Behind the Backline

Behind the Backline

By Matt JacobyMusic
Download on the App Store

Behind the Backline episodes

  • Carolina Drumworks - Finding a Deeper Appreciation for Drums Through Building

    For most people who come into contact with drums, they have a very basic understanding of the relationship between a drummer and his tools. And the case is the same for some drummers too, who only enjoy the basic level of understanding when playing and performing live.

    But for some, where the art of drum building and performance is serious business, they have a zen-like passion and obsession with the science, the materials, the sound, and the craftsmanship that goes into each finished drum..  For some, the deep connection between a drum and its builder can be a beautiful state of mind that most people will never understand or experience.   

    Another Reason for Jam Sessions 

    As I learned more about how much I didn’t know about my drums in 25 years of playing, a single drum can be played by 12 different people and reveal 12 different characters based on the connection it has with each player.  The sound that is heard from behind the drum is entirely different from what the audience experiences, so if you build drums, remember to take a cue from Carolina and take a drum to an open mic or jam session and experience the sound of your “children” from the audience’s point of view versus from the drummer’s point of view.   

    Hand-Crafted to the Core 

    As you’ll come to hear during this episode, Carolina Drumworks isn’t your typical custom drum shop, where using all the standard machines and techniques to build the core product and then putting an unique spin on it to make it their own is more often the norm that not.  In fact, Carolina lives in a very small shop, too small for most machines, including the finishing and spray machines (which they do not own).  This allows their process to maximize the amount of hands-on time with each drum, forming a deeper relationship with each drum from bare materials to finished masterpiece.   

    About Our Guest 

    Jeff Hankin, owner of Carolina Drumworks, joins us in this episode to talk about how he was inspired to deepen his relationship with his drums by going from just a decades-long player to building his first drum using a shell he found on eBay.  To this day, he prefers building one of a kind masterpieces for drummers who are much better than him, knowing that his perfect drums are the best they can be for the best players in the world.

    29 min
  • INDeDrum Lab - Crafting a Better Drum by Building on a Legend

    How do you make the drummer from Brooks & Dunn, Reba McEntire and Jewel drop his jaw? All it takes is three simple steps:   

    1.) Work for a legendary drum brand for 5 years 

    2.) Observe and see where their process could stand to make improvements 

    3.) Start your own drum brand to make those changes happen   

    Easy right? 😃   

    Humble Beginnings 

    Independent Drum Lab, or INDeDrum Lab, was started exactly in that way three years ago.  Using his engineering background and his experience while working with one of the most legendary drum brands in existence, founder Josh Allen was able to bring together a better way of designing and constructing drums, resulting in a more superior sound, higher quality materials and happier drummers.   

    About Our Guest 

    Josh Allen, Founder of Independent Drum Lab, joins us in this episode to share his story of his engineering background, how he worked and learned alongside the great team at Ludwig, and why he decided to take his new knowledge, ideas and ambitions and start his own drum manufacturing business.

    21 min
  • DrumART.com - Custom Bass Drum Heads to Make Your Drummer (More) Important*
    Have you ever been to a concert and noticed the sexy, awesome band logo or custom artwork that the drummer has on his front bass drum head?  Have you ever wondered how they do that or where they get it from?
     
    You haven’t? Well, tough noodles.  I’m still going to tell you.  Be prepared to be amazed!
     
    DrumART has been around since the early days of the Internet, having now designed and/or printed over 50,000 custom bass drum heads for drummers of all ages and levels, from beginner to internationally famous. Hell, even I’ve had two heads printed by these guys, so as a customer myself, I can safely and honestly say that these heads are the real deal!
     
    A major piece to the success of their business model is their state of the art, web-based drum head builder, which allows drummers of all skill levels to easily drag and drop pieces to design their own drum head. Customers can either upload their own custom graphic or photo, or use one of around 70 million+ photos in DrumART’s stock library and then add text, change colors, add ports, and more to craft the perfect masterpiece.
     
    As a side note, DrumART also now has a sister website, GrillGraphics.com, which makes custom grill skins for guitars. But this episode is strictly about custom bass drum heads. Now back to our regularly scheduled podcast notes.
     
