rhythm kings

FREE ELECTIONS in Pakistan, a plebiscite in Chile, mini-revolutions in the Soviet Union, and now... another triumphant blow for democracy is struck as over 15,000 of Britain's drummers vote for their favourite heroes.

This latest mega-survey has been conducted by the Avedis Zildjian Company, "cymbal makers since 1623" and one of the biggest names in the business. The company asked drummers to vote in six different categories, and Best Overall Drummer turned out to be Omar Hakim (pictured), Weather Report leading light and coincidentally Sting's favourite sticksman. Runner-up was Vinnie Colaiuta, formerly with Frank Zappa and now a super-street credible session player.

In the other categories, Neil Peart of Rush won Best Rock/Metal Drummer, with the brilliantly courageous Rick Allen of Def Leppard (he who plays with only one arm) coming a close second. Best Studio (read "Unknown to the Rest of the World") Drummers were Dave Weckl and Simon Phillips; Best Jazz Drummers were Peter Erskine and Steve White; Best Mainstream Drummers were Mark Brzezicki (Big Country), Mel Gaynor (Simple Minds) and Manu Katché; and finally, in a class of his own, was Best Latin Drummer Alex Acuna.

You can get a colour poster of Mr Hakim by sending a stamped, addressed A4 envelope to Drummers' Poll Results, Zildjian International, (Contact Details). On the poster's reverse side is a complete list of poll-winners together with individual photos, biographies and, surprise surprise, details of their Zildjian cymbal setups.

the tsbeat goes on

IT'S COMPETITION TIME. Yes, the ninth (doesn't time fly when you're having fun?) annual TSB Rock School Competition is up and running and awaiting your entry. There are prizes worth over £6,500, and the competition is open to anyone between the ages of 13 and 19 so long as they're attending school or college.

To enter, all you have to do is record two songs on a cassette (one of which must be an original composition) and send it in to the judges. If you're selected as one of the best of the bunch, you'll then get to play at a regional final early in 1989, with the winners from each regional section going through to the National Final at the end of March.

Win the whole thing and your band will receive musical equipment to the value of £2,500, while your school or college will get a further grand's worth of Yamaha musical instruments. Other prizes will be awarded for Best Stage Presentation, Best Songwriter, and Best Individual Performance.

Check out your Music Department for a poster and an entry form, or try your nearest branch of "The Bank That Likes To Say Yes". Alternatively, write to; the Organiser, TSB Rock School Competition, (Contact Details).

press for action

IN THE BAD old days, recording exhibitions were strictly Trade Only - quiet, deadly dull affairs visited by big-name producers, socially inadequate boffins and "suits". Between them they chatted endlessly about such things as "wow and flutter", "SMPTE timecode" and "parametric equalisation". "Music" hardly got a look-in.

Thankfully, all that has changed with the arrival of the Real Live Hands On Show, which takes place in London over the weekend of December 3-4. This is a recording show for people who actually make music, with almost all the major manufacturers of small studio gear exhibiting. There will also be seminars on recording technique and "Ask the Expert" sessions for the puzzled, the confused, and the plain stupid. Above all, there'll be every opportunity for punters to get their "hands on"the machines that make the tapes that make the records.

The happening event is at the Royal National Hotel Conference Centre, (Contact Details). Open 10am-7pm Saturday, 10am-5pm Sunday.

radio daze

AS THE FIRST issue of PHAZE 1 goes to press, some highly depressing news about the development of night-time radio in the UK is coming to light.

Radio 1's extension into the early hours has turned out to be a big disappointment; Nicky Campbell and (especially) Richard Skinner seem intent on serving up a mundane diet of "CD and album music", aimed at an audience that is viewed as being predominantly over the age of 25.

This is a kick in the teeth for young musicians, who might reasonably have expected to see a new national outlet for their music (see the 'Airplay Action' feature elsewhere this issue), but who are now unlikely to get much joy even out of that old stalwart John Peel, whose show has been moved to an earlier slot in the hope that its obscure content won't scare off the over-25s.

Two things seem to have escaped the attention of the powers-that-be at Britain's favourite radio station. First, that many of those over-25s are the people who made John Peel's show such a success in the first place, and second, that the new programming is very little different from that already offered by Radio 1's more conservative partner, Radio 2, at exactly the same time of night.

