Moving up to Real (Electronic) Drums

[Hanover]

Okay, after really enjoying playing the drums in Rock Band...to the point where I play everything on expert and really pound them when getting into a song, I think I'm ready to take the plunge and buy a real electronic set.

I have the set I want picked out (Alesis) and I'm ready to send in my order for 2nd day delivery....

The only thing is, I'm trying to make sure this isn't just a whim as $700 is a lot to spend on something that might end up in the closet some day.

So I'm just asking...has anyone else done this? Have you stuck with it since you purchased them? What was the hardest thing to learn moving up to the real deal?

I have quite a few friends who play real instruments who I could jam out with...so I'm thinking thats kind of an incentive...

[tiger5150]

700 is a lot, did you look at the set at Best Buy . com. I think they were around 250. A safer way to go IMO.

[SaltyDawg]

Maybe start out with some cheaper ones. The ION IED01 is like $150-$200 on ebay right now (and even cheaper). If you end up sticking it in a closet, it's not too big of a loss...

[sultan_of_skoal]

i'm considering it but with an acoustic set not electric, i've been looking on www.kijiji.com in my area and have found some decent used sets for about 300-400 might be something you could look into and save yourself some money

[Hanover]

Ended up getting a Simmons SD7K...nice set, three toms, a snare, high hat and three cymbals. Now to set it up. :)

[johnnymac949]

A sincere question, what will you play on them?
Will you have to get sheet music or can you
play along to a CD (I couldn't do that ;-)

Are you going to try and hook them up to rockband?

[Nasenbluten]

I have a simmons sd7k i am quite pleased, only problem is my floor tom goes off when i smack my ride cymbal too hard, it's a good kit for the price GL and get some lessons it will help:D

[ChiefyNutz]

After playing Rock Band, I decided I wanted to learn the drums as well. I ended up getting the Simmons SD7K set. It is a pretty good kit and it allows me to practice. Hopefully one day I'll be ready to upgrade! I'm on my third week of lessons and I've loved it so far.

[fiddolbrfrho]

i had an electronic drum set prior to getting rock band. it's a roland TD-6S, which i got for about $1500. it's VERY nice and extremely fun to play, though i'm still pretty crappy at drums. i even have a double kick pedal. =)

expensive when compared to toys, it's actually cheap when you think of it as a real instrument. if you want a kit that's going to even remotely stand up to the experience of a real (non-electronic) drum kit, it's pretty minimal.

http://namm.harmony-central.com/WNAMM04/Content/Roland/PR/V-TOUR.jpg

i'm hoping that if i play enough rock band i will get better timing, because that was always my problem. i didn't have the patience to just sit there and play the same thig over and over and over, but RB makes you do that and makes it fun. i think RB drums will translate over into real life drumming skill a lot more than GH skills translate into real guitar (i play guitar too, but i'm way better at GH than the real thing!).

[holyground]

I just purchased a Roland kit for about 1k. Zzounds.com has this deal where you can split the payments into 4. all you need is a credit or debit card. I was looking at the alexis, but realized that for a couple hundred more, I should just get the roland. Do yourself a favor and go to Guitar center. They have all of those kits hooked up: you can practice on them.

I'm on my second month of lessons. I am doing two things: practicing for real and then transcribing the rockband notes (in my head) to the e-drums. It's fun to try and figure out what the notes are... kind of like sight-reading them.

[SinepTaf]

i had an electronic drum set prior to getting rock band. it's a roland TD-6S, which i got for about $1500. it's VERY nice and extremely fun to play, though i'm still pretty crappy at drums. i even have a double kick pedal. =)

expensive when compared to toys, it's actually cheap when you think of it as a real instrument. if you want a kit that's going to even remotely stand up to the experience of a real (non-electronic) drum kit, it's pretty minimal.

http://namm.harmony-central.com/WNAMM04/Content/Roland/PR/V-TOUR.jpg

i'm hoping that if i play enough rock band i will get better timing, because that was always my problem. i didn't have the patience to just sit there and play the same thig over and over and over, but RB makes you do that and makes it fun. i think RB drums will translate over into real life drumming skill a lot more than GH skills translate into real guitar (i play guitar too, but i'm way better at GH than the real thing!).

