So I think my band just lost its drummer...

[Nik]

I think that maybe I'm just not destined to be in a band.

So we met this drummer through myspace 4 months ago. He was into Dream Theater and all the bands that I was into, and he could play their stuff. He also had 2 drumkits, one of which was wired to record. So basically, he had the right attitude, the right equipment, and most importantly, the talent. And all was good.

Then he had to get his leg operated and was out of commission for a while, but we worked with him, and he got back in shape.

One thing I noticed was that he never answered our e-mails... ever. I would write, "Hey man, we jamming tomorrow, get back to me with a 'yes' or 'no' ASAP." And I would never get an answer. We would call him and rarely be able to get in touch with him. Most of the time his phone would ring and ring and no one would pick up. There would be periods where we couldn't contact him for as long as 3-4 weeks.

Now, he's had problems and things, and we gave him the benefit of doubt. But I would look on his myspace and see that he is actually logging into his myspace every single day, so there's no way he's missing our messages. At one point, my bassist ended up sending him the same message 25 times in order to prompt a reply by way of annoyance.

The first time this happened, we decided not to talk to him about this issue. He was still new to the band, so we figured that when he got to know us better and we became better friends, then he'd be more inclined to answer our e-mails and phone calls. Plus, he's such a nice guy that we couldn't bear to have such a talk with him.

Now it's happened again; we made plans for this Saturday last week, and he again failed to follow through. He said that he'd call my bassist back this morning. My bassist waiting 1 hour, then 2. No call every came. And yet we could see that he was on-line on his myspace. Stuff like this happening once wouldn't bother me, but this has been happening as long as we've known him

By these actions I get the impression he's not interested in being in the band, and yet when we talk to him in person, he seems very enthusiastic about it. He's slowing the band down-big time. And if he's really not interested in the band, that means we've wasted 4 months of progress with him, while we could've been looking for a new drummer.

Music is my favorite thing in the world; I spend 100% of my free time doing music, and the jams we had with him was what I would look forward to the most during my entire week. So when he backs down from his promises I can't help but feel bad.

We wrote him an e-mail today:

For the 20th time in a row now, you have fallen back on your promises and failed to respond to our messages. We realize that in life stuff comes up from time to time, but it's sad when we make plans a week ahead of time and you fail to follow through. It's also sad that you promised KC to call him and you never did.

For us, this creates the illusion that you're not really interested in pursuing this band thing any further. Quite frankly, you are slowing the band down. Look at it from our point of view: I devote 100% of my free time writing, recording, and trying to get the band off the ground, and KC also invests a majority of his time into the band. So maybe you can see why we're pretty pissed off right now.

We're not asking you for the same sort of devotion as we put in; but I don't think asking for 1 jam per week is asking too much. I don't think asking you to follow up on your promises and respond to our calls and e-mails is asking too much of you.

You're cool and all, but right now you're slowing the band down, and that's something we really can't afford. If this is all a big misunderstanding or if you are genuinely interested in being in the band, then that's fine; we are willing to wipe the slate clean and forget this whole thing ever happened if you promise to stop being so flaky from now on (and actually follow through on this promise.)

I hate having to write you this e-mail, it's really hard for me, but at this rate the band is getting nowhere, and it's crucial that we get this sorted in order for the band to continue.

We want this band to get somewhere; if possible, we'd like to do it as a profession later in life and we're committed to that belief. Are you willing to commit yourself and start working for the band, or are you not interested?

If you are interested in continuing to play with us, the first step would to respond to this e-mail or give us a call. If you don't respond to this e-mail, we'll know that you are no longer interested in being in the band.

Please get back to us ASAP!!!

--Nik
~KC

Am I justified in getting angry or no? Am I overreacting? Do you think I'm right in feeling this way?

Sorry for the long post, but I really had to vent somewhere Sometimes I think I'm not fit for a band.

[Jason]

Dude welcome to the club. Pick up the god damn phone and call. PERIOD. i hate people this is one of the reason im not in a band atm.

[nyck]

Nik, you were right in emailing him that. There's nothing worse than bad communication. Keep us updated.

[guitarjitsumaster]

Yea, it seems to me when a bandmate doesnt communicate and return calls and mail. Its a sure sign of responsibility and follow through issues. Either there in the middle of the road about the band and wanting to be detached and non-commital or there just not a dedicated type person. Personally I make communication a big issue because when your in a band its like a family. You have to be on the same page or nothing is going to work. I feel your frustration, I lost a bass player today because of the same issue

[Naren]

You were definitely justified in doing that. I'm actually thinking of quitting my band right now partially because of that. This type of thing has happened to me in about 3 bands so far up until now and I quit 2 of those bands specifically because of it. It's something that really pisses me off that I can't take.