Dance to the radio. If you can.

key words

LEARNING ABOUT ELECTRONIC KEYBOARDS is a difficult enough business at the best of times, but some recent books make it harder than others.

Take 'The Synthesizer' by John Bates, for example. Published by the hugely reputable Oxford University Press, this book purports to be a simple, easy-to-understand guide to what synthesizers are, what they can do for you, and how they do it. In truth, the book succeeds on the first count because it is very easy to get the hang of. But on the debit side, it was obviously written some time ago, and is painfully out of touch with many of the latest developments - in both music and technology. This is a fast-moving world, and you can't afford to get off and admire the view every so often, as this book tries to do. Cheap at £3.50, but not the bargain it appears to be.

More successful is 'Keyfax 3' by Julian Colbeck. This is a more commercial effort, aimed fairly and squarely at people who want to choose between all the different models of keyboard currently available (new and, crucially, secondhand). The author does his job admirably, being both well-clued up historically and well-informed as to the most recent goings-on. There are good tutorial bits on basic technotheory, too, so it's not all prices and spec sheets. Of course, the fact that 'Keyfax 3' is published by Music Maker Publications, the parent company behind PHAZE 1, is neither here nor there. This book is £10.95 (of anybody's money) well spent.

if it moves, hit it!

THINK OF "PERCUSSION" and you probably think of congas, bongos, shakers, and other bits and pieces that fall loosely into the category of "Latin Percussion". The good ol' Oxford English Dictionary reckons percussion covers just about anything that is "struck together", which would include a typical drum kit, as well as anything else that can be hit and which makes a noise as a result.

One man who knows just how broad a field "percussion" covers is Steve Sidelnyk. Steve was playing "non-kit" percussion instruments long before they became trendy, and now his studio credits include Toyah, Black, and Afrika Bambaataa. His first "big break" came when he got the percussion-playing spot alongside drummer Steve White in the Style Council, and his latest work has been with Aztec Camera (lotsa TV work) and Bros (on stage but not on the box).

"I was lucky to work with a big act so early in my career", he says with reference to the Style Council days. "It allowed me to get that confidence which only comes from playing in front of large audiences. Not that I was ever actually scared or anything, but the best way of building up your style and technique is to go out there and actually play."

Just as bewildering as the range of names Steve has played with is the fact that he only took up formal percussion training three years ago. His tutor was Latin percussionist John Chambers, who died tragically earlier this year, before Steve had finished his studying. But... "He showed me how to play all the authentic Latin rhythms and the proper use of traditional instruments. But what I learnt most from him was to treat anything and everything as percussion."

Steve practises what he preaches, too. He's come a long way since his days as an "ordinary" drummer, amassing - among other things - an amazing collection of Japanese egg shakers. And not unnaturally, this fascination for weird and wonderful sounds has led Steve to explore the world of sampling.

"I started to get into it because when I went on tour, bands particularly wanted to re-create a certain sound from the record", he says. "The easiest way to do it was to sample it from the master tape, but I soon realised I could turn it to my advantage as a working musician: suddenly you've got every instrument at your disposal."

Steve is quick to point out that sampling is all about imagination. For him, just recording a snare sound from a Cameo record carries considerably less clout than, say, sampling somebody blowing across the top of a bottle of mineral water. To prove his point, Steve loads said sample into his Akai S900 and plays it.

And the make of mineral water? Why, Perrier of course. Eau, the excitement...

going for gold

THESE DAYS, if you want it gold-plated, you can get it. Cufflinks, filofaxes, Rolls-Royce radiator badges, jack plugs... Now there's even a company making gold-plated guitar strings. They're more expensive than the standard items (well, you didn't honestly think they'd be cheaper, did you?), but less likely to aggravate players who suffer from nickel allergies (even stainless-steel strings contain some nickel), much better to look at, and reputedly longer lasting, too.

The distributors, Brazenrock, reckon that these "Maxima Gold" strings should last up to four times as long as ordinary guitar strings, but at this stage it's anybody's guess how this durability is achieved. Gold is, after all, a soft-ish metal normally reckoned to be less hard-wearing than, say, nickel or steel. More to the point, string wear often has more to do with sweat, grime, skin, and other bodily nasties working their way into the windings than it has with the actual strength of the metal concerned.

