Drummer wants to sing. Song suggestions?
Our drummer has decided that he will try to sing lead on a song. But he really doesn't know what to sing. He needs something easy to play on drums while he sings. Just wondering if anyone here on a guitar forum is a drummer and could offer up some easy starter songs that our drummer could check out. Thanks for any suggestions.
Comments
Yeah, the song has to easy on the drummer to play while singing. I know from experience that I cannot sing and play bass on some songs because the bass line just works against the melody rhythm and I get mucked up. So the drum part has to be easy before he will try to sing the song.
We do have the drummer singing backup parts on some songs and he does quite well. But there are songs that he is too busy on the kit to sing even backup. Anyway, the only thing that came to my mind was Ringo Starr singing \"With A Little Help From My Friends\" - not one of my favorite songs and I don't think it would go over too well with the kids today. The other singing drummer I was thinking about was Don Henley from the Eagles, but his vocal range is a bit high for us. We can transpose songs into different keys, but sometimes the song loses its zip in different keys and sometimes a song just is designed to be played a certain way.
Thanks, iliace. I like all 3 of those songs. As a bass player, I would really like to play Sweet Emotion. It's been a favorite song of mine for years.
I currently sing 2 ZZ Top songs: Gimme All Your Lovin' and Sharp Dressed Man. But Tush is also a great tune. I don't think 3 ZZ Top songs over 4 hours would be too much for the crowd.
Slither might be a stretch. I'll have to listen to that song again with the drummer in mind. I used to play that song on guitar and it was pretty easy. I can't imagine it would be any harder on bass. And it would be nice to bring in some newer songs to the set list.
I personally know the drummers in 5 bands locally, and only one of them ever sings lead vocals. I don't know if that because the others can't sing or if it's just too hard to play drums and sing lead at the same time. That is, I really don't know what the skill level is required to pull it off. We are encouraging our drummer to pick up a few songs, if he can, and sing lead. He has a good voice, so that's not the problem. But, like me, it's a big leap to go from singing backup support to taking the lead vocal on a song.
Just for you:
• What's the difference between a drummer and a bag of garbage? The garbage gets taken out at least once a week.
• Why did the drummer have 10 kids? He sucked at the rhythm method.
• Did you hear about the drummer who went to Harvard? Me neither.
• Why is a drum machine better than a drummer? Because a drum machine can keep good time and it won't sleep with your girlfriend.
• Did you hear about the drummer that got an AM radio? It took him a month to figure out he could also play it at night.
• Why did the drummer move to L.A.? Because it was easier to spell.
• What do you call a smart drummer? A piano player
• A guitar player and a drummer were walking through a park one day. The guitar player said, \"Hey look at that dog with one eye!\" The drummer covers one eye and says, \"Where?\"
....feel free to add your drummer jokes....
BTW, awesome drummer jokes!
My contribution/s:
Q: How can you tell a drummer has good balance?
A: He drools equally out of both sides of his mouth.
Q: What do you call a drummer who's just broken up with his girlfriend?
A: \"Homeless\"
Also - ignore the voice-over in the first few seconds of it (I was messing around and then bounced it without deleting). And I never did guitar solos for this. But anyway, for anyone who wants to listen:
http://www.44lbs.net/ilia/Tush.mp3
I'm a crappy drummer and I was able to pull off singing and playing not too badly.
-Rf.
I imagine the concentration level is more gift than learned skill. (but I don't know)
Karen Carpenter seems to be most admired. (of course she's more back in my day)
Micky Dolenz, had some nice music. But I know this stuff is not relevant for today, yet the techniques might be a good study.
I always liked Ringo Starr, Phil Collins, Don Henley, Dave Grohl.
If you do a search, it's surprising how many names you recognize, and some singers you never realized also played drums.
But if I were a drummer that wanted to sing, I'd look to others work who are drummer singers, and take notes of what worked for them.
Maybe a singer drummer needs to write their own? That might be also a good suggestion.
Then it seems like you'd be playing from your soul.
All familiar names. But both Don Henley and Phil Collins sang some songs while drumming, and others when someone else was drumming. I've seen concert footage of both of them on the drum kit singing, and out front on the lead vocal mic. Dave Grohl sings lead for the Foo Fighters, but when he was drumming for Nirvana, I don't think he sang lead on any songs. I did see him singing backup on Nirvana songs from his kit, but never singing lead while drumming.
I know from experience that playing bass and singing lead vocal just does not work with some songs. But I'm only singing two ZZ Top songs and I don't have a problem singing over steady 8th notes on the bass. Some of my bass lines in other songs are too complicated, however, and/or work against the vocal line.
This will be our drummer's first song, and none of us in the band are coming up with great suggestions. But I'm going to pass on the suggestions here in this thread and see if anything fits for him.
Last night, our drummer was asked to sing a song. He chose \"Sedated\" and that worked out for him.
He hasn't come up with any ideas, so he asked us. If you are not a lead singer, I suppose there is always some reason to not chose a song. I know, for my part, I throw out complete lists of songs I won't sing and play bass at the same time. I don't know if he has a similiar problem, or if it's another big step forward to playing drums and singing lead. Over the past year, we slowly got him to start singing backup. He has a good voice, but I know singing lead takes alot more courage than singing backup.
I sang in choirs all though high school and college, but never lead. I only sing two songs for the band, but I'm still not comfortable with taking lead vocals. My goal is to work up to one song per set. Our new lead guitarist is a singer in his own right. he is up to about 5 songs per night and he will take more songs as we learn them as a band. Our sound guy actually comes up and sings 3 songs for us now. So our drummer wants to jump on the bandwagon with the rest of the band and try to sing lead on at least one song. My guess, it's just stepping into the uncomfort zone that's holding him back. That's why I'm looking for an easy song he might like.
Drummer jokes--Why do guitarists put drumsticks on their dash--so they can park in handicap
The one I used to tell my drummer:whatta call someone who hangs around musicians all day--a drummer.