Craig Reynolds has called out bands for using pre-recorded kick drum tracks live. The drummer for Stray From The Path and host of the popular podcast and lifestyle brand The Downbeat, Reynolds let loose on the increasingly common practice on Twitter recently, predictably igniting a total shitstorm that set the metal press (ourselves included) and fandom into a bit of a spin.
In the initial Tweet, which you can see below, Reynolds comments "Some of your favourite bands have ALL their kick drums on track and you’re so dumb you don’t notice" which as per the nature of the increasingly divisive bird app, inspired all manner of responses from folks coming out in support of or against the as-yet-unnamed bands engaging in the practice.
some of your favourite bands have ALL their kick drums on track and you’re so dumb you don’t notice
— craig reynolds VERIFlED CHECKMARK HERE (@reynlord) May 23, 2023
It also inspired a whole lot of people to ask Reynolds to name and shame the acts, something that he has opted not to do. Outrage culture aside (and there was plenty, this was taking place on Twitter after all), the comments did inspire people to engage Reynolds in some surprisingly nuanced discussion surrounding what fans should expect from a live performance in the modern era.
"stop asking me which bands. you just want blood and not systemic change to the culture which also sounds quite a lot like the state of the world at the moment doesnt it? plus i want these people to know that i know. and I need collateral for my music exit strategy"
stop asking me which bands. you just want blood and not systemic change to the culture which also sounds quite a lot like the state of the world at the moment doesnt it? plus i want these people to know that i know. and I need collateral for my music exit strategy™️ https://t.co/SEnxWstehv
— craig reynolds VERIFlED CHECKMARK HERE (@reynlord) May 23, 2023
Some fans argued the idea of acts using a backing track for kicks didn't bother them or strike them as being any different from the myriad of other backing tracks being used in the typical live performance in the modern era, that was an argument that Reynolds was having none of, Tweeting "putting ALL of the kick drum on a backing track is like having a football team with one player who is secretly an android, but then everyone just going ‘ah cool that android is absolutely murdering everyone again and scored 500 goals, love this!’
putting ALL of the kick drum on a backing track is like having a football team with one player who js secretly an android, but then everyone just going ‘ah cool that android is absolutely murdering everyone again and scored 500 goals, love this!’
— craig reynolds VERIFlED CHECKMARK HERE (@reynlord) May 23, 2023
The discussion continues to rage on, with Reynolds somewhat unintentionally taking on the role of educator to the masses by explaining the difference between the common use of 'triggers', which he is fine with and the use of backing tracks. Reynolds closed that gap by offering "the most annoying part of this whole thing has been people using the term ‘triggers’ for this. triggering is absolutely fine and if anything it makes your mistakes FAR more noticeable. completely pretending to play one of your drums while it does complex patterns: not cool"
the most annoying part of this whole thing has been people using the term ‘triggers’ for this. triggering is absolutely fine and if anything it makes your mistakes FAR more noticeable. completely pretending to play one of your drums while it does complex patterns: not cool
— craig reynolds VERIFlED CHECKMARK HERE (@reynlord) May 23, 2023
The whole saga has been rather entertaining, but it also prompted Reynolds to ask some salient questions about the future of music, including the role AI may play in the future.
"i guess there will always be people who just want to see a ‘spectacle’ regardless of talent or hard work. each to their own but those people will be the first to ‘make their own’ music with AI and stop supporting artists. i hate everything about music except music"
i guess there will always be people who just want to see a ‘spectacle’ regardless of talent or hard work. each to their own but those people will be the first to ‘make their own’ music with AI and stop supporting artists. i hate everything about music except music
— craig reynolds VERIFlED CHECKMARK HERE (@reynlord) May 23, 2023
Reynolds who was recently in Australia with Stray From The Path, rather cleverly provided proof of concept by sharing a video from the Sydney show in which he switched up the audio between quantized album audio and camera audio to showcase how simple it could be to use backing tracks in that manner.
