Drum Lesson : Seven Days - verse groove (www.joecrabtree.com)

Full album chorus transcription and outro from the Live in Oslo version available in the Drum Vault at www.joecrabtree...
An explanation of Vinnie's groove for the verse of Sting's Seven Days.

[@wesj1989]

This is like writing in Latin with your left hand, writing in English in your right, and painting a Da Vinci with your feet. ALL AT THE SAME FREAKIN' TIME!! Props to anyone who can play this.

[@drummerguy626]

what ever, im not here to argue, i was just trying to point out that he said one thing and played another. its a good video, one of the best ive seen of this song on here

[@geraldarena5983]

Excellent job explaining this tricky beat, Mr. Crabtree. Especially the hi hat pattern.

[@yanyan201]

Seven Days is a fascinating piece of music. The timing of it had me stumped for ages but thanks to this video I now know what's going on ! Thank you.

[@simon.jacobs.0709]

That was extremely well done, in total control, while understanding exactly what is happening in the pattern variations and demonstrating them with ease.

[@jazzpianoman01]

Hi Joe, Thanks for explaining the Vinnie groove here; I shall certainly sit down and break it down for practice

[@slowhand06]

Hats off to you, well explained and demostrated. As someone who had lessons but could never figure it out too well if it was explained and counted out like that, it made a lot of sense. I always figured it out by listening and copying... The hard way probably!

[@scottp118]

Hi. If he's calling the song's hi-hat part sixteenth notes, which he does, then we're dealing with long 5/4 measures, with 2backbeats each. But he's counting twice as fast, in 5/8. He's inconsistent, because he's calling the second accent per phrase (the one he says is bass drum optional)the and of 2, which it would only actually be if it were in 5/8. In 5/4 it would be the "ah" (3rd sixteenth note) of 1.

[@peteharman1061]

THIS IS FANTASTIC WORK THANK YOU

[@johanehn]

That's it! I'm gonna buy a drum kit.

[@Jez2008UK]

You are such a talented young man. A gifted drummer and teacher. Thank you for educating us.

[@KRAZEEIZATION]

Great demonstration. I love that song and I want to master it on drums. Thanks for doing this!

[@farclebaba]

This groove is a stellar example of Vinnie's unique genius on this instrument. There a very select group of players who could play this and makes feel relaxed, comfortable, and grooving like all hell the way Vinnie does. Furthermore, I'll say that there are very few drummers who possess the kind of creativity Vinnie has to even invent this groove, and all of the drum parts for this song in the first place. Vinnie's space-alien, computer brain is without peer in terms of what he can do on the fly/improvisation-ally with polyrhythms, and Zappa's words bear that out. Zappa said Vinnie was incredibly unique in his ability to calculate, and feel, in real-time, extremely complex and unusual polyrhythms and polymeters. It really astounded Zappa, and that in itself is an amazing thing. But what's REALLY special about Vinnie's playing is this incredible facility described above, combined with his amazingly rare creativity. Vinnie is simply brilliant at writing parts that no one else would think of. He'll approach a groove, or a part and just throw the rulebook out the window. And it WILL SOUND AMAZING. He's really an outside of the box thinker in this regard. An artist in the truest sense. Vinnie's playing holds a very special place in the league of elite drummers and musicians from the late part of the 20th century. Go read about his audition for Zappa if you want to be amazed.

[@markshina3511]

Best tutorial out there!

[@jon325]

WOW - fantastic!!! Great walk-through!!! Excellent work!!!

[@farclebaba]

FANTASTIC breakdown Joe. Love it.

[@galapagosdrum]

Brilliantly explained, brilliant playing!

[@bobbysbackingtracks]

Great lesson clarity. Thank you!

[@willy44]

joe, very nice of you to share without bravura! You play very well and Thank you for your 'straight ahead' offering. All the best to You and your drumming career. Sincerely, Steve B

[@GlenChild]

Love your playing, awesome as always Joe..Glen.

[@colmenaresarmada]

thank you so much for sharing your knowledge, I love that song, i'm a fan from venezuela. Someday i'll play it like you mate!

[@Cowri]

Brilliantly explained and executed, thanks mate!

[@Rockunstank]

Great Teacher / Instructor.

[@joecrabtreedrums]

I would write the part in 5/8 with 16ths on the hats. Reading in 5/8 I would count the 8th notes as 1,2,3,4,5,1,2,3,4,5 rather than 1,&,2,&,3,1,&,2,&,3 as it makes more sense. When explaining the main groove I'm in 5/8 counting the 8th notes as the pulse. When explaining the hihat accent loop I'm switching to 5/4 (2 x 5/8) considering the quarter note the pulse. A 16th note is half an 8th note whether you refer to it as an '&' or an 'e'. I hope the explanation wasn't too confusing.

