Everything’s Better With Massive, Heart-Defibriliating Drums

Proof:

Soulja Boy Tell Em’s “Crank That” without massive drums: Cromulent.

Soulja Boy Tell Em’s “Crank That” with massive drums, courtesy of Travis Barker: F’n awesome:

Thank you, class dismissed.

Comments

  1. Dan says:

    God, that sucks.

    No offense, man, but it’s just not my thing.

  2. Tom says:

    AWESOME! It could have used a little down mix on the cymbals and some up mix on the bass, but still, it rocks!

    Thanks for that!

  3. Kate Baker says:

    My God, what a difference. It makes the original song actually tolerable.

    You couldn’t have picked a better word than ‘cromulent’ to describe the first. :)

  4. Jas says:

    I think I’d hold off on calling it cromulent. I’m sure it’s an entirely wonderful example of modern music, but I’m with Dan. Not my thing.

    That said, the original premise, that heart-defibriliating drums make any music better, is entirely true. One of the finest examples of a fantastic drumline is from the second verse to Ringfinger by NIN. It’s easily my favorite – very much like a heartbeat.

  5. Diplomachismo says:

    If I want to see meth-induced smarmy grandstanding, I’ll visit a United Technical Institute campus commencement ceremony. They have a strict policy against going shirtless.

  6. Guess Travis Barker really wasn’t dead.

    He was just upping the suck factor on that song.

  7. Janiece says:

    Ew. On both counts.

    Just not my style…

  8. Christian says:

    “Im gonna pass it to Arab and he gone crank it up fasho”

    I’d have to say that some of those lyrics are pretty unpleasant. You can read them all here: http://lyricwiki.org

    Not my cup of tea either, but you certainly got a reaction from us though [g].

  9. John Scalzi says:

    Here’s something cleanse the palate of those of you who feel this one’s a little too harsh.

  10. D.Paul says:

    I wasn’t the biggest fan of blink-182, Mr. Barker’s former band (although their last album before they broke up was surprisingly mature for the eternally adolescent trio), but I’ve always enjoyed Travis’ wildly inventive drumming.

    It’s impressive to see what he does with such a scaled-down drum set. Thanks, John. That certainly helped burn off some post-Thanksgiving calories!

  11. GTD Wannabe says:

    Ahhhh, that was a coke snorting moment. By that I mean, snorting cola out my nose after linking to Sailing…. Love it. Love the whole thread. Snort.

  12. Ron Hogan says:

    My music listening habits being what they are, I’ve never actually heard that song WITHOUT massive drums, and now I don’t know why anybody would want to.

  13. Rob Thornton says:

    Nice! Being from the DC area, I must call this remix the “go-go beat from hell.” Yum!

    Reminds me of Bonham in “When The Levee Breaks” and there is no higher compliment in my book.

  14. Christian says:

    Anybody up for: The Who In Cincinnati?

    http://www.ktvb.com/video/index.html?nvid=195337

    There’s a guy who suspiciously looks like John Scalzi at 5:01

  15. Scalzi,

    I see your “Sailing” and raise you a “Sunshine.”

    Ha!

  16. Miko says:

    Never liked Blink-182, but they did have a genuinely great rock drummer.

  17. John Scalzi says:

    Chang:

    Amateur. If you’re going to bring the sunshine, this is how you do it.

  18. Scalzicce,

    Consider this a warning.

    You’ll want to stop now while I’m ahead.

    And next won’t be Hazy Fantayzy, either.

  19. John Scalzi says:

    Considering the link doesn’t work, your threats are, at best, ambiguous. I win!

  20. Kate Baker says:

    Saaaaaaaaiiilllinnngg, take me awaaaaaayy, oh whoah oh oh oh…

    All we need now is a ‘Rick Roll’ and the thread will be complete.

    Oh here, I gotz 1 4 u.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBGIQ7ZuuiU

  21. SO much for being able to edit my comments.

    Here is my first salvo.

    And the WMD of annoying songs…

    Don’t maake me roll out the bratz,

  22. Oooh, snowflakes.

    Tooling with the site instead of admitting defeat. Hehe.

  23. John Scalzi says:

    I’m not the one who malformed his HTML, Chang. I win again!

  24. Dan says:

    Scalzi? Chang?

    Your sunshine-fu is weak, grasshoppers.

    Behold the awesome power!

    Now. Kneel before Zod!

