Speeding up

[Bg]

but remember bad habits are hard to break...oh and something about old dogs and new tricks!
good luck

thats probably most of the problem....

[naphazoline]

from what I've seen, speeding up and slowing down almost always happens at the start or end of a fill... the drummer can get their mind in the 'fill' zone and then have to get themselves back into the standard rhythm again, and the crossover between those two places is where they can go awry.

spot on! i reckon you've hit the nail on the head there rock'.
aside from the real shitty drummers, that lose their way right through the song, it seems to me that the drummer is not listening to the others when it comes time to joining back in after the fill.or some just try to be to flashy during their fills, and it stuffs them up.

[rocklander]

yup. our current drummer is pretty good in this respect. we regularly had to ask our previous drummer to 'keep it simple' and avoid any of the fills until they were really at ease with the song, and then introduce fills. the trouble is that everybody wants to be a star.. and I don't mean that in a bad way. we wouldn't be performing in front of people if we didn't want to...um.. perform in front of people, but that's where putting in those fills, or licks, or ad-libs, etc. kicks in ... to "be the star" and can leave us a lil high and dry when it comes to fitting back in with the rest of the unit.

[mahtone]

I played with a bassist that used to turn to the drummer and say 'race you to the end.'

The timing was not the best.

[bluesbass]

Drummers get a lot of flack.
They (along with us bass players) get blamed for all the tempo fluctuations but it is the job of everyone in band to keep good time.
Many guitar players have never even practiced with a metronome (or can even spell it), but they'll often be the first to tell others to do it.
If its a problem in your band why not take the time to talk to your bandmates about the importance of their own contribution to timekeeping?

Playing in good time requires trust in your internal clock.
One of the reasons drummers often play too much in the way of fills is because of a lack of confidence in their time-keeping abilities.
Drummers want to hear all the subdivisions of the beat.
So getting your drummer to slow down and play less fills requires that he has trust in his fellow band mates.
He must have confidence in the timekeeping abilities of the others in the group.
If he doesn't trust them to keep good time, he will overplay in an effort to "keep things together".

[Capt. Black]

Nicely put and an interesting point BB.
On a side note I reckon any rhythm section is due extra credit because they're not allowed to take a break during a song.
Guitars and vocals get a ton of opportunities to take a break and gather their thoughts/timing during a song. Witness BG's long sustained notes whenever he's trying to remember the words or remembering where he left that beer. I know I can drop out of the mix and yep, that tends to improve the song no end. But if the rhythm section decides to have a breather or merely falters, the shit hits the fan... and shit covered fans don't usually come back a second time.

[Bg]

that reminds me, where did I leave that beer?

[mahtone]

Nevermind: it'll be flat by now.

[rocklander]

Nevermind: it'll be flat by now.

sure, but he could detune his taste buds though...

[Capt. Black]

that reminds me, where did I leave that beer?

Sustain for days... weeks even.

[Bg]

Usually I don't bother to put it down, it seems like such a waste of time....

[Cabb]

Well from the jamming I did last year I noticed how crap I was at keeping time, and how much the drummer fluctuated as well. I went away and practiced things (I found I was losing time in hammer ons and things of that nature) that were causing my problems.

Ummm... kind of simple things like adding in the 'ands' between the beats. One and two and three and four and....

Yeah, my opinion is you each need to practice your parts individually to a click / metro-gnome and then come back together