Check these golden wonders out, though. Even if they don't wear quite as hard as you thought they might, you can always make them into a necklace after they've done, er, sterling service on your guitar. INFO: Brazenrock Distribution, (Contact Details).

bass: how high can you go?

THE ASTUTE among you may already have noticed one glaring omission from PHAZE 1's glorious first-issue contents page. Yes that's right: no bass guitars.

The reason for the dearth of four-strings is simple. There aren't many around. Not in a sensible price bracket, anyway. If you're a young bass player with more enthusiasm than credit-worthiness, finding a decent bass guitar you can actually afford can be a tricky business. A few Fender Precision or Jazz Bass copies, the odd late-'70s horror story lurking between Victorian fireplaces at the junk shop, the (very) occasional "sale bargain"... And that's yer lot.

Why the shortfall? According to Neville Marten, editor of 'Guitarist' magazine and contributor to these pages, the problem lies in the fact that today's bass guitars are just too good. "The bass is enjoying today what the electric guitar enjoyed a few years ago", he says. "It's been developed to the point where the latest models bear no resemblance to what you could buy a few years back. The circuitry is getting so hi-tech, the construction so precise... and as a result, the cost is going up and up."

Which leaves a gaping hole in the music marketplace ready for some enterprising designers to fill - and a lot of low-note lovers turning to synthesizers and samplers to supply their basslines until they fill it. So c'mon everybody: let's get bark to, er, bassics.

in a bigger country

GLASNOST AND PERESTROIKA, why not have a little 'Peace In Our Time'? No, we're not talking Neville Chamberlain here, but the title of Big Country's latest album.

How better to publicise 'Peace In Our Time', and for that matter the band's six-date tour of the Soviet Union, than by playing live at a party held inside the Soviet embassy, to an assorted bunch of music biz hangers-on and Fleet Street hacks - not to mention several million Radio 1 listeners.

Radio 1 listeners? I remember a time when you couldn't get a bug into a Soviet embassy; now they're doing live outside broadcasts and stocking the bar with Coca-Cola.

Times are changing and Big Country are a part of it, becoming the first western rock band to play in the Soviet Union without the help of any state-run organisations. The punters are even going to be allowed to stand. May I have this slam dance, comrade?

The party ended with a press conference and an opportunity for the band to pose in front of a painting of Lenin. Across the hallway, a caption proclaimed "Silence on the nuclear testing range", while on a table further down the corridor were a pile of Big Country albums. Propaganda or record promotion? A tricky one, that. Big Country were fair enough and their hearts are in the right place, but I'd come to see Glasnost and Perestroika - pity they didn't play.

this is only the start

"SO THIS IS PHAZE 1", you think. "Nice tidy little mag. Good interviews. Entertaining features. Handy tips. Up-to-the-second news. Yep. I like it."

Well, you're going to like it even more in future. Next month, for example, PHAZE 1 will be talking to Eddy Grant and Kiss (among others), assessing a British guitar that takes on the Koreans at their own game, explaining the jargon surrounding music-biz contracts, and explaining how to choose and use computer music software.

Next issue will also see the start of what publishers term "reader participation" - a difficult thing to get hold of when you've only printed one issue. There'll be a fascinating little 'Theirs and Yours' feature, in which latest record releases from the big boys will be judged alongside demo tapes from readers. There'll be a letters page for you to contribute to (Berols at the ready, now). And there'll be a massive section devoted to free classified ads: if you've got some gear you want to sell, a band vacancy you need to fill, or a problem you want to share, just jot the info down on a piece of paper (max 20 words), stick it in an envelope marked "Phaze 1 free ads", send it to the address at the front of the magazine, and we'll do our best to include it in the next issue. And all for the price of a stamp.

The bargains don't stop there, either. For a strictly limited period (until December 31, to be precise), you can subscribe to PHAZE 1 for a ridiculously low price. The normal subs rate will be £15 for a year plus postage, but move fast and you'll get the same 12 issues for only a tenner — post-free. Simply make out a cheque or postal order for £10 payable to "Phaze 1 Publications" and send it to the same address, this time marking your envelope "Phaze 1 subscriptions". So beat the Newsagents' Shelf Blues - and ensure you don't miss an issue of the music magazine that says "Play!"