The Basic Toolkit; What Every Musician Should Be Packin`...

As a self-trained percussionist, I can tell you that one of the biggest temptations for me has been focussing all of my attention towards one instrument at a time. I believe this is a normal tendency; I mean virtually every other musician focuses on their discipline, so why can`t we do the same? As a result, I found that I wanted to play congas on EVERYTHING, or Djembe on EVERYTHING when, simply, it just was not needed; and this only cluttered the track.

I just hadn`t practised with adding subtle additions that wouldn`t distract a listener`s attention. We all want to be heard, (especially with a drumming background), and many musician`s would like to show off their musical talent`s. This is all fine, and most styles allows for room for technical ability here and there, but the truth is, this is not our job role!

I would get fed up with playing simple rhythms and try to over complicate things, but I never stopped to ask myself, what EXACTLY am I contributing to the overall SOUND of the piece of music? This took some time to realise, and I believe most drummers who treat percussion as a drum kit will make the same mistakes as I did.

Ok, so I better keep with the title when I say what every MUSICIAN should be packing. I don`t know about you, but there have been countless occasions where the music sounds GREAT :) wer`e all having a whale of a time, the groove is sweet and we`re all looking at each other to try and read what might be coming next. All of a sudden, the guitarist gives that look at you...the look that he`s going to be bringing the dynamics down and it signals the bassist to stop..the drummer does too..great job..but now as a band you have to find ways to build everything back up gradually at a level that feels like a natural pace for the track. For me personally, this is one of those moments where, most of the time, the song goes to shit..basically a large majority of us panic in these situations!!! What do we do?? Where do we go from here?? We can`t stay here for too long..whatever happens it just gets a bit messy.

There are some really simple-yet effective solutions. They are so obvious yet completed overlooked in most bands!!!

What are they then? Well..for about £5 you can get three different types of egg shaker...(that`s right i`m literally changing lives right now..please please know I`m joking). The beautiful thing about these little things is they provide an inkling of presence that LITERALLY keeps a pulse/rhythm going in any genre of music. If your wanting to avoid complete silence, or just a guitar line by itself that feels like it is losing momentum (and a listeners attention) then this will do the job. So you might be thinking i`m teaching you how to suck eggs..sorry and sorry, but you know what, most of the time...simplicity is the key and some of the best songs on this planet are the ones with simple parts, simple chords and simple melodies in them. Heard of the money groove??? Is the money groove hard?? Hell no...

My point to this article is that you don`t need a drummer of percussionist to add these extra flavours in to your dish of sounds, anyone can do it and it doesn`t cost much (or take space in your guitar case). Tell you what, I challenge you do grab a piece of percussion and play a track with it. I want you to see what the different types of interaction you can have with your fellow band mates. I can tell you now, If you weren`t gelling with the bassist before, and now your adding something really great to his bass line, the chances are his own ears are going to notice your compliments and right there is a NEW DYNAMIC between you which you may not have discovered otherwise.