  25. Dan says:

    Whoa… I missed Chang’s first link…

    I weep… And, I owe Chang beers…

  26. S’okay, Dan. You can buy me and Scalzi sasparilla.

  27. Nathan says:

    I see your annoying lameness and raise you a lamest.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFgKkTKqh9Y

  28. Patrick M. says:

    Drums good. Song bad(Or at least not my style. I assume for the style that it is, it is considered good and I can respect that.)

    I like how it looks like he is holding two sticks in each hand at times.

    And for my own safety, I am not clicking on those links in the comments.

  29. Dr. Phil says:

    Katrina and the Waves – Walking on Sunshine. Sorry, couldn’t find their video on YouTube… Still, one of the happiest songs around.

    Dr. Phil

  30. Cassie says:

    That has to be the lamest of all George Harrison’s songs.

    And who did the video? Terry Gilliam and Jim Hensen?

  31. Christopher Hawley says:

    I’m with Patrick M. on this one… the drumming is gutundteit, but the underlying song is, well, fecal.

    As for the (alleged) Tunes of Great Suckage which others have suggested: I have not yet listened to all of them, but have already eliminated the works of Bobby, John, George and Katrina from consideration – none of these, IMNSHO, begin to plumb the depths of suck when compared to the cromulent tune which began this thread. Merciful Ghod, were I to listen to Crank That a few more times, even the pablum droolings of Chris Cross would begin to appeal…

    Dr. Phil, this is for you .. share and enjoy:
    Walking On Sunshine Katrina and The Waves

  32. Nick Douglas says:

    “Cromulent” means “acceptable”: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cromulent

  33. Lee Gray says:

    That drumtastic version is more of a “religious” occurrence than anything I saw in the Creation Museum piece.

    It might even overcome the tryptophan and get me up and moving today.

  34. Miko says:

    ..look, if we’re trying to find the worst piece of music now (and not counting novelty comedy stuff like The Birdie Song) there’s only one choice:

    Nitro – Freight Train

    I dare you to watch until the part with the explosion and the guitar solo and not either laugh or weep hysterically.

  35. Maeg says:

    Miko: The song was… chunderous. The guitar solo made me sad – so much grandstanding, so little… well… music.

    The video reminded me of my childhood, where I would really get into the hairband tunes of the day — until I SAW them for the first time.

    That guy’s hair COULDN’T have been real.. could it?

  36. Jimbob says:

    I’m sorry, I thought this thread was about people adding their own styling to a song so as to improve upon the original…

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2SLd854SHU

  37. refugee says:

    An excellent demonstration of what happens when you add a real musician to rap or whatever the hell the original was.

    Still doesn’t fix it, but the drums utterly overwhelm what little else there is.

    Oh, and “WMD of annoying songs”? Bobby Goldsboro’s “Honey” At the very least, a toxic spill of schmaltz.

  38. Dr. Phil says:

    Ooh, Christopher — many thanks! I blogged about the happiest 1980s pop video e-vah here. I obviously didn’t dig down deep enough in YouTube — finding only covers by others and anime cut videos. (grin)

    And in case anything thinks I’m joking, I included mention of Katrina and the Waves – Walking on Sunshine because of the Sunshine connection. I am not putting it up as an annoying song.

    Your mileage will vary. Carry on — nothing to see here.

    Dr. Phil

  39. Christopher Hawley says:

    @14:

    Anybody up for: The Who In Cincinnati?
    http://www.ktvb.com/video/index.html?nvid=195337

    There’s a guy who suspiciously looks like John Scalzi at 5:01

    Christian – I believe you misspelled “a passel of idiots and poor crowd management in Cincinnatti” in the sentence above. Please to reserve the Who-dissing for when it’s appropriate?

    Has anyone besides Christian been able to view this? Not that I care to see frenzied consumerism in all its stunning shades of ugly, but: a) I’d like to see their faces, in case I ever encounter them; b) not being able to access it gets me p*ssed off. (Hint: neither a browser nor an OS be teh problem.)

    Perhaps it’s a case of “Tens of ThousnadsThousands of Intartubes Surfers Smush Server in Boise”?

  40. Manny says:

    Why buy happiness retail, when you can get it in bulk from the supplier?

    http://yachtrock.com/

  41. Nikita says:

    Scalzi you disappoint me. If you want a rap song with overwhelming, defibrillator drums, you need to root out Oukast’s B.O.B. Here it is on youtube in case you forgot. For those of y’all that find all that rapping a little too harsh and you know young, forward it to 3:00 and get your crunk on!

  42. Skar says:

    Holy goats that was awesome.

    I know nothing about the technical aspects of music, and rap generally leaves me cold. I know what I like though, and I liked that.

  43. God says:

    ok- that was….stupid.

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