding like shit even infront of myself when I know no-one else is listening. I think my poor self-esteem has a shitload to do with it.

I guess it's not too late to seek help etc. I'm open to all sorts of suggestions, stories, whatever.

*sigh* it depresses me that I've been playing for longer than I've been listening to metal yet it's still an issue for me...

[devildriver_drummer]

Just keep practicing, as I say, the better you know your instrument, the easier it will be able to put out a solo out of nowhere or a little fill solo in a song or whatever. Just practice little things you can put into one big...thing

And keep practicing your shizzzz!!!1

[[bslsthgrt!]]

Try this... play a song you know well, and get comfortable in the beat. Then, start adding little bits, just an extra bass beat here, and extra hi-hat rise there etc, and build on that. Pretty soon, you'll be able to improvise with the best of 'em. That's the method I used to make the leap from repetition to improvisation, and I might not be very good yet with only 1 year's experience but I can improvise now lol.

[blastbeatsforbreakfast]

quit worrying what other people think.

i typically warm up by "soloing" by myself for an hour.

[Alix]

Trouble is I worry about what I think infront of myself, which I know is really quite pathetic, and too much playing of what I thought was absolute rubbish ruins a session for me completely Of course it's worse when I'm playing with the band (even after all the reashurance), and I wouldn't be caught dead improvising live haha.

Hopefully I'll get myself that e-kit I saw on sale and give that one a go [bslsthgrt!]. Guitarist from my main band made up a CD of the songs he wrote with basic drum ideas on it so we'll start with that.

[anarchist_tomato]

learn your rudiments and spread 'em over snare and toms, and even learn 'em on your feet.

when your metronome training your double bass (that 150 for 15 minutes thing you were doing), spend the time improving over the toms and so on, just keep filling for most of the time while your feet are bashing away to the beat. this will teach you more indpendence and get you comfy with new chops that fit within the beat.

[Alix]

Sounds like a plan

I got myself an e-kit today which I'm hoping will inspire me to practice again and experiment with ideas without shitting off the neighbours. I also got myself a book too. It said it was basic drumming but it was pretty thick so I gave it a quick flick; and its pretty extensive, so I'll work my way though it as well. It reminds me of school bands from back in the day

[anarchist_tomato]

e-kits will help more than you can guess, it gets rid of the shyness factor when training. if you're playing with the book stuff, get the book on lars ulrich, written around the time of justice. i picked up a hell of a lot of chops from that (great for improv). also, learn the skill of stuffing up with style, like dropping the beat but recovering in a way that makes it sound like you were just filling/improving

[[bslsthgrt!]]

The E-kit will help, since no one will be able to hear you properly lol. Just keep going until you've got something original on the E-kit, then play the same thing on your acoustic kit (Y)

Just don't drop sticks, like I keep doing recently

[Alix]

hahaha!
I generally only lose sticks when I'm trying to do fancy tricks with them...almost lost one during the first song of my first gig

[[bslsthgrt!]]

The last gig we played I dropped 2 lol... we were playing in front of an almost 100% chav audience, so they just didn't care at all. I tried a bit too hard to impress and ended up with a stick on the floor... twice.