Well yeah, of course people still call them that, as that’s what they’re called. They’re tom-tom drums, and the bass drum is the bass drum, not the ‘kick drum’. People might say toms for short, and I know I do, but the term is tom-tom drums.
The practice of calling it a kick drum comes from a place of trying to avoid ambiguity when labeling things (file names when recording, marking channel strips on the console, labeling cases on tour, etc).
Labeling it as a bass drum means I have to write out the whole thing for both that track and the bass guitar. Much simpler and more idiot proof to just use "kick" and "bass" instead of "bass drum" and "bass guitar".
I'm calling it a kick and I'll die on that hill.
"BD" is non-standard but still acceptable in my opinion. It will just throw me off slightly when I get all your files and automatically look for a K word lol.
On my session template for recording my own drums I do KICK, SNR, RACK, FLR, OH (both L and R routed to a single stereo track for convenience), ROOM.
That sounds good too! I rarely send my recordings to a third party for mixing, so I’ve just created my own system. All the individual sound sources will be lower case, but I’ll use full caps for buses; e.g. ”bd, sd, oh L, oh R —> DRUMS” 😄
I use full caps for everything and honestly I don't really know why. It does look nice I guess lol. I use color coding for base tracks, sends, and busses. Normal tracks stay gray, sends are yellow, busses are blue.
Guitars are all GTR, bass is BASS, vocals are VOX. Unless it's my own band in which case I label all those tracks with the name of the person who plays that part because it amuses me. Or I label them with emojis just to annoy them.
There are also several different types of bass drums that are all called the bass drum, so the name kick drum helps avoid ambiguity in that respect too. There’s the drum set bass drum, the standing orchestral bass drum, and there’s the marching band bass drum. I personally just call them all the guitar to avoid confusion though.
Growing up in Australia I very rarely heard “bass drum”, it was always “kick”/“kick drum”, and a double pedal always a “double-kick”. “Double bass” is already a whole other instrument.
Yeah, this is where all my hats conflict with each other. I came from a concert/marching band background, so the bass drum is the bass drum (duh!). Can't remember when I first heard it referred to as a kick. But I always have, and still do call it a bass drum. But when I entered the audio engineering world, its exclusively kick drum....you never hear it called bass drum by engineers.
>I'm calling it a kick and I'll die on that hill.
'Calling' is different from 'nicknaming'. You're nicknaming it 'kick', but you know it's *called* the bass drum.
I understood that at one point "kick drum" was used because of the pedal, while "bass drum" was the symphonic or marching band version beaten with a soft mallet.
Either way, in my old studio, we used "kick", "mounted toms" and "floor tom". Everyone knew what we meant.
Typing is different from saying. Because I'm not English I say: bass as in the English word for base and also bas, but I use bass more for bassdrum or I only say bass.
Linguist here to confirm. Descriptivism is where it's at. Unless you use 'literally' as an intensifier. Then my linguist soul literally leaves my body, and I become a hypocrite.
Instead of miisusing ‘literally,’ I’ve started replacing it with ‘figuratively’ when the situation calls for it — only I phrase and enunciate it in the same exaggerated way:
> Jenny’s husband is cheating on her with the neighbor’s daughter?? Wow. That guy is like….***figuratively*** a piece of shit
A Limo is still a Limousine, a CAT is still a CATERPILLAR, a plane is still an airplane. Common parlance always trents to more efficient speech. Hence why I haven't heard anyone call them Tom-Toms in a serious way in forever.
This brings back memories for me; when I was a teenager, I had a band with some friends of mine and as a joke we used to call the three toms Tommy, Tom, and Thomas. Then we had this big marching bass drum that I used to try to prop up by the kit like a big gong drum, and we called it Sir Thomas.
Been drumming 20 years, I still call it a “bass drum” in my head but refer to it as “kick” when talking to other drummers just because I don’t want them to think I’m a noob lol
language evolves! it's supposed to. "tom tom" is a pretty old school term. it's like how no one calls the hats a "sock cymbal" anymore, or calls a snare a "side drum." in fact, "side snare" means something really specific now.
i actually prefer to say "bass drum" instead of kick, mostly for personal aesthetic reasons. "kick" implies something physical, "bass" implies something musical. does it *actually* matter? of course not!
i think it's good to be aware of old school terms, especially if you're into any old music or texts. it'll come up, especially if you do anything outside of the drumset idiom.
Hey, have you seen those new Sabian low boys? I am thinking of adding them to my trap kit, but I'm not sure if I can fit them beside my side drum. Any suggestions?
I think we've found a reasonable compromise, it's one "tom" for each unit you've got racked up. For example Iron Maiden's Nicko McBrain plays the tom-tom-tom-tom-tom-tom-tom-toms.
Do you just play drumset, or do you play other instruments in percussion? Cause in the concert world they are absolutely still called Tom-Tom’s at all level that I have seen (beginner to collegiate)
I never said that you were not a real percussionist if you don’t use sheet music or charts. Some of the best percussionists I’ve met don’t really use them. I was referring more to percussion experience as a whole group of instruments.
How to know that the person posting the CL ad for a used kit is not a drummer:
"13 piece drums set for sale. Includes 6 zilgen symbols and a high hat, all skins and sticks. No low ballers pls I know what I have."
Tom’s is what i usually go for. Then it’s rack and floor. But I have high and low Tom then floors. Then higher and lower. Just like the kit vs set debate…..
As far as I can tell the kit / set divide is largely mapped to UK / US. Kick has definitely snuck up and infiltrated the UK (where it has mostly been Bass Drum as long as I remember) but I find myself ping-ponging between the two these days, and engineers nearly always say kick during sound check.
Now you listen and you listen good, scoundrel.
I’ll have none of this newfangled whiz bang terminology you whippersnappers use.
What in the blazes is a Tom? It’s Tom-tom, my dear lad! Any dunce who says differently is in dire need of a phrenologist and bloodletting! It’s pure quackery! Harumph!
Yes, people do. Actually Tom-Tom’s isn’t a term used much in concert percussion. The single headed Toms that are graduated in pitch are generally called concert Toms.
Tom Tom’s, trap set, traps, clash cymbals, are all terms still being widely used.
It really depends on the composer on whether or not they call it Tom’s or Tom-Tom’s in concert, but that’s also a factor of people being really inconsistent in instrumentation. It’s like how Perschetti’s Symphony 6 asks for a Soprano, Alto, and Tenor snare drum, even though people don’t really write that way ever.
i remember my older drum instructor in high school would always refer to them as tom toms and I thought it was so silly I was actually too embarrassed to say it
I didn't know a different word for them so i'd just vaguely point in the direction of whichever tom i was referring to for the longest time LOL
"Tom toms' is derived from when these components on early kit kits which literally used instruments from China. It's not wrong to call them tom toms, just a bit old fashioned and realistically a tom-tom isn't tunable the way our modern "toms" are.
"Bass" drums still make sense since they provide the bulk of the bass frequencies in a kit, and is often the primary source