Over the past couple years I've tried a huge number of different sound sources with my Zendrum, trying to the find the "perfect" live rig to suit most situations.
I've tried small and simple, large and complex, dedicated hardware modules as well as VST hosts. None of them were quite "right". With any one rig I'd have to sacrifice a level of one feature to gain in another.
The key features of a live rig are (to me):
I'd been working on refurbishing my old snare drum recently. Here's a shot of the finished product.
The shell is from a vintage Duplex Tonecraft (Rogers) snare, from the 60's. I first acquired it in the late 80's at a flea market for $10.
Back then it was in blue sparkle wrap. The original hardware was in sad shape, the chrome pitted and peeling and with rust setting in. In the early 90's I stripped the original wrap and replaced it with piano black. I also replaced the original lugs with the old "Pearl style" ones and sharpened the bearing edges. I also added a layer of satin polyurethane to the interior to help the shell project more.
Now for its second refurbishment, I've restripped the shell and sealed it with clear polyurethane. I've also replaced ALL the hardware this time, with newer Pearl "bridge" lugs and a modern throw off from Drum Foundry. I've also added a larger vent and custom Purecussion snares. This drum just plain sings now! I could not be happier with it.
To add to its personal historical and sentimental value, the rims it uses are now from my very first student snare drum from some 28 years ago. My drum teacher, Mrs. Horst, engraved our names on them so we students could tell them all apart. I'm flooded with memories whenever I remove this drum from its case :)
One of the best upgrades you can get for your Zendrum is the integrated wireless option. This adds an internal MIDIJet board along with a battery compartment for a single 9-volt that powers both the Zendrum board and the MIDIJet. I cannot say enough good things about this setup, it simply rocks. Once you've tried it you'll wonder how you ever got by being tethered with a MIDI cable!
Of course keeping the option to go back to being wired is important too, if for nothing else than to have a "plan B" should things go wrong. For instance you may have forgotten to bring or charge your batteries, or perhaps there is too much radio interference at the gig. Whatever the circumstances, it's important to be able to go back to using a wired connection at will.
Which brings us to the point of this article, because if you have one of the first crop of Z4 boards and utilize any Roland drum modules, you probably have discovered that a wired connection (i.e. not using the MIDIJet) simply no longer works! The Zendrum powers up fine, but no amount of banging on the triggers will register with the Roland unit. The official explanation for this that I've received from the Zendrum folks is that the Roland units expect just a slightly higher electrical current than the Z4 is providing at the MIDI port, even though the Z4 is adhering to the official MIDI specification.
One workaround for this that I stumbled on is to rectify the MIDI signal before it reaches the Roland unit, by doing a pass-through on another unit. In other words, by placing an additional MIDI device between the Zendrum and the Roland unit, the MIDI data signal is boosted to a level that Roland can pick up on. This would seem to contradict the notion that the Z4 board is operating correctly and that it's the Roland unit that is at fault, but i can't speak to that -- I only know that using a middle-man approach here works. Of course that adds a bit of complexity to your rig, and it's not always practical to drag around secondary MIDI devices, so it's less than an ideal solution.
I've received information from one of the Zendrum electrical engineers on how to affect a more permanent fix, as I will describe here. This fix involves opening up your Zendrum and taking a soldering iron to it. If you're not comfortable doing either of those things, then stop reading now. Even if you *are* comfortable doing this, I would encourage you to first contact Zendrum corp and discuss your options. I'm making no warranty against performing this fix, and I certainly won't take responsibility if you brick your axe. Nuff said.
The fix involves shorting out one resistor on the main Z4 board, either R10 or R13. Removing one of these from the circuit path with increase the amount of current that leaves the MIDI port, bringing it in line with what Roland modules expect. The simplest way to short out one of these resistors is to place a blob of solder on top of it. As long as you are very careful about not getting solder anywhere else on the board it should be a piece of cake.
Details of the fix plus photos of my axe under the knife...
One thing I learned about my Zendrum is that the leads to the battery case are very fragile. It turns out that every time you swing the battery compartment out, the wires that are soldered to it twist a tiny bit. One of mine was just barely hanging on and indeed snapped off during reassembly. Call me paranoid, but I would try to limit how often you open and close the battery compartment. Over time I'm sure the lead will snap off on its own. If you ever find that your axe no longers powers up from the battery, this would be the first thing to check.
The learning curve will be steep -- general consensus is that it takes about a month to become proficient -- but it's going to be a fun, rewarding journey for sure!
It won't be suitable for every gig of course, but for ones where it is, the benefits are simply huge. I won't have to tear down my kit, shove it in the car, unload and setup it up, etc. Nope, I'll be able to gig outta just one or two bags. What's more is I won't have to sit behind a kit to perform, after already having to sit in the car for an hour to get to the gig in the first place.
Ergonomics and back pain avoidance aside though, it's pretty clear after fiddling around with it for only a short while that the Zendrum is going to allow me to do things that I couldn't do before, even with my electronic kit. Likewise there are things I won't be able to do at all with it, at least without some trickery (cymbal swells and press rolls come to mind). But I think that this just reinforces the fact that this isn't meant to be a drumset replacement, it's a completely different instrument.
This is gonna be fun!
So despite my previous dragging of feet, I finally went ahead and preordered a TDW-20 after I heard through the rumor mill that Full Compass was offering them for around $360 USD, shipping included.
What really gets my goat though is why this isn't their advertised price? At the time I placed my order, their reported list price was $599 and the price they were offering under their "low price guarantee" was $495. I'd never before encountered a situation before where phoning in an order resulted in a nearly 30% savings over an Internet price, especially one that claimed to have a "low price guarantee".
Look, I'm not complaining -- $360 was low enough for me to take the plunge and buy the card. It does make me wonder though how many times I've gotten the shaft by paying what seemed to be the lowest price on the Internet. I guess we should all start getting quotes over the phone again.
Don't get me wrong, the TDW-20 does add a lot of new features -- but the MSRP of nearly $500 doesn't quite seem justified. The only features that I truly know I'd be interested in are the enhanced hi-hat resolution and support for fitting all of my kit collection onto one compact flash card. The rest of it, while nice, just doesn't blow my skirt up. I really was hoping for positional sensing and interval control on the toms, and while the unit does have 300 new sounds, I've yet to see a list or hear samples of what they actually are. Historically I've only ever found about 10% of Roland's sounds useful anyhow, so chances are there are only a few new ones I'd be interested in.
*sigh*
Maybe I'll pick one up if they drop below say $299. Paying anything more just doesn't make sense to me right now.
Started work on converting the 13" snare from the Chameleon kit. I don't anticipate running into any major problems with this one, seems pretty cut and dry. I am however looking forward to applying some of the lessons learned from my first attempt, with the 10" tom.
Here are some pics of the snare before I started:
I've finally begun work on the electronic conversion of the kit I purchased a while back. I'm starting with the high tom (10") since it should be the easiest to convert.
Here are some pictures of the procedure.
Enter the Kable Keeper!
My loving wife put these together to help me out.
Just got a new toy, a Tama Air Ride stand for my snare. This thing is perfect for mounting a PD-125, which is generally too small to fit into a standard snare basket comfortably. Air ride stands come in two flavors, one with Star-Cast mounts and one with just an L-rod. Since the Roland PD-125 already has an L-rod mount, I went with the latter.
This is simply an awesome snare stand.. small yet massive, it hardly takes up any room between my pedals but doesn't wobble a bit while wailing on it. A perfect match for a Roland TD-20 kit.
Daniel and I took some pics while setting it up: slide show
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