Looks like time to start looking for a new drummer.

[Korbain]

the joys of trying to find the right band members lol.

[The Dark Wolf]

^ NO SHIT!


I think we've all been through this, bro. It can be frustrating as hell. I'd say this guy is probably not a good bet. At this point, for me, I see qany sign of that nonsense, and I basically cut. Think about it like a job. If you were a boss, would you keep somebody with those kinds of work habits?

[Rick]

Originally Posted by Korbain

the joys of trying to find the right band members lol.

Yep. I know all about that.

[shredfreak]

Originally Posted by rg7420user

Yep. I know all about that.

Share the sentiment with you man.

@nik: you'v been really friendly to that guy, think i would've freaked after all that stuff you've been, through with him.

Not really in a similar situation, but anyhow.
Me and a friend are gonna start a band and we're not even going to look for a drummer probably. Just emailed this one guitarplayer and if he doesn't come through, it's just the 2 of us ... With me playing all guitars, bass too possibly and programming the drums&synths. We're both sick of the fact that we can't do our own thing or that we get ourselves into situation like nik here. So there's a good chanche the first few gigs will be the 2 of us playing along with a cd or something similar

[Nik]

Thanks for your comments guys! It's a fairly complex issue in some ways and I wasn't sure how to judge it.

There's more aspects to all this--as I mentioned, he seems EXTREMELY enthusiastic about the band when we talk in person, and his taste in music and his talent--it's all so perfect that it'll be a major blow if we have to let him go.

Another thing that bugs me about him: up until we let him into our band, he was a solo artist--he has drums, bass, guitar, and he would play all the instruments and make his own music. And that's understandable, I used to do the same thing.

So, he's been in the band about 4 months now, and last week we jammed with him. When I got over to his house, what do I see? It turns out that he's just dropped a shitload of cash on a Mesa Boogie F-50 guitar amplifier for his guitar. So basically, my drummer has a better guitar amp than me.

This also kind of bothered me. I mean, that's like me dropping a pile of cash on buying myself a drum kit, even though I have a drummer in my band I can see why he'd do this before he was in a band, but now that we're in this band together, doesn't that mean that the guitar duties are left to me? It seems that he's more interested in playing/recording his own stuff...

But yeah, I agree, finding the perfect band-member is hard, but this guy seemed so perfect, apart from this major communication issue... Oh well. He's logged onto to myspace right now, still no reply... Asking him to type a "yes" or "no" reply is not asking that much--what does it take, like 5 seconds???

shredfreak: good luck man The finished product in music is all that matters. Still, there's just something magic to jamming out with a drummer... Gah, this sucks--All I want to do is make music!!!

[The Dark Wolf]

Nik - I think it's clear. The writing is on the wall. You remind me of a person in a bad relationship, who knows it's going to hell, but keeps trying to find reasons to hold on.

Trust me. Before you know it, 5 years could have went by, and you're still dealing with this bullshit. Find someone like-minded as yourself.

[Nik]

Thanks guys.

I sent him that message about 20 times now. I know he's seen it--he was logged into myspace twice this morning and didn't respond.

So I sent him another copies, and I posted that message as a comment on his myspace so all his friends can see it, too. I didn't want to do that, but apparently we're not getting through to him.

I'd sever our connections right now and never bother with him again, but my bassist's gigantic amp is still over at his place, and I also left some source CDs for the first album over at his house, so we need to get those back

It's gonna be awkward doing that.

I feel like shit right now; music is the only really good thing in my life--I destroyed my social life to get better at guitar (and I have no regrets) but this means that when something like this happens, the impact on me is much bigger than anyone can really understand

[The Dark Wolf]

Bullshit. I understand completely. I feel the same way, Nik. I've spent not only time, but lots of money for a college education in music, equipment, PA systems, computers, you name it. I can relate.

Earlier this year, I met this cool cat, a drummer by trade. Man, we hit it off so well - super guy - he had a nice soundproofed basement, awesome drum set, he was ....ing kick ass, our musical tastes were the same. Just, made in heaven.

Until we actually started playing. HOLY SHIT. Dr. ....in' Jeckyl. This guy turned into a total controlling, angry, nutcase. I swear, he never smiled while he played, but frowned angrily at his drums the whole time.

"Hey man, that was great!" I, the singer, and the bass player would exclaim happily.
"....!" the drummer would yell. "Let's ....in' do it again. Shit, goddammit, mother ....er."

"Huh?"