    Jim Feck, Owner, CEO, COO, CFO and Janitor of DrumART.com, and 5th generation family drummer (his son is #6!), joins us in this first new episode of 2019 to share the story of how DrumART got its start in the late 90’s, how he responds to people who ask “what do you do for a living”, the struggle to balance growing a business and raising a family, and what it’s like having a nice 4,000 square foot facility in upstate New York to design, print, produce and ship custom bass drum artwork all over the world and have their heads displayed in front of millions of music fans.
     
    * - Typically it’s not usually a good idea to let your drummer have so much responsibility, but in this case, we think he or she can handle it.  You can now breathe a sigh of relief.  (I'm a drummer too, so I can safely say that, I think)
    33 min
  • Lords of the Trident - The Most Metal Backline That’s 700 Years in the Making
    Imagine if you were alive 700 years ago and, while hosting a concert that was giving out free rats for every ticket sold, you accidentally caused the Bubonic Plague?  What would YOU do?
     
    If you were Lords of the Trident, the most immortal, most metal band on Earth, you would go into hiding for the next 700 years and let the whole “Bubonic Plague thing” pass over and allow history to correct itself and remove you from any future history books so that you weren’t destined to have that finger pointed at you for all of eternity, right?  RIGHT?!  Well, yes, that’s right and that’s exactly what they did too.
     
    According to their website (which by the way is the most metal website on the Internet), their metal is so pure that only diamonds can scratch it, even though it’s usually the diamonds that are the ones that end up getting hurt in the end.  Their amps are so loud that even Manowar knocked on their door and asked them to turn it down (please?).  In the end, it’s probably just easier to succumb to their greatest, realize you aren’t worthy enough to gaze upon their might, and just sit down and listen to this episode to learn about the gear they use and how it helps them in battle.
     
    The band is made up of Fang VonWrathenstein (lead vocals), Socrates of Shred (lead guitar), Asian Metal (lead guitar), Captain Bluddbeard (lead bass), and ANALOG (lead drums).  In case you didn’t notice, this band is so metal, they all lead and no one is lowly enough to be considered “backup".
     
    Fang VonWrathenstein (MORTAL NAME: Ty Christian), lead singer, front-being and business executive for Madison, Wisconsin based Lords of the Trident, graces us with his super metal presence in this first-ever, consumer-focused interview where we turn the tables and talk to the bands about their own backlines, what they use and why they use it, what’s up with his obsession with too many flames in music videos, and why we hope this episode will ultimately correct the imbalance in the world between good and evil, music and silence, and volcanos and unicorns.
     
    And yes, you are worthy enough to listen to this interview. Although just a disclaimer: your ears might bleed a little.
    33 min
  • Sugar Percussion - Premium Drums Inspired by Family and Furniture Making
    When you’re a drummer that has made custom furniture for 20 years and your drums age to the point of being unplayable, what options do you have?  Well, you could wait to scrap together enough money to buy a new one, or decide to put those woodworking skills to even more use, learn how to build drum shells and build your own kit.  I’m sure you can guess which path Jefferson took.
     
    Behind every Sugar drum is 20+ years experience with woodworking techniques, knowledge of quality wood selection, and a passion and obsession to create high quality, high standard products. And behind the Sugar name is a standard of quality, passion and love that can only be matched and surpassed by the relationship Jefferson has with his daughter and company namesake, Ms. Ruby Sugar.  If a drum doesn’t meet his criteria, it becomes unworthy of bearing her name.
     
    Sugar, while a small operation of only two drum builders, is on a mission to preserve the true definition behind the word “custom”, focusing on building a drum all the way up from the tree to match a customer’s requests rather than allowing a customer to just select from a pre-determined list of shells, a list of available colors and adding on store bought hardware.
     
    On their website, they have no standard website shopping cart or checkout process.  There is no standard list of available products to choose from.  Just the details you need to help you design the drum set of your dreams and a quick way to email Jefferson directly so you can begin having a personal one-to-one conversation about your ideas and how you’re going to achieve it together with Sugar.
     
    Jefferson Shallenberger, owner and drum builder of Sugar Percussion, joins us in this episode to talk about the passion and inspiration that led to Sugar’s early beginnings, why he has to answer to his CEO (his daughter and the company’s namesake), and how his attention to detail and his high standards to produce a quality product, furniture or drums, has made Sugar a premium drum brand.
    28 min
  • Mahalo Amps - Quality Guitar Amps Born From a Single Quality Doorstop
    Most companies, new and old, can trace their origins back to a similar story of when their founder had an idea and how it evolved over the years to become the company we know and admire. This story starts with a doorstop (for real).
     
