Michale Jackson pocket covers 🕺 11 legendary cymbal rigs compared 🔔 10-minute speed fix

@Zack Graybeal

Zack Graybeal turned an Amsterdam set into a solo over the Dragon Ball Z Ultra Instinct theme, a bit he nearly cut from the tour before reinstating it at the last second. Now he is polling fans on what anime or game theme to solo over next, with Kingdom Hearts already in the running. A small window into how a touring drummer keeps a recurring set piece feeling fresh.

@Harry Jenkins

Harry Jenkins locks into Michael Jackson's "P.Y.T." in a London reel that's pure pocket and feel, leaning into the song's bounce without overplaying it. The clip pulled 6.5K views and 600-plus likes for good reason: it's a clinic in serving the groove on a track that lives or dies by the drummer's touch. Worth the 30 seconds.

Domino Santantonio rips through Michael Jackson's "Beat It" at Thomann's Drum Bash, compressing the track's pop swagger into a 46-second clip that hits every signature accent. It's a tidy showcase of how to honor a chart while still putting your own pocket on it. Worth the minute for any drummer who's ever sized up a Toto-era groove.

@Remo Inc.

Devon "Stixx" Taylor's Studio 606 solo is a clinic in head selection, with the Powerstroke P77 Coated snare cutting through with a fat, controlled crack that steals the clip. His tom voicing pairs Emperor Vintage Clear up top with an Ambassador SMT Clear on the floor, finished off with Crown Control Gels in Smoke for tuning polish. Worth the minute for the snare tone alone.

Nikki Glaspie steps into the Remo HQ Studio to put the Emperor SMT bass drumhead through its three flavors: Clear, Coated, and Ebony. The built-in external dampening system is the headline here, swapping out the usual ritual of taping pillows and gels for a head that arrives pre-controlled. Clear gives a focused low end that drops cleanly into a mix, Coated adds attack and definition, and Ebony pushes the deepest fundamental.

Bonham's modest setup gets the cold open, and from there Drumeo's Brandon Toews works through 11 of the most recognizable cymbal rigs in drumming, all miked up with over 100 cymbals on hand. The chapter list reads like a tour of stylistic extremes: Neil Peart's sprawling Rush arsenal, Stewart Copeland's bright splash-heavy Police kit, Lars Ulrich, Travis Barker, Brooks Wackerman, Tomas Haake's Meshuggah setup, Dave Weckl in Elektric Band mode, and Vinnie Colaiuta with Sting to close it out. My personal favourite has to be the HHX Dave Weckl cymbals. I absolutely love this splash.

@Meinl Cymbals

Zach Dubay tears through "Pathways," a tune penned by fellow Meinl artist Joel Turcotte, and the cymbal choices alone are worth studying. He pairs a 22" Byzance Monophonic Ride (with rivets he installed himself) and 14" Byzance Jazz Thin hats dressed with a Dry Ching Ring, then layers in a Temporal Stack II with a modified bottom cymbal for the more textural moments.

It's a setup that rewards close listening, dark sustain from the Byzance Dark Ride and Vintage Crash sitting under sharper articulation from the Crasher Hats and Classics Custom Dual Crash. The reel is the teaser; the full performance lives on Meinl's YouTube channel and is the better watch if you want to hear how the composition actually breathes.

@Eddie Van Dongen | Creative Drum Coach

Eddie Van Dongen is five days into a 30-day challenge of moving paradiddles around the kit, and the pitch is simple: if you only ever run this rudiment on a pad, you're leaving most of its value on the table. The takeaway for today is that combining paradiddle variations across drums and cymbals turns a practice-room exercise into actual grooves you'd want to play on a gig.

Take the standard paradiddle, RLRR LRLL, and stop thinking of it as eight notes in a line. Think of it as a sticking you can orchestrate. Try the doubles on the snare and the singles on toms or cymbals. Flip it: singles around the kit, doubles back on the snare. Then start mixing flavors, pairing a single paradiddle with an inverted one (RLLR LRRL) or a reverse (RRLR LLRL) so the accent pattern keeps shifting. Drop your kick under the accents and you've got a groove, not an exercise.

Start slow, somewhere around 70 to 80 bpm, and pick one orchestration before you stack more on top. The common mistake is rushing to move everything around the kit before the sticking is clean, which is when the doubles get sloppy and the accents disappear. Lock the rudiment first, then move it. Today's takeaway: a paradiddle is a groove engine, not just a pad warmup.

Hugh tackles a problem nearly every developing drummer hits: hands that stall out somewhere south of where the music actually lives. The pitch in "Fixing A Drummer's Speed In 10 Minutes" is that ten focused minutes a day, structured properly, will move the needle faster than another hour of unfocused practice. Walk away with a framework for what speed work should actually look like on your practice pad.

The angle the lesson opens up is the difference between playing fast and training for speed. Those are not the same thing. Training for speed means sitting at a tempo that exposes tension, fixing the mechanics there, then nudging the metronome up in small increments. A few things you can apply today without watching anything: pick one rudiment, single strokes or doubles, and clock your current clean ceiling on a metronome. Drop 15 to 20 BPM below it and play one minute on, thirty seconds off, for the full ten. Watch your shoulders, your grip pressure, and your breathing. The most common mistake is gripping harder when the tempo climbs, which is exactly what kills speed. Let the stick rebound. If your forearm is burning, you are muscling it.

Hugh links a free Beginner Speed practice plan in the description if you want his full structure.