Aviator Worship

Flailing Monkeys

Nov 8, 2011 Aviator Worship
Posted by Weston

You are PUMPED!! You plug in your guitar, click on the glorious dotted eighth delay, look over at your bassist who just turned his volume up and give him the “we’re awesome-let’s do this” nod. You step up to the mic with your supporting musicians behind you. You strike your first chord, but what’s this? You are playing all alone! An unexpected solo. There was no count off, no crashing or thumping sounds. O ya, no drummer…

You have no drummer, what do you do? First, you get on your knees and pray, regularly. I am not figuratively speaking, literally get on your knees, thank God for what you have, and pray for a drummer, regularly.

Until God chooses that you have learned what you need to learn without a drummer, what do you do until you get one? You have a few options, and by a few I mean less than 4, but more than 2, unless you are really creative.

Your first option is to do acoustic sets. You do not necessarily need any percussion for this, but if you have a coordinated guitarist or singer, ask if they would be interested in playing the djembe or cajon. Acoustics can lack intensity, so be careful, but they can also be very intimate. Also, egg shakers never hurt. Unless they are thrown, then they hurt pretty bad.

Secondly, use a click. Just make a click of the songs tempo and run that through your in ears. This, however, will not work without in ear monitors. You can add vocal cues like “chorus” or “verse” to keep everyone together. This will allow you to have a central tempo and to do more with what you have. Some programs for making a simple click, I would recommend Audacity for PC users or Garageband for Mac users. Just use a midi track and select woodblock or beep. You will want to make the first “click” different so it is distinguishable from “two three” and “four”.

Lastly, I would recommend making a click track with drums programmed in. This is the most expensive, time consuming, and frustrating option. With this, you will be able to have a click in your ears and run the drums through the system. This will allow you to have intensity and a lot of diversity. The way to do this is get a drumming software, I suggest EZDrummer or Addictive Drums, listen to the song and program the drums in. Map it out. Know how many verses, choruses, and bridges there are. You can use simple beats, or do it exactly like the song. I prefer to do it exactly like the song. People will not notice the lack of drummer as much and it allows you to keep the “feel” of that song. You can use programs like Fruity Loops, Acid Pro, Pro Tools, Garageband, Logic, Reason, etc. to make the clicks. To run it live, just get an 1/8th in. to L/R 1/4th in. cable and run your click panned all the way left and drums all the way right. You can use an iPod or computer to execute it live. Like I said, this is the hardest option, but I feel like for my situation it is the best out of the three for me, and I want to give God my best.

Whatever you choose, DO NOT let it replace a drummer. No computer program can follow you and do an extra chorus at the end or improvise a solution for a problem. Pray, everyday. Do the best you can with what you have.

Work hard and pray harder,

Weston Heflin

Aviator Students, Worship Leader