I have the same set. Very nice set. I love the mesh snare.

[Hanover]

I just ordered two instructional DVDs by Tommy Ioge. They've been very highly recommended.

Well, it's all set up. The only problem is that I don't have any patch cables with 1/4" jacks on them and I had no adapters. So I'll be running to Best Buy to pick those up this evening. I was going to just patch it into my home theater system, but I have a feeling I'll be picking up an amp this weekend since I'll need my theater system to listen to the instructional DVDs.

Here's the set I picked up:

http://images.guitarcenter.com/products/optionRegular/Simmons/525887jpg.jpg

But I put on Rock Band in practice mode and just sort of hit the pads to the rhythm of the note chart and wow...it was pretty natural. The only problem is the crash cymbal is in the wrong spot in Rock Band. :)

Heres hoping they make a patch to map your midi drums to Rock Band. :)


After playing Rock Band, I decided I wanted to learn the drums as well. I ended up getting the Simmons SD7K set. It is a pretty good kit and it allows me to practice. Hopefully one day I'll be ready to upgrade! I'm on my third week of lessons and I've loved it so far.

[Nextonex]

anyone know if those cymbols can be purchaced seperatly and will they trigger a hit if I connected it to my green pad?

[holyground]

anyone know if those cymbols can be purchaced seperatly and will they trigger a hit if I connected it to my green pad?

It's not plug and play, if that's what you're asking. The connections aren't the same: it'd taked some soldering/juryrigging to get it to work, but I know you can do such a thing. Either get a seperate processer (midi-to-something or other) and then crack open your drums and solder the connections, or get a piezo senser and plug that into the bracket.

Either way, good luck. It's not for the faint of heart.

[RawWS6]

Heres hoping they make a patch to map your midi drums to Rock Band. :)

http://www.rockband.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20420

It takes a little time, some soldering skills that are easily learned and about $150 worth of parts, but works great. It consumes your RB set, but the good news is you can buy separate sets now if you need an additional one.

Not sure about your set, but my TD-6SW works great.

[Tarzanman]

Its generally a bad idea to buy a NEW instrument when one is just starting out.

It might have been wiser to get used electronic drum kits.

That is what I did.... spent $335 total. Got 6 pad triggers, two cymball triggers, a kick pedal (plus bass trigger) and a hi-hat pedal along with a throne, cables and the Yamaha DTX 2.0 brain.

I have a photo of it on my profile here

[Hanover]

Nah, as soon as I sat down behind my drums and started playing along with a song on my iPod (patched into the auxillary jack), I knew I had made the right decision. Can't wait for my tutorial DVDs to come in on Friday.



Its generally a bad idea to buy a NEW instrument when one is just starting out.

It might have been wiser to get used electronic drum kits.

That is what I did.... spent $335 total. Got 6 pad triggers, two cymball triggers, a kick pedal (plus bass trigger) and a hi-hat pedal along with a throne, cables and the Yamaha DTX 2.0 brain.

I have a photo of it on my profile here

[bounchfx]

my roomate bought the Roland HD-1 set and it's great. Compact too.

[wesjett08]

I think its awesome that Rock band is turning alot of people onto drums,I wish I would have had such a great learning tool 6 years ago when I started...

[short_circus]

I became a drummer a long time before RB, but I find playing RB is a great and fun way to stay in practice. And, congrats on the drum set purchase, welcome to the fold and stick with it bro!

[Hanover]

One of the things I've realized is just how much Rock Band has made my ears attuned to the rhythm of songs. I can pretty much pick out each drum/cymbal being hit. The hardest part to hear in most songs is the bass pedal...

So what I do is pick a song on my iPod that sounds easy and just try to play each drum separately. I repeat the song until I pretty much have the rhythm down. Thanks to all the practice in Rock Band, I can actually play R.E.M.'s Orange Crush on my real set now. :)

It's amazing! I found myself sitting at my real drum set for four hours last night not wanting to stop.

After going through my DVD lessons, I'm thinking of signing up for a couple of real ones. :)

Oh yeah, I picked up a Roland Personal monitor last night...Guitar Center is an awesome place, if you have one in your neighborhood, I highly recommend checking them out.