    Mahalo founder Richie Mays used to tinker a lot with building his own amps after finding that the amps he was using didn’t produce the right sound for him. While it was a 5-year process of piecing together parts in his pursuit to build his dream amp, he still didn’t have an output transformer to make it reality.
     
    One day while he was at the repair shop he worked for in Atlanta, he saw an output transformer being used as a doorstop.  He was immediately drawn to it and knew it was the answer he had been looking for to reach his goal amp. He asked if he could take it.  The only form of payment that was asked of him?  A replacement object to continue propping the door open.  The next day in came in with a brick and got his wish.
     
    Upon acquiring his doorstop find, his mission was complete.  He had just played through the best-sounding amp he had ever owned. And he had built it. That amp became the Mahalo AEM50, which is still available for purchase today.
     
    The rest, as they say, his history. Richie’s friend and Mahalo's co-founder Scott Phillips joins us in this episode to share this crazy story of how Mahalo amps came to be, the inspiration their company culture draws from the Hawaiian Islands, and some of the famous names that call Mahalo their go-to amp brand.
    20 min
  • Dream Cymbals & Gongs - High Quality Cymbals Born From a Grass Roots Movement
    A lot of businesses usually follow a pattern of starting out family-based and traditionally small with a focus on the customer. But as growth happens, it can be really easy to lose sight of that in order to accommodate the ever-changing landscape of a growing business.  Leadership changes, employee turnover, hiring people who can fill support jobs but don’t necessarily know the product inside and out, and a focus on the bottom line become more important than the roots you came from.  It’s nobody’s fault, and most of the time it is a natural part of growth.
     
    But as this and a few of our other interviews have revealed, the younger brands are attempting to keep customer-centric cultures intact while attempting to grow out of that new business mindset into one that can scale and be successful. This is great news for the music industry as it slowly makes the shift from solely corporate-owned to one that once again puts the fans and artists first.
     
    Dream Cymbals and Gongs is no exception to this new (and revived) way of thinking.  Now in their 10th year in business, Dream started out as a boutique cymbal brand, rooted first in producing high quality gongs and orchestral cymbals at a more affordable price point.  Eventually they moved into drum sets and have now given all genres a more affordable, yet high quality cymbal to experience.
     
    One of Dream’s biggest unique factors is their industry-leading cymbal recycling program, where they will take just about any type of broken cymbal (except for those made of brass) and melt it down to be used in other Dream products; not necessarily their flagship product lines, but in ways that help re-use the materials and reduce the amount of materials ending up in landfills.
     
    While their distribution does include a few bigger names such as KMC and Lone Star Percussion, it’s mostly made up of smaller brick-and-mortar mom-and-pop shops.  This allows Dream to be a brand that’s giving back to its local communities by supporting the smaller shops and driving more business to them.  They even use the smaller retailers to host events such as cymbal recycling drives and cymbal tasting events that pair with wine, foods and other local vendors to draw people into the stores.
     
    Brian LaRue, Director of Operations for Dream Cymbals & Gongs, joins us in this episode to share the story of how Dream started, the details behind the industry’s most creative (and only) cymbal recycling program, and what it’s like to be a part of a small, yet efficient team taking on the cymbal industry from a new perspective.
    31 min
  • Istanbul Mehmet Cymbals - 100% Hand-Crafted Cymbals from Turkey
    In an industry that has evolved from making its products by hand to making them via machine in order to ensure consistency, it can be hard to be the one that resists and insists that the original way is still the best way.  Technology is changing all the time, and experts think that keeping up with it is the only way to stay relevant.  But is that really true?
     
    In the midst of all of this technological upheaval, Istanbul Mehmet Cymbals is one of the few brands that can honestly say that the old way is the best way. In all of the years of change, it has successfully been able to set itself apart by resisting the change and upgrades technology offers and continuing to produce cymbals that are made one at a time by hand and hammer in its home country of Turkey.
     