Yeah, it wasn't hard to show up, grab my shit, say "Have a nice life, dude. And learn to chill a bit." and never look back. .... that. I'm not gonna waste any more of my precious, almost 32-year old time on nonsense.

[Nik]

Well, I flooded my drummer's inbox with about 40 identical messages (as posted on the previous page) before he responded. I also left that message as a comment un his myspace, too.

Here's his reply:

Hey,
Sorry I left a message but then lost my phone and found it again. I know thats no excuse. I think you guys are great musicians and great people and I hate to sya it but I think I dont have enough time to put into a band right now. I may be getting a job and that will take up alot of time. Message me back because I cant ifnd my phone.

Not much of a reply; we're gonna see if we can set something up to where we can talk in person next weekend when we come buy to pick up my bassists amp from his house.

I was just listening to this one old jam we recorded with him and it was so awesome

EDIT: TDW - that sounds like a very similar experience... when you look for bandmembers for so long, and finally find someone that seems so perfect, it's hard to let go.

[The Dark Wolf]

Originally Posted by Nik

EDIT: TDW - that sounds like a very similar experience... when you look for bandmembers for so long, and finally find someone that seems so perfect, it's hard to let go.

Not after you've wasted years, brother. It gets surprisingly easy after that.

[Naren]

Ha ha ha. Bob. One thing that irritated me about one band I was in was that we could play the song almost perfect and the bass player would find lots of things to complain about. He'd be like "No, we're doing it over again." I'd be like "Hey, we've already done this song 5 times today. Let's do something different." and he goes "No, we have to get this song right" and I'm like "What the ....? We've gotten it right every time so far."

In fact, I just quit my current band for many various reasons, but one of the main reasons was because one of the band members was not flexible at all. For a song he wrote, he wanted the vocals this way and the guitar this way and the bass this way and he'd say "That's wrong. It's like this." or "No, you need to sing like this." He had his own image and he'd push it too hard. I'd say "I think it'd sound better if I played it like this" and he'd just say "No, it goes like this." I really really liked the music we were making, but when I'd write something that I thought was awesome and he'd said "That's no good." I thought "Alright, then I'll play this riff and do these vocals in a different band." I thought it'd be better to quit now instead of a year or two later when we've got two albums worth of songs to throw away. I don't find it too much of a waste because, of the 6 songs my band made, I plan on using 3 of them (since I wrote all the guitar parts and vocals/lyrics for them).

That guy sounds like a psycho, Bob.

[Shawn]

Sorry to hear this, Nik, it sounds as if he's not interested. I would move on and find another drummer and save yourself some headaches. I've been there before with a bass player we had, he always stood us up and screwed us over, we took his shit for 4 years and finally ditched him. He was always the one booking the shows and he was the most enthusiastic in our band but he was also always nowhere to be found.

Good luck with this, I hope everything turns out.

[The Dark Wolf]

Originally Posted by Naren

Ha ha ha. Bob.

But never you, dude. I'd work with you again in 2.3 seconds. Easy. You're the best and most professional musician I've ever had the priviledge to play with, write songs with, jam with, hang out with, and drink with.

Originally Posted by Naren

That guy sounds like a psycho, Bob.

Dude... *shudder* you had no idea. You know what working with me is like. Barring the very rare ".... YOU!" (), man, I'm easy. Our bass player was so laid back! And Nate? Nate's always happy-go-lucky. But that guy, whoa. He ....ing scared me, E.

And what was so incongruous was that when he wasn't drumming, he was the nicest, most passive and laid back dude ever.

Go figure.

[Naren]

Originally Posted by The Dark Wolf

But never you, dude. I'd work with you again in 2.3 seconds. Easy. You're the best and most professional musician I've ever had the priviledge to play with, write songs with, jam with, hang out with, and drink with.

Thanks. Same back at ya. I've never found it easier to write good-sounding songs than when playing with ya. Sometimes we'd just be making up a song off the top of our heads and improvising the whole thing and, to me, it sounded like something off a professionally recorded album.

Since I just quit my band, now I have to find members for my new band. I basically want to take the sound I created in my song "Haunter of The Dark" and expand that into a new band (You should hear some of the new stuff I've been making, "Born Of Insanity", "Forsaken", "Haunter of the Dark"). It's like thrash metal meets death metal meets new American metal (Unearth, Lamb Of God) with lots of my own personal influences. Just got to find a good lead guitarist, bass player, and drummer who can share a similar vision with me and have the will to get it carried out... They might be hard to find... (sigh)

Edit: Hey. Looks like I'll be visiting the US for about 2 weeks around Christmas. I don't think I'll be able to bring my seven with me (but I really want to), but we'll definitely have to get together to jam and hang out.

