Hey Guy's,
To set the record straight.... This is how we worked out the drum parts for
Synchestra.
First of all, Dev and I got together and started jamming the stuff out in the rehearsal space. Dev would always have an idea of what he wanted. He would let me know what kind of beat he would want or where he would want the kick and snare, then I would take it from there. For example, in
Gaia he let me know that he wanted a straight up driving beat, so I came up with this cool beat that was driving but had a crap load of Ghost Strokes in it, Bells and other cool things. I love that kind of stuff, it worked and I think it really lent to the song.
Notes From Africa we were jamming and Dev said follow the guitar groove on drums, so my interpretation is the drum part you hear in that song.
Triumph was another song where I got to come up with a ton of cool stuff, same with
Hypergeek and so on...
Every song was pretty much like that. Some songs Dev definitely had a very specific drum beat in mind, like the
Baby Song, he knew exactly what he wanted and we went for it, then in most of the songs he'd let me know where the kick and snare went and I'd play off it and come up with a bunch of different beats until he loved it. It's a real cool way to work. Dev gets what he pretty much wants and I get to keep my style of drumming in the music. I always play for the music first then worry about fills and the cool stuff. Dev is great at producing drums as well, that should'nt be overlooked. I think you'll truly hear what Dev's drum writing is like when he releases
The Mighty Masturbator, he's doing it all on
Drumkit From Hell with no help from a drummer. I'm excited to hear and I know it'll be insane, probably not even playable !!!
As for fills, that would be my personal touch. It's pretty hard to tell someone how to do a technical fill when you can't play drums and show them. Dev did have ideas for some fills that definitely stuck though.
That's pretty much how Synchestra was written.
Accelerated Evolution was a bit of a different story though. I learn't that album in a couple months then went in to record it. Dev did have almost all of the drum beats worked out already with the exception of a couple songs like
Slow m Me Down and
Away which we did the same process as Synchestra. AE was more of a basic Rock album that Dev could get drum ideas thru alot easier. I think AE turned out great but Synchestra is the masterpiece for me as far as drumming goes, that album has all out RVP drumming in it, but only one side of my drumming.
Like Biert said, you can check out
Non-Human Level or
Lalu if you want to hear a Thrash Metal and Progressive Metal side of me as well. I've also done a ton of session work doing everything from Pop music to Country. My new Solo/Side Project
Terror Syndrome will be out in 2007, that's some pretty crazy stuff as well. Keep your ears open for it and hopefully we'll start working on some new DTB stuff later in the year (I'll be buggin' the hell out of Dev for it
)
So, there is an Encyclopedia answer for you !
All the best,
RVP
).
(Check out his work for Non-Human Level and Lalu, if you haven't so already. Worth it 
)