    The result is a beautiful line of products that consists of cymbals that each contain their own slight variations and characteristics to give each drummer who ones one his own “custom” cymbal.  Their philosophy of staying true to their roots has proven to be extremely successful and has given them the confidence to continue doing what they’re doing.
     
    Carl Thomson, USA Artist Relations and Online Media Manager for Istanbul Mehmet Cymbals, joins us in this episode to share the story of how a single brand became two separate companies that continue to respect each other (and even share a similar brand and logo), how an original cymbal factory in Turkey is still used to produce their cymbals to this very day, and what it’s like to try and set themselves apart in a “shared branding” environment.
    33 min
  • Live Undiscovered Music (LÜM) - Music Streaming for the Other 90% of Music
    It seems like everywhere you look these days there’s another music streaming service or music discovery tool that caters only to popular mainstream music, including Spotify and Pandora.  But did you realize that by focusing on only this music demographic those services only really represent and promote the top 10% (or less) of music on the planet?  Where can you discover the other 90% of music?!
     
    Live Undiscovered Music, or LÜM, hopes to change all that. Starting in August of 2018, bands and fans will get the chance to experience a much larger catalog of music than you will ever find on Spotify, Pandora or even SoundCloud.  This streaming service will come built into a new kind of music-focused social media platform that will allow fans to discover, share and rate new music that is truly new and “undiscovered”.
     
    For those of us who are old enough to remember the good ol’ days of MySpace, you might argue (as I did in this episode) that a music streaming service coupled with a social media platform has already been tried and, in part, failed in the community.  However, as CEO Max Fergus reminds us, MySpace’s time was before we were mobile and connected all the time.  MySpace was never portable in its prime, and now that it has been reborn as a music platform, the newness of the past has sort of been washed away with time and left it forgotten for many of us.
     
    There’s also rumors of some fancy, secret features that we won’t know about until LÜM officially launches on August 17th here in Madison, Wisconsin during our annual Forward Technology Festival.
     
    LÜM CEO Max Fergus joins us in this episode to share with us where the idea for LÜM came from, how the team behind the app came together, what the relatively short development timeline has been like, and what he hopes LÜM will do for the future of the music industry.
    28 min
  • Broadjam - Giving Independent Musicians Opportunities for Placement in Radio, Film and TV
    It can be hard for lesser-known bands and musicians to get a foothold in several areas of the music industry without having the right connections or, as old school as it sounds, a record label. This is true when it comes to trying to get licensing agreements to place their music in radio, film, TV shows, advertising campaigns, and video games.
     
    But what if there was a social network built specifically for that reason?  What if bands and artists could connect with each other, build relationships, collaborate, and easily find music licensing opportunities to help support their revenue goals?
     
    Broadjam.com, founded in 1999, is one of the world’s largest and oldest music community websites that provides services aimed at independent musicians and bands. The website is home to over 500,000 searchable songs and over 190,000 artists from all over the world.
     
    To help independent musicians find opportunities, Broadjam holds a variety of sponsored contests throughout the year with the purpose of exposing and rewarding the best in musicianship and songwriting.  These songs can go on to receive placement in major media campaigns on the radio, TV, film and even video games.
     
    Music industry professionals also use the Broadjam service to find music for feature films, TV and commercials, plus they take will take part in select Broadjam contests to help determine winners and placements. Major record labels use Broadjam’s music encoding service to encode, catalog and control music metadata.
     
    Broadjam also offers professional services to industry customers, including their online system for tallying votes in popular music award ceremonies, from the popular Academy of Country Music Awards all the way back Broadjam’s backyard in Madison, Wisconsin for the annual Madison Area Music Awards. Their knowledge and expertise has been trusted by clients such as Warner/Chappell, Advanced Micro Devices, Peavey, Yamaha and more.
     
    Roy Elkins, founder and president of Broadjam, joins us in this episode to share his story with us about how Broadjam came about, his experiences and time in the music industry, his past employment at Ensoniq Corporation and Sonic Foundry that gave him a foundation and the connections to establish Broadjam, and his love of continuously giving back to the music industry at both the local and national levels.
    31 min

About Behind the Backline

From the publisher's feed

Behind the Backline is the podcast where we chat with merchants, brands and industry professionals in the musical instrument, pro audio and event technology space about their products, services,…