[The Dark Wolf]

^ Abso-frickin-lutely, man. It'll be cool to see you again.

I like the direction you're describing yourself as to having taken. Same with me. My music has defintely taken a more brutal turn, like yourself.

[Naren]

I did quit my band, but I might be able to get the lead guitarist to e-mail me some MP3s of some of our songs from a CD the bass player has (that I'd been asking to borrow for 2 weeks). The vocal style is COMPLETELY different than anything I ever did in the US. For one song, the vocals are kind of like thrash (kinda like old Metallica) meets grind/death metal (like Carcass) and then another really heavy style that I don't know what to compare to. I still have some clean vocals, though. Like, one song I have called "Born Of Insanity" starts out sounding really sad and depressing with really clean laid back vocals and a cool guitar arpeggio, then gets insanely heavy and almost psychotic-sounding. Another song is heavy throughout the whole song, but has mostly clean vocals for the chorus (clean vocals that sound super creepy and evil).

I still have my Epiphone in my house in the US, so if you don't have a seven I could use (I doubt you do), I can probably just jam with my Epiphone. One of my songs only uses the seventh string in the chorus and the bridge, so I can "get by" with a six, but it doesn't sound the same. I could bring my seven to the US, but then I couldn't bring my laptop (and I need that too). But, then again, I don't have an amp in the US (I sold it before I came to Japan). Hm... that might be a problem...

But, definitely need to hang and jam.

[The Dark Wolf]

I've got a backup 7, may get another Ibanez 7 by then, and I have tons of equipment, dude.

All we need is a place to play. Rick would probably be down, though, since he'd be glad to see you. Plus, I'm working on some things right now. My friend is going to be moving into a house with a full, finished basement, and I'm talking to a bass player and a drummer this week.

I'm sure I'll have something lined up, long and short of it. Those musical ideas sound really interesting, BTW. Awesomely metal, getting in touch with your Lovecraftian side some more, I see. ....ing sweet.

[Naren]

Originally Posted by The Dark Wolf

I've got a backup 7, may get another Ibanez 7 by then, and I have tons of equipment, dude.

All we need is a place to play. Rick would probably be down, though, since he'd be glad to see you. Plus, I'm working on some things right now. My friend is going to be moving into a house with a full, finished basement, and I'm talking to a bass player and a drummer this week.

Yeah, I'd really like to see Rick again. He's a great dude. I miss that guy.

If I could use your backup 7, that'd be great. But it'd have to be tuned in a standard tuning (BEADGBE or ADGCFAD). I can't really play any of my songs in your FCGCFAD tuning. For example, my one song I want to play for you (cuz it ....ing rocks) has guitar arpeggios that utilize the 4-4-4-4 intervals. The song is impossible to play interval-wise on a six-string without retuning the 3rd interval between the g and b strings into a 4th. Absolutely impossible in a 5-5-4-4 tuning.

Originally Posted by The Dark Wolf

I'm sure I'll have something lined up, long and short of it. Those musical ideas sound really interesting, BTW. Awesomely metal, getting in touch with your Lovecraftian side some more, I see. ....ing sweet.

Yeah. I think you'd really like them. I've always been in touch with my Lovecraftian side (I've read every single story he's ever written Been a fan of his for 3, 4, maybe 5 years now). I'd just never written a song about any of his novels/short stories or ideas. "The Haunter Of The Dark" is one of my favorite Lovecraft stories, so I wrote a song about it (called appropriately "Haunter of The Dark"). It's got some cool Lovecraftian lyrics in there like "A windowless monolith where evil lies", "What terrors left to be known, Abominations best left alone. Beyond to the three-lobed burning eye and into endless darkness", etc. etc. The way I wrote it, though, it's impossible to play the intro or bridge with just one guitar (the intro has some really awesome guitar interaction and a pretty sweet solo. Two solos in the whole song, but the solo in the bridge is left up to the lead guitarist. I'm sure you could make an amazing solo for it, knowing your style).

So, let's plan on you using your 2027 in your usual tuning, me using your backup 7 in one step down, and playing at possibly Rick's place. Maybe the week after Christmas? the 27th, 28th, or 29th. Around there. I'll be looking forward to it.

[The Dark Wolf]

Sounds great. Either at Rick's, or the new place (which would probably be even better. I don't know the state of Rick's garage. Last I saw it, he had it in half - the back part was still studio, but the front was regular garage.)

I tune up my bottom strings to A standard sometimes. Rarely, but sometimes.

[Naren]

Just tune that backup 7 to A standard (aka 1 step down) for me and we'll be in business.