[TheYuckyDuck]

Fusion.. of course.

This is completely stupid, but I see this all the time. Guys have these big 12/13"Ts and 16/18"FTs and they put these awful "Drum-heads for Dummies" on them (pinstripes, hydraulics, EC2s, Emperors, EQ4s, Control Sounds, Black-dots, Perf-II, Powerstroke 3s, etc..), and they'll throw pillows or some piece of foam garbage (EQ pad, Emad, Muffl rings, Power-kicks, Towels, or Carpet) in the Kick drum, and then start putting e-rings, o-rings, L-rings, Moon Gels, mini-mads, and duct tape all over the place, and that's what they roll with. It's their method to getting that great "Low-End" sound they have to get. It's all crap. All of it. That sound isn't Low-End.. It's Low-Quality... It drives me crazy watch fools do this. It's completely opposite of what they should do. The way to get a good low tone is by reducing mass, not adding it. Smaller drums, lighter heads, thinner shells, shallower depths, and adequate tuning will produce low fundamental tonality and clean notes too. I'll never understand why so many people buy a perfectly good set of drums, and spend allot of extra money buying the stuff necessary to make it sound like ****.

This shouldn't even be a debatable issue any longer. "Standard" size (12,13,16FT) kits are "Standard" for a reason. Because for 50 years, engineering, material, and production techniques of drum shells and heads, was as advanced as monkeys pounding on coconut shells with tree branches. Drums had to be that big just to get some sort of recognizable tone out of it. That's no longer the case. With today's technology, the only purposes for large drums, is to look good or aid people who can't tune drums. That's not to say large drums don't serve a purpose. Because they do. But the idea of 12 & 13 toms up top, is frankly an antiquated concept. So is the need for a 18" Floor Tom and 24" & 26" Bass drums. With the technology of today, these drums are just occupying space where you could put other drums or cymbals, making the kit heavier and bulkier, and wasting motion by having to cover longer distances between strokes from drum to drum. Personally I never use a drum larger than 10" mounted up top. I've used 8 & 10 to reduce the distances between drums. But I've spent the last 16 years limited by playing 2 Starclassics kits of identical sizes (1 maple-1 performer). Both sets have all mounted toms in 8,10,12,14,16 & 22,24 kicks. I've never been totally happy with either set-up. But I made them work. There's no point in having huge drums anymore. You can't get a clean tone out of 18"FT... It's basically a thud. May as well take the reso off it and make it a gong drum.

This morning I purchased my first new drum set since 1993 and I'm stoked. Gone forever are my limitations. My new drums (Yes, I'm very happy today) are going give me limitless set-up options, convenience, variable dynamics, crazy broad tuning spectrum, and above all else: efficiency.
My new set is a 10pc Yamaha Maple Custom Absolute Nouveau (no snare) - in sizes:
7x8"
7x10"
8x10"
8x12"
10x12"
11x13"
12x14"
13x15"
17.5x22"K
17.5x20"K