Transition to Hard - Please Help!

**.GH** · Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 571 Location: Biddeford, Maine

Alright, background info first.

I've never played drums in my life, but have had a solid musical (though it's mostly vocal) history, so I have some rhythm.

I picked up the drumsticks, started a few songs on Medium, sucked, but passed. Went down to Easy to get the basics, beat that, beat Medium, 5 starring most of the songs and 4 starring the rest. I've already seen an improvement in the week or so I've had the game.

But Hard's a whole different beast. The Double Bass kills me, as does stuff like off beat Bass.

I can pass the songs most of the time, but not very well, and I don't want to just scrape by.

Besides the OBVIOUS answer (practicing), is there anything you can suggest? Is my foot not on the pedal right, am I too high from the drumset, etc.

**disquette** · Joined: 12 Dec 2007 Posts: 82

the two things that have made the biggest difference for me are:

1) proper callibration - especially the second screen in the manual callibration process. I was shocked to find that I needed to set that at 70ms.

2) a real drum pedal.

caveat: I am not nearly as good as a lot of the people here, and have 5 starred only 4 of the expert songs so far (and the easy ones, at that). Maybe they have other advice that can help.

**alsoknownas** · Joined: 16 Jan 2007 Posts: 591 Location: Minneapolis, MN

I was in the exact same boat as you, and honestly the thing that helped the most was continuous playing and working at harder songs. You'll be amazed at how fast it comes along. Secondly, with the bass being hard on off beats or on beats with no other notes, the way I think about them is to make it a three combo of notes. So let's say its Yellow, Pedal, Yellow. I think of that as a three note part that hit seperate from the rest of the song. Probably ideally, it's easier to have your hand be completely independent of your foot and the thought needed for each, but this way worked for me getting started on harder difficulties.
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Rock Band Stats:
X Guitar Gold Stars: 48/58
X Guitar FCs: 25/58
X Bass Gold Stars: 54/58
X Bass FCs: 54/58
Total Bass FCs: 89
Rank: #3

**JoshNeff** · Joined: 25 Nov 2007 Posts: 222 Location: Minneapolis, MN

My background in music- guitar for 12 years, with a long vacation somewhere in there. I played guitar only as a hobby, band when I was in highschool 10 years ago, but never really super good.

I spun drum and bass for the last 8 years or so, and 3-4 years of that I did it as a job. I think that helped me to be able to hear and pick up complex beats without too big of an issue.

I beat medium on drums pretty easily, and after that beat hard. Hard was tough... I beat it, but I have some horrid scores. I found the easiest way was to memorize "beats" in my head, not how the song sounded. I would hear the beats different but memorize the patterns, so a majority of songs I'de play in my head. If something was really tricky I would skip notes, but keep the beat in my head.

If it went like 1 _ 2 _ 1 _ 2 then to 1_2 3 4 1_2 i'de keep the first beat in my head, and if I was comfortable throw in the other notes. If you get really off beat its a nightmare to pick back up and I think you miss more in the long run.

My advice is just to figure out how to keep beats in your head, and what changing them around would sound like. This let me beat all but 2 songs sightread on hard, and the medium tour on with no trouble.

I also invested in some nice sticks, because the ones RB comes with are trash. A little more weight to them helped a TON as you dont have to hit, you can start to just barely tap the pad and FEEL you're doing something.

**.GH** · Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 571 Location: Biddeford, Maine

Stuck on Reptilia, which I guess is pretty common.

Damn off beat stuff.