[@HNIC94]

yeah man! good job. the best KZbin explanation I seen of this yet.

[@ViestursSamts]

so nice work!! i wanted to learn 5/4 all the time, and especially i knew this nice and difficult sting song.. so thank you for your work!!

[@perovaas]

Excellent, man! Made it clear and playable. Congrats and thanks!

[@clydezjr]

Very well illustrated and explained...thanks man!

[@markshina3511]

Perfect video

[@scottnewellguitar]

Great lesson and demo of this groove!

[@tcbetka]

Wow...outstanding explanation. Thanks for the video! Make me want to go play my drums!

[@dominic8129]

Cool explanation... Liked it 👍👍👍

[@therealrussellsmyth]

Great drumming and instructions Woeful backing track !

[@Cheektowga]

Thanks Joe! I found your "Seven Days" tutorial very informative...

[@drummersgroove]

Great explanation man, good work. And what a song this is!

[@gotmonkeyfinger]

Thank you Bro! NYC here.

[@jubankta1627]

Excellent lesson sir!!

[@chessdude67]

Very nice teaching! Thanks so much for the help. peace.

[@NickUK82]

very well explained and played. good job!

[@64bbfan]

You're a great teacher thank you

[@herrkaliyuga]

Nice work!

[@BmakinFilm]

There can be no doubt that this song is most easily counted, written and read in 5/4 time. Think simple! The more simply you think and count to yourself, the more relaxed you'll play. It is also easier to read 8th notes than to read 16ths, and music is always written to be most easily read, as all good copyists know. Look at a chart for Take Five (Dave Brubeck): 8th notes in 5/4.There is nothing strange about 190 bpm! Remember 'Wipe Out"? That is in 4/4 at almost the same tempo.

[@Pulcino84]

Super complimenti!!

[@sessiondrummer]

Joe! Good job mate. Wicekd editing etc...Of course great playing too. I always told you, you are so Vinnie..

[@robmurray2310]

broke this down lovely, thanks

[@pack1101]

Great work!

[@SilenzioParlaAgnese]

I guess he is right, if the song is in 5/4 then the metronome plays at (approx.) 190bpm, which is a very strange thing for this kind of music. i think it's better to approach it as a 5/8, but everyone should try to make learning and practicing easier, so if there's someone counting 5/4, no problem! Anyway, great explanation and great job!

[@joecrabtreedrums]

@snakespence Yeah, go to my website and click on Lessons->more lessons in the menu. The backing and transcription of the outro are in the drum vault (left hand side of the page). Thanks, Joe

[@HanDrumsolo]

It's 5 against 4, I'm pretty sure it was transcribed in the issue of modern drummer that Vinnie was in around the time the album came out

[@Mart1nWalkerDrums]

Ignore me. ..... Should've watched your whole thing before running my mouth. You nailed it. Nice.

[@fredericzanone5379]

Excellent

[@Avico78]

Thanks u ! Very helpful I think u are doing great job!

[@mesoprano]

Good job man !!!

[@joecrabtreedrums]

I don't have me playing it all the way through, but the play along and transcription are on my site (see link in video description)

[@scryc]

great lesson!

[@franciscoetchenique]

one, two, three, four, five...no matter what, eights or fours its your choice...once you choose, everything else relates to that. aaaannddd...this guy explains it perfectly well in 5-8, it works and if you thought of it in 5-4 you would have to think the accents as half notes which makes no sense

[@DrMorbid]

bhdrums: Every other quarter note (if you consider the fast hihat strokes as sixteenth notes). It will go over the bars but that's OK.

[@PhatPhunk]

Great lesson. Nice breakdown.. Really love that K hihat... :)

[@kimbye1]

Great lesson. Thanks :)

[@jaudsle]

nice work friend

[@TroyaE117]

Well expalined there Joe. Thanks. I can get the basic hi-hat, the snare and the base drum. Those hi-hat accents at 8.33 and elsewhere will need more time. I smile :)

[@Ventysize]

And there is a whole segment of videos on this song by Nick Molenda on youtube in case anyone would like another option

[@drummerguy626]

yeah, im not bashing him, just making sure he knows the correct tim signature for the song

[@joecrabtreedrums]

Hi, the majority of the transcription and play along is in the DrumVault on my site (bottom of the MasterClass page). There isn't another video. Thanks, Joe

[@LawrenceDelToroDrum]

good job thanks , a favorite .

[@MentzArtPixLab]

The song was written in 5/8 but all we now that in US they develop a groove using 2 bar... But it's still a 5/8... Joe Crab show his method and he is a great... I think (like you) that accents comes by itself, but not all drummer are able to do it without create a structure like the one Joe show to us... More skilled you're, less things you need to listen before playing each cover... :-)

[@joecrabtreedrums]

@snakespence you have to make a donation to get the log in details.