hey guys, my australia vlog is out now on my YT. for a bit of topical fun i have this sydney show clip switch between camera audio and 100% EDITED QUANTIZED ALBUM AUDIO (lip syncing) to show just how easy it is to fool people even up this close. check out the full video on my YT pic.twitter.com/pEITBfYaZX
— craig reynolds VERIFlED CHECKMARK HERE (@reynlord) May 24, 2023
A revered drummer in his own right, Reynolds's contributions to Stray From The Path are frequently praised by critics and fans alike for their precision and inventiveness, so if anyone has the ear or the credentials to comment on the matter it is him. Stray From The Path have been bringing their charged-up hardcore fury and politically outspoken lyricism to the masses for the better part of two decades, aiming to be the kind of band that can be a gateway to both heavy music and radical ideas.
The Long Island, NY hardcore heavyweights, released their cracking new album Euthanasia via UNFD last year. The darkest and heaviest work of the band's career, drawing on challenging circumstances to create a record that pulls no punches sonically or lyrically.
Clearly the work of a more weathered and visceral era of Stray From The Path--the tremendous riffs and hip-hop-meets-hardcore vocal cadences are still there, but this time they're accompanied by an apocalyptic mood that draws the listener in and doesn't let go.
Produced by scene luminary Will Putney, (Knocked Loose, Body Count, Every Time I Die) the record reflects the grimmer personal and global circumstances that surrounded and inspired its creation.
In celebration of Euthanasia's release, we caught up with guitarist Tom Williams who gave us the inside word on five things you may not have known about the creation of Euthanasia.
5 Things You May Not Know About The Making of Euthanasia
They wrote the lyrics together
"I'll say one thing is that people may or may not know is that we all write the lyrics together. We kind of do it all like a round table and we will just loop songs and sometimes loop parts for hours and just all sit there writing. And sometimes a lot of stuff will be jumbled in together where like a line is my line and one line is, you know, Anthony's line or one line is Drew's line and Will Putney is writing lyrics for us too. So, the five of us all sit in a fucking circle where we all write lyrics together and we make these songs like literally together."
The majority of the album was created via Twitch
"The majority of this record was made on Twitch between me and Craig because Craig lives in Scotland and I live in the US and we couldn't see each other and him and I are the main songwriters. We would literally get on Twitch and Craig would get on the Stray From The Path Twitch channel and play some drums, make some stuff for me, program it and send it to me. Then I would go on stream, open it up for the first time and listen to it with our viewers and then be like oh that's cool and start jamming with it. We wrote a lot of our songs like that. We wrote Guillotine and Neighborhood Watch that way. A lot of times our people saw us making a song in real-time. Even on songs like Guillotine, there was even some like fan feedback that ended up going into the song. Someone had an idea for something, and it ended up going into the fucking song"
Stick To Your Guns' frontman delivered a first for the band on Bread and Roses
"Jesse Barnett's part in Bread and Roses is the first time there's ever been clean singing on a Straight From The Path record."
Benno from Veine.FM supplies the turntable scratches heard on Ladder Work
"The DJ turntable scratching in the song Ladder Work is Benno from Veine.FM. He's their sample/DJ, whatever you call It, but he's that's him on there doing that stuff. He took all of the samples from the record and he just kinda made his own thing. So, on the last track in the chorus that's him."
Producer Will Putney's wife's voice is heard on the voicemail message featured in the final track
"On the last track, there’s a phone message saying, ‘like to meet the requirements of Euthanasia, you must have a constant unbearable suffering,’. Anyway, the person who did that was Will Putney's wife, Marissa. It's funny because we found that in a clip of a documentary, I watched about assisted suicide. In that they say to qualify for it, you must meet the requirements and you must be in a constant state of unbearable pain and it's incurable. So, we were trying to capture that, but there was all this ambience and noises behind it that we couldn't put in the song that sounded cool. We just needed a female voice as this clip is so like daunting. So, we were like, let's go ask Marissa then Marissa did it."
Listen to Euthanasia now
