What’s In A Name? – The Guts To Title Yourself Your Passion

I started drumming at the age of seven, when my dad bought me a drum set for Christmas.  For years I’d play almost every day by myself, rockin’ out with my favorite records.  Then in 6th grade I formed my band, Outrage, a group that I played with continuously until I graduated from high school.  I was passionate about drums and drumming, and, like many young musicians, I dreamed of being a rock star someday.

Far right, me at 15. My band's amazing business card.

But in spite of my love for drumming and my commitment to my band, it took me years to get up the guts to call myself a drummer.  “Drummer” was such an intimidating title to me.  I was afraid of applying it to myself.  Owning the word felt like an obligation.  Calling myself a drummer, I thought, meant I had to live up to expectations, both my own and those of others, about what a drummer was. Do I deserve the title?  Do I fit the image of a drummer?  Does being a drummer exclude me from being other things?

It was only after college, when I leaped off the face of Mt. Security and devoted myself to music and my band, Spymob, that I finally started to call myself a drummer.  At first it was awkward.  When someone would ask me what I did for a living, I’d say, with a forced confidence, “I’m a drummer.” And then I’d await their judgment.  Did I measure up?  Did I look the part?  Of course the judgment was only in my head.  I quickly realized that people love meeting people who call themselves drummers.  At the very least, it’s a great conversation starter.  (Is there anything cooler in the world than being a drummer?)  Soon I embraced the title wholeheartedly.  And ever since, I’ve been proud to call myself, above everything else, a drummer.

Spymob, c2000

The funny thing is, once I finally adopted the drummer title, it quickly lost its intimidating punch.  Like almost everything we fear, the word stopped being scary when I finally embraced it and ascribed my own meaning to it.  For years I’d been afraid that labeling myself a drummer meant that I had to live up to some idea of what it was to be John, or Neil, or Elvin, or Zigaboo, my childhood idols who gave the word so much significance to me growing up.  I had no idea how I could ever BE those guys.  “Drummer,” I finally realized, could represent something other than some ideal I had in my head, an ideal I could never embody now matter how hard I tried, because it wasn’t who I am.  “Drummer” could simply represent ME and my own particular reasons for hitting the skins.

During all the years I resisted the drummer title, it never crossed my mind that other drummers were resisting it, too.  But once I got over my hang-up with the word, I suddenly began to hear other players hedging, too.  I also began hearing friends who are writers deny the title of “writer,” and friends who were painters deny the title of “painter.”  I realized I wasn’t alone.

But so what?  Does it matter what we call ourselves?  I used to think it didn’t.  Now I think it does.

There’s something about naming a thing that tells the mind, “Go.”  A name endows a thing with meaning and a mission.  A name is a commitment to realizing a thing’s potential.  We name children just as they’re taking their first breaths.  We name ships before they set off to sea, we name schools before they open their doors, and we say “I’ll love you forever” before we get married.

Openly naming a thing that we love can be hard to do if we’re afraid it won’t succeed.  (How disappointed and ashamed we’ll feel if we take that thing seriously and it doesn’t work out!)  Ironically, though, it’s by naming a thing that we increase its chance of success.  Naming a thing enables us to make it our own, to make it be anything we want it to be, and to define what success means for it.

In truth, the title drummer means something different to everyone who claims it.  And this is as it should be, because everyone who calls himself a drummer has his own relationship to the drums, and his own reason for playing them.

I Know Drummers

I know all kinds of drummers. In my thirty years of playing, I’ve learned that no two drummers relate to the instrument the same way.

I know drummers who are gear heads.  My friend, Chris, is one of them.  Chris is a good drummer, but I’ve never been convinced that he loves to play the drums more than he loves to play WITH them.  Chris relates to his drums the way he relates to his 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle – a car that Chris spent ten years of his life restoring to it’s original condition.  Chris’s passion for vintage drum kits is an extension of his love for reviving the beauty of old things.  Chris currently owns fourteen drum sets, in various conditions, and he spends entire days on his computer tracking down old tension rods, hoops and lugs, hoping to revive the past glory of each kit.

I know drummers who are technicians, like my old drum tech, Matt.  Matt has little interest for being in a band.  He’s not a big fan of collaborating with other humans.  He’s also not much into performing live.  But Matt is one of the most technically proficient drummers I’ve ever known, and a brilliant music reader.  Matt was a state-champion snare drummer in his high school marching band, and he’s applied that same clarity and rigor to executing the most intricate rhythms on the drum set.  Matt has no ambition for stardom.  Nor does he seem to have any practical goal as a musician.  Matt is happy being a closet genius.  For him, heaven is five free hours on a Saturday and a brand new book on “Advanced Latin Technique.”

I know drummers who are giggers.  Peter’s a gigger, dividing his time between six or eight groups.  Peter’s too impatient to devote himself to just one band.  But he loves to perform, and he’s great at it.  Bands and solo artists gladly bend to Pete’s hectic performance schedule because, in spite of his well-known disdain for rehearsing, he’s a joy to work with and has incredible energy on stage.  Pete’s no technician, but he is a natural, musical drummer.  His passion for playing is all about connecting with an audience and elevating the performances of everyone on stage, and at that he’s a master.

Let Love Rule

There are many reasons we drum, but usually there’s one thing that drives us to drum above all others.  For some it’s gear, others chops, others performing.  Before I owned the title, drummer, for myself, I felt like I had to love and master all these aspects of drumming, and more.  Surprisingly, once I allowed myself to join the drummer club, I realized that not only did I not have to think like other drummers about the instrument, but that it was better for me not to try.  I realized being the best drummer I could be meant viewing the instrument through my own eyes and approaching it in my own way.

I love the physicality of drumming, I love the feeling and sound of performing a great groove, I love the challenge of arranging the right drum part for a song, and I love performing, too.  But over time I learned that the thing that has kept me interested in playing the drums for so long is the challenge and enjoyment of collaborating with others to build something really cool.  Once I learned that, I stopped kicking myself for not being the flashiest player in the world.  I stopped kicking myself for not keeping up with all the latest gear.  I could finally focus my energy on what I loved most and was best at – uniting a band around a common purpose – and leave things I didn’t really care about to my drumming comrades.

For years I believed that if I started calling myself a drummer, I’d be crippled by the pressure of living up to the title.  Additionally, I believed that by avoiding the title, I would also avoid the possibility of failing at what I loved to do most in the world.  Because, the logic goes, if I don’t think of myself as a drummer, then I can never truly fail at it, right?

You can’t succeed at something if you don’t know why you’re doing it in the first place.  By bravely calling ourselves drummers, even long before we think we deserve to, we take ownership of our art.  Committing to our art in this way pushes us to more quickly define what it is we love most about playing the drums, and what we’re best at.  Knowing these two things, we can define what success means to us, and then finally get down to the business of achieving it.

Twitter @ ericfawcett