[@BASSikneeds]

very helpful, thank you

[@jouxplan]

Absolutely fantastic stuff! I have tried to master this but it really is horribly difficult - I can't get it! Great explanation and great drumming - very, very impressive! Have a look at my drum vids - Genesis and Police, but no 'Seven Days' funnily enough! I take my hat off to you.

[@dpgweb]

Increible trabajo!! Me ayudó la ostia, un saludo crack!!

[@LudvigAlm]

@wesj1989 well, it is easier if you don't try to play the pieces as separate beats, but just concentrate on playing the whole groove as one... if you get what I mean. Don't try to write Latin with one hand and so on.. but paint a Da Vinci with written Latin and English in it... (I tried to be somewhat profound, and it didn't really work, but you get the point...)

[@123craw]

thanks! perfect !

[@TroyaE117]

I think the hi-hat is accented on 2 and 5, closed rimshot on 4, and base drum on 1. That's about all of it that I can manage.

[@tylerpons5887]

TroyaE117 If you watch live videos of Vinnie playing, he does the kick on 1 and and the and of 2. It sounds better in my opinion.

[@pilgy1]

nice one mate!

great job mate keep it up

[@poorcku]

i knew that drums are hard to play, but what you are doing here is godly. so i guess no drums for me, i'll stick to my guitar :) well done!

[@davidcipriani]

Realy, grate job, excellent, I like to hear the drums a little harder on the track! .. hugs joe!!

[@joecrabtreedrums]

@snakespence you don't need one. Just click through and paypal will let you use a card without signing up.

[@nolo68]

excellent !

[@kmb1]

Wow, leave it to drummers to debate over 8th and 1/4 notes! There is a difference between 5/8 and 5/4. Yes, two measures of 5/8 will equal one measure of 5/4 time wise, but in terms of phrasing, it doesn't work feel wise. Listen to the other instruments (in the original, non sequenced version). They are not counting 5/8, they're counting in 5/4. The quarter note is the pulse. Vinnie is a master of subdivision. Anything you have to do to figure it out is ok, but the song is in 5/4.

[@jamout65]

Awesome!

[@drummerguy626]

what i was trying to say is that he says its in 5/8 but when he is counting it out he is counting it in 5/4 not 5/8

[@writetovagelis1975]

two things to add in ur video. 1st the time in seven days is not 5/4 or 5/8 but it is 10/8.The way he has them analyzed is 3-3-2-2. also on the 16th note pattern on the hi hat ...why not play 134 of the tetraplette of sixteenths?The accent comes by itself every second bar. take care

[@bromungus6893]

Vagelis Moulakakis 10/8 is the same as 5/4

[@Export_Import]

easy and доступно ))))

[@RobertKarasekGermany]

perfect !!!!

[@LudvigAlm]

@Dylan6281 I guess it differs. I absolutely hate learning grooves as separate pieces, and it has never worked for me.

[@turbocixna]

thats the spirit!!!!

[@landart67]

My brain just ripped apart

[@jtromsness]

I was literally pulling out my hair and laughing

[@lala76]

freakky!thanks nw i can pretty much get this song

[@joecrabtreedrums]

@bringtharock Thank you. I spend a lot of my time working on the MasterClass lessons on my website. The aim is to make enough from those to be able to keep putting the free stuff up on KZbin too. Please check it out if you get the chance. There's a lot of good stuff in there.

[@drummerguy626]

actually, the way he explains it is in 5/4. a 5/8 measure is one 8th not shorter than a 3/4 measure, so how could that work for this song? the answer is it cant. its in 5/4

[@scottp118]

We have no way to know whether whether the song's 5/8 or 5/4; that time signature only determines how it's written. I agree that it would be easier to transcribe in 5/4, but we can't really say it IS in 5/4 or that it ISN'T in 5/8.

[@lguynn7]

Where did you get the track that you were playing to in the end with just the instruments and no drums, and where can I download it

[@mauricelebrun]

AAAAAAAAAAAll Right !!!! Gosh how could they find such a beat. I wonder who's the crazyiest???...Sting or Colaiuta. I'll work on it 'till I get it, thanks a lot. momo

[@4difference]

kick vinny! nice drum sound btw :)

[@joecrabtreedrums]

It's whatever you want it to be. I count it in 5/8, but the accent on the hi hat ends up in 5/4. You could write it all in 5/16 or 5/2 if you wanted, or even 4/4 (though that would look very confusing). Don't get too caught up in it once you know what's going on.

[@maeu59]

It’s 5/8

[@michellmaximo]

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

[@davidsteez5715]

great

[@Mart1nWalkerDrums]

HI, Nice tutorial, BUT..is it not the case that the recorded version actually features accented triplets on the hi hat not straight 16ths? Thats what I'm working on now. Check out my progress, Ive done a section in the cover where I play it like that