Drum Theater

This issue’s update covers the various bits and pieces that bring us up to date in the world of Mike and his drum tech Eric Disrude – quite a bit to cover, so...

Just to add a little flesh to the bones of the “B-Rig” Mirage (acrylic) kit: this made its debut during the Asian dates of the Chaos in Motion tour – the kit was basically the same as the Albino B-Rig kit in configuration (two Octobans, two floor toms). Only two overhead mic’s were used on this kit. The holes cut in the front kick heads had no Holz reinforcers and the heads had stock black Tama logos. White pillows were used to match the white Melody Master 14” snare. Gold LP bar chimes instead of the silver finish versions on the Mirage Monster were also given an airing.

The LTE 10 Year Reunion shows, which followed the end of the Chaos in Motion tour, took MP, JP and JR out on the road again, accompanied by a mini-crew which included Eric and Stewart Wilson (DT’s monitor engineer). A variety of kits were used on these dates, with rehearsals taking place at the theatre being used for the Nearfest show – for this one, and the BB Kings show, parts of the Mirage Monster tour kit were plundered including 20” kick drum, 8” rack tom, two Octobans and 14” and 16” floor toms, an MP125 snare and a timbalito, which were not used in the Mirage Monster. Also, the original Roland Rhythm Coach was used for the “secret cowbell” (the version on the Mirage Monster kit used the separated module from a Rhythm Coach and was triggered by a Roland PD8 pad). An assortment of cymbals, all mounted on rack components from the Mirage tour kit, rounded it up.

The rehearsals started with the clear kick drum front head in place – this was replaced before the first show with a very cool graphic head, resplendent with the image from the first LTE album – very cool! Eric cut a hole in the head and fitted a 4” Holz reinforcer to prevent the head from splitting.

Further kits were employed as the tour progressed. In Chicago, an Astral Black Diamond finish Birch/Bubinga kit was used with 10” rack tom, 22” kick, two floor toms, and two (black finish) Octobans. Mike had a set of bar-chimes on this kit and used a black MP125 snare – the LTE logo kick head from the first two shows, was also transferred to this kit. TWO timbalitos were featured on this kit (in addition to the two Octobans) and the cymbal selection was slightly different from the first two shows. No rack was used.

The final kit on the tour was a Diamond Dust finish Birch/Bubinga kit. This was back to the same configuration as the first two shows, except a 10” rack tom and 22” kick were used, a white tambourine featured, two (black finish) Octobans (higher pitch than MP normally uses) and a new kick drum head featured (this one had the microphone hole cut out directly under the Tama logo on the head and didn’t use a Holz reinforcer. A black MP125 snare was used and the set-up reverted to one timbalito – again, cymbal selection was very similar to the other set-ups with MP having plenty of sound options!

With the summer break in between the end of the LTE tour and when DT entered the studio (Avatar in NYC) in October 2008 to record their latest album, Mike had obviously been doing some thinking about kit choice. I had fully expected him to use the Mirage Monster, but in true MP tradition, he surprised me by having two separate kits for the sessions – and NEITHER was a Mirage (acrylic)!

The main kit for the new album was a Tama Bubinga shelled variant in Black Metallic finish with a gold inlay: two 22” kicks, three racks, a floor tom either side and a Gong Bass drum in the same finish on Mike’s right comprised the Bubinga shelled drums. Four standard black finish Octobans to MP’s left plus a timbalito and the 14” Melody Master snare finished up the drum configuration. No rack was used – this harks back to the 6DOIT sessions when Mike was experimenting with the first conjoined kit set up. No rack was used as these have to be custom built when the final set-up has been arrived at (as was the case with all of Mike’s kits since “Awake” which featured his one and only Mapex kit).

The other kit was a Birch/Bubinga shelled kit in Red Sparkle Fade finish – this featured the 12” Melody Master snare and consisted of one rack tom and two floors. HOWEVER, from the studio pics that appeared on Jordan’s “Wizards Log”, there were other drums in this finish, so the configuration may have changed during the recording (as I write DT are a little over a month into recording, so plenty of time for things to change!).

Mike had Tama make and send him a custom 8” snare drum a month or so into the recording sessions – again on Jordan’s site, there was the clip of MP opening the box only to find that the drum and it’s components were all there (no heads though), but not connected to each other! (i.e. the drum would have to be ASSEMBLED in the studio!) This drum appeared to be a similar finish to the Bubinga kit, but again, it’s a LONG way into the future to speculate as to what kit Mike will use on the NEXT tour (or what the shells will be made of OR the finish).

I should add that Eric was NOT present for the load-in and kit set-up for these sessions – he was out on tour with another artist when DT entered the studio, but he WAS responsible for ordering the drums/hardware/cymbals etc. – he just wasn’t there to build the kits.

So that brings us up to date as of mid-November 2008 – phew! Until next time...