Hexhammer wrote:
....good stuff lad.



Some leg poking....

I can't believe that I missed that post about your kit. I totally understand why you'd change the custom kit plan when a deal like that came up. Just a beautiful looking kit in that chrome Can't wait to hear what it sounds like. That idea of a joint tour sounds brilliant, could be really good for all the bands involved. Could also be a great deal of fun! Would also be some night for a metal loving gig goer!
Is there a chance you could become the actual Finnish distributor for the sticks?

Yea the chrome Tour Customs are damn awesome. I wish I will find the missing pieces soon.... Its like needle in a haystack, these things are quite rare in Finland. Nice prices though as these things don't have the reputation they'd deserve.

The tour thing WILL happen if we will be able to book enough gigs, so far, nothing but that's no wonder, approaching venues by email isn't the best way to do it but most of them want it that way. Everything else is just about arrangements, we have all the necessary gear, well almost, I still need quite a lot of equipment to make my drums ready for more gigs. Few mics, some hardware, hardcases for everything and that's pretty much it.

I don't know that yet, all I want is to do promotion for them and in return get drumsticks on a discount. But the company boss who I'm in contact with said on his last email that we could come up with "business partnership." No specifics were discussed yet so I don't know how this will roll out.

They didn't endrose me, but they offered me a really good deal on drumsticks! -30% off the retail price and with 0,7€/pair I can get custom engraving on them. The final price will be below 7€/pair which is absolutely awesome! Standard prices here are between 10-15€/pair so its a very good deal! Heck, I think that's better than some endorsements are, the usual discount rates on endorsements are between 10-15% for "averga joe" drummer, much better for the high profile people of course, but anyway. Its a damn sweet deal!

They also promised bigger benefits for me if I'm able to find more customers from Finland for them. I'm yet to find out about the specifics of that, but holy heck this deal is really something! I expected a ten percent discount, nothing like this. I will definitely promote this company with pleasure, quick replies in perfect English too.

And all I needed to do is ask. Oh and another thing, my custom snare drum is starting to look like a drum, the birch shell is awesome, has a tone even without tuning, all I had to do was to install the heads with bit of pressure on the lugs and it already speaks. I'll do the finish next week.

That snare looks sweet! You just gots to love birch, truly a very pretty wood. I bet it sounds amazing. Great news on that discount too and if you can get some other folk interested it could maybe bring some pennies in by the sound of it

That birch shell looks almost too pretty to be covered under mirror chrome. But well, next time then and it'll have the transparent stuff inside anyway. What little I did try today, it seems to resonate heck of a lot, no tuning, just putting the head in place and tightening the screws a bit and its already making quite nice tone. I bet it'll get even better with the glossy stuff on the inside.... That usually clears up the sound and brings up the attack and volume. Birch shells have naturally accentuated high frequencies so it'll probably split ears which is exactly my kind of snare drum. Lot of volume potential and clear attack.

That discount is damn awesome! I now know bit about the options I have and it seems I've got nothing to loose but could be quite a lot to gain. I might end up importing those drumsticks even. Anyway, more on this next week when I finish that snare drum.

Snare drum project goes on.... Today I added the dark green tint on the inside after making sure the bearing edge and outside is decently protected. I also cut the wrap to correct size. I really hope I didn't scratch it as even the tiniest scratch stands out like sore thumb on mirror chrome. So far, so good. Tomorrow I'll start to add laquer, that will take a good while, possibly I'm finished next week. I'm thinking about adding probably around ten layers with a light sanding after each layer. That's painfully slow process as the laquer dries for around 24 hours.

Then I have the big news of today, I was just given the green light to promote Rohema drumsticks also online and they granted me basically full freedom on this, the more their name gets out, the better. I ordered my first batch of custom drumsticks with a custom print you see below. Its going to be laser engraved so it will also last, whereas normal print will fade in use. I'm also actively in talks with several drummer friends about making a group order, or if they're in haste, just contact them directly. I'm also planning to save up some money to buy bunch of sticks for resale, they said I would get them with very generous discount and then I could sell them with a profit of my choosing. The good thing here is that I will be able to sell them several euros below the retail price, which makes it mutually beneficial for the company, for me and also to the customer. And this whole thing is completely voluntary and in-exclusive as its not an endorsement. Anyway, from now on, I'm the official promoter of Rohema percussion in Finland. Pretty neat.

Wow Hex, that's wonderful. I hope it all goes well, but most especially your music.

Thanks. this thread was supposed to be about music, not being a gear junkie. But its a big part of the whole deal, specially in heavy metal in which sound is very much about the gear its played with. And I love it, the small tiny little materialist in me loves this stuff.

Also there's not that much to talk about the music itself at the moment. Excluding the progress we're making on writing new songs! We got two songs now without lyrics and few others which still need to be finished. Definitely our strongest material so far, very technical in a way and very old school at the same time. I wish I had more to tell or something to show... Soon I will though as I'm going to make new drumming videos and also, we're recording our gig next saturday, also on video so there's things brewing behind the scenes.

