New Stuff!
Here's a review on a variety of items I got a week or two back.
The items are:
Regal Tip Ed Thigpen Model Brushes
Vic Firth Dreadlocks
Vic Firth Peter Erskine model drumsticks
Pro Mark Hot Rods
Moongels
1. The Ed Thigpen Model brushes are very nice. They feature retractable wire brushes, with a rubber handle. However, the back third or so of the handle is made of wood. This is very handy because with the metal butt on the end, the wood on the end of the handle, and the brush on the front, you can get a variety of different sounds (although considering there's not much wood on the back you won't be getting as good sounding cross sticks and stuff as you would with regular sticks). The brushes themselves are very nice, the fulcrum point is right where the rubber meets the wood so there is a fine grip, and the wire brushes are very flexy, making a smooth and delicate brush sound. They seem to glide across the heads much nicer than my old Zildjian brushes. The only thing thats not as good about these brushes is that if you want to try and do that trick where you turn the brush around and roll it on the drumhead for a cool effect (if you know what I mean) if you aren't careful then the brush will slide because of the wood part. Otherwise great brushes overall, I highly suggest them if you are in search of that light brush sound
2. The Vic Firth Dreadlocks are also very nice, giving you plenty of room to be creative and get cool sounds. They are quite large and ship in this pretty big box, which surprised me. They feature wood handels with braided metal wires attached to the handle. When I first ordered them I was picturing that the wires would be more flexy like a pair of brushes but with more attack, but they are very stiff. Nonetheless they are quite nice. They have a sharp attack with a unique sort of clicketty/scrape sound, and aren't as loud as regular sticks. They sound great on both drums and cymbals, and you can get a cool scraping sound if desired. They sound like stiff, aggressive brushes with a lot of attack if you sweep them on the head in circles in stuff. I also enjoy sticking half of the wires in the ride cymbal and going up and down, making a sort of one handed roll effect on the ride. These are very cool and creative and sound quite good.
3. The Vic firth Peter Erskine sticks are what I've been using for a while now. They are about 5A size and are quite long and thin with plenty of bounce. The small beaded tip allows for great delicate sounds on cymbals and a great feel for jazzy type styles.
4. The Pro Mark hot rods are great, I'm sure many of you have used them before. They combine bounce and feel with a sound thats louder than brushes but softer than sticks, with good attack. On cymbals they produce a very delicate sound which I personally really like, although others may not. Highly suggested
5. The Moongels are amazing! I put one directly on each of my three lower toms, and they instantly cut out all the undesired overtones on each drum. By using the right amount, they don't deaden the drum too much but instead make it sound deeper and fuller. They take away the resonance a bit, too. On my 16" floor tom one significantly takes out the overtones and lessens the resonance a little bit, leaving my deepest tom slightly more resonant than the others. However, a whole moongel on my 14 and 12" toms makes them sound perfect. On my 10" tom and my snare, I like some of the overtones so I get nice sharp rimshots and full buzz rolls on the snare, so I cut the last moongel in half and put a half on each drum. Now that took away the undesired buzz and ring out of these two drums while still making them sound great. I highly suggest the moongels
I also ordered the book Extreme Interdependence by Marco Minneman, I'll try and get a review of it done once it comes and I've gone through it a bit! Hope all this helps!
Last edited by oaktree137; 08-23-2010 at 06:43 PM.
~Pearl, Zildjian, Hammerax, Remo, Vic Firth, LP, Pulse~
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