Frequently Asked Questions
Who are you and what is your history of playing the drums?
My name is Bryan and I live in a suburb 30 miles outside of Chicago. I started playing drums officially in 1983, beginning with a very basic kids drum set you get at Toys R’ Us, eventaully graduating to a real drum kit during the Christmas of 1984; a Tama ImperialStar 4-piece kit. Over the years, I taught myself how to play, learning songs by ear, and expanding my kit to mimic my all-time favorite drummer, Neil Peart. I have been influence by many drummers throughout time, Neil being the sole reason I play drums, but drummers such as Shannon Larkin, Lars Ulrich, & Nick Menza all heavily inspired me to push the envelope further.
I moved into electronic drums sometime in late 1998 with a Roland TD-7 kit later upgrading to a Roland TD-30 the summer of 2016. It wasn’t until December 2017 when I purchased Superior Drummer 3 that my music production and drum sound quality reached a point of pure enjoyment. Not saying all the previous years sucked, it’s just this drum software made playing electronic drums enjoyable like playing on an acoustic set again.
What products do you use to create your drum covers?
As of 2021, I currently use Logic Pro as my DAW of choice while triggering Superior Drummer 3 from my Roland TD-30VSE drumkit via a USB connection. In mid-2023, I swapped out the Roland TD-30 drum module for two Audiofront eDRUMin10 drum modules. This gave me more room for input expansion (more drums/cymbals) for a future acoustic to electronic drum conversion. I then use Linsoul KZ ZS 10 Pro in-ear monitors connected to a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 for audio monitoring. All video is captured from my Samsung Galaxy S24 smartphone (main camera), a GoPro Hero 4 (overhead camera), and a Samsung Galaxy S6 (kick cam) which is then edited together with Adobe Premiere Pro.
Which Superior Drummer 3 expansions do you use for your sound?
My main drum sound started off with the Djent preset found in the core Superior Drummer 3 library. From there, I have altered pretty much every aspect of the kit to my liking. Each drum cover I do, I tweak the kit to fit the song more closely utilizing all the Toontrack EZX & SDX expansions I have in my library. My library grows constantly, so my choices of kit pieces I use will fluctuate greatly. I have put together a spreadsheet of the expansions I use for each drum cover release to help aid in knowing which expansion is used on each song. Currently, I have the follow Toontrack expansions…
Hey, can we do a collaboration?
I am always up for a collaboration, if the timing, and the song is right. If you want to use a previous drum cover I have done for your collab, this works out the best because I am pretty much all done! I have many projects going on at any giving moment, whether it be personal projects (non-music related), stuff I am currently working on for my YouTube channel, or projects for friends. Do not get discouraged if I turn your request down. I archive all my previous projects and they are always available to see the light of day again. BUT PLEASE, DO NOT JUST TAKE MY WORK AND REPOST IT WITHOUT MY KNOWLEDGE! I am more than willing to work with you and I love seeing my work mixed with others. Just give credit where credit is due. Thanks.
I want to get one of your project files but I don’t want to do a subscription. Is there anything we can work out?
Subscriptions through buymeacoffee.com is a cancel at anytime model. So you can select a membership tier, grab all the files you want, and cancel before the next month is rebilled. Additionally, you can go to the requests page and request a specific item for a nominal fee. If you have further concerns, feel free to contact me.
How can I contact you?
If you have a question for this FAQ or want to contact me, here is the information » email: contact @ redgearmusic.com or Discord: mayhemkrew#0125