We're starting to promote for record labels too btw, first time with this band... Although I have little hope of us finding a suitable label as the music industry for (non mainstream) heavy metal is non existent. We would easily have enough material for a full length album, soon even without picking any of the old songs. We have a plan on that already, we're going to take few of the best songs from our demos, cook it up with several brand new ones, of course the old songs will be re-arranged somewhat to fit in. Nothing strange on that one, that's what band often do with their debut.

All promotion is good right now, Hex. And, of course, promotion is a two way street.

Nice work there hex .... you seem to be pretty good with your hands, good thing to have

psketti wrote:
Thanks. I love crafting stuff, be it a drum or a chainmail armor or a bicycle. These skills sure come in handy, literally. Latest completely new thing I did was that I fixed my boot. I got old soviet style military boots, good stuff but some of the seams might break so I had to fix it. No problem, could have used a better needle for it.

The snare drum is getting closer of being done, today I started to add the glossy varnish, that's going to take a while, it dries for sixteen hours, meaning one layer a day and I need to do about 8-12 layers to make the "piano gloss." Slow job. It would be nice to have several drums to make at once so I wouldn't need to wait so much.

I can't wait to see and hear the finished snare! This sort if project is a real labour of love and i always find it hard to maintain that attention to detail all the way through. Usually somewhere in the middle i get a bit sloppy
Great news on the sticks set up

I would say it'll take another week and half to finish the whole thing... One layer of varnish a day takes ages to finish. On sunday I'll get new drumheads for it. Too bad the music shop didn't have a wide Puresound snare, now I have to use the non-brand snare which is ok. The Puresound just sounds so damn good. I really need to get one.

Tomorrow. As per usual when our younger brethren are arranging gigs... Everything is a mess and nobody knows anything. I pretty much had to clear out all issues about gear, the cars, places to sleep and I also made the flyer/poster which you see below. The kiddo's should thank their gods for me being around paying attention to organizing things for them.

Good flyer

Just some stuff I cooked up in photoshop from stuff I found online... Nobody yet noted out the classis "Get psyched!" banner from Wolfenstein 3D.

Great stuff mate, very much looking forward to hearing the finished product

My snaredrum will be ready next week and I'm definitely making a video about it. I'm planning to make a kind of channel update anyway and do some talking in it.... I have only once before made a video on screwtube on which I say something. And then there's new covers I want to make too. Oh and also we might get some video tomorrow from the gig.

Holy crap, where should I start? Last days have been a total blast in many ways... Things have been going my way big time.

The gig on saturday was a total mess at first, our sologuitarist had arrangements messed up as per usual... He just does not decide anything until the last minute and I nearly lost my cool with it. After messing around a lot we got to the venue and put our stuff together. There was a new engineer we hadn't worked with before and he was just plain awesome! Worked like a pro and everything was a breeze to set up.

The gig went ok, I did fuckton of mistakes but holy crap I don't know if we ever have had that hot crowd! Lot of old friends showed up, even my old classmate from artschool. She was there by a strike of blind luck and it was nice to go and say hello. Long time no see. Radux and Maniac Abductor were both on fire. I guess this is what happens when there's right kind of bands and crowd is going nuts. We got some really hot stage as we played second last. The final band was a let down actually... Their music isn't all that well suited to a thrash metal night.

Then there was the big surprise, we have this true kult fan from Joensuu who showed up without invitation. He just jumped on a bus and came to see us, he had no plans on how to get back home and where to stay overnight, he just wanted to see the gig. I promised him to stay at my place in a heartbeat, we had him in the after party last time too. Then he got wasted way too soon and I had to literally carry him backstage so he wouldn't end up in jail for being too drunk. He passed out and puked all over the place and there he was happily napping in a puddle of puke. I cleaned his phone and saved his jacket from the endless flood of vomit. He sure took the Antabus Reaction quite literally. After the gigs we tear down our stuff and headed to my place.... It was crowded as heck as I had guys of Maniac Abductor stay in my place with also our sologuitarist and our passed out follower. The after party was awesome, we stayed up until morning ten and drank a lot and it was so much fun. Next day I cooked for everyone which surely didn't go unappreciated and said good byes. Now I can say we're officially part of the scene, made so many new friends. Amazing times, living the dream sort of.

Then yesterday I finished my custom snare drum. Its perfect! Its loud as heck on low tuning and that chrome finish will melt posers eyes. Also I've been getting some new gear again, I got the most awesome vintage loudness delivery devices also known as Yamaha 900 series strap driven bassdrum pedals from mid eighties. After some adjustments I noticed that these things are better than my direct drive pedals. Even without changing the springs. Then today I got a new cymbal too, Paiste Alpha 14" Crystal Crash which I'm yet to test out.

I really need to make some drumming videos soon, perhaps a drumsolo or something just to demonstrate the sounds.