My bassists, uncle was a session drummer, so when we go to his uncles house sometimes, he has a ton fo sets, and lets us mess with them. He showed me this really wierd thing he did, where he took a fork, and started doing these odd sweepes on the china and crash cymbals, and it made a really loud sort of lazer noise. I wondeerd if I could do it it in a slightly less harmful way, so I took some dented aluminum sticks, one of them had a sort of jagged thing sticking out of the side, and I sweeped it like a brush accross my crash, but really fast, and I got a squealing whoosh.
He also did some wierd stuff, he had a shaker, but he filled it with pennies, so it made a more metallic jangly noise. He would put a mic on his Hi-Hat clamp and
attack it, like he would a jingle. It sounded pretty cool.
Heres some odd things I messed around with you should try:
Try buying one of this hot rods, and then taking off the top wrap, and bending the tiny sticks so the spread around and look like wood brushes. You get tiny little rolls on each hit if you do it right.
Try melting down metal and cooling them into little squares. Putting them on your cymbals can get some funny sounds.
PLace a crash right over your Floor Tom, bounce up into the bottom of the cymbal with one stickand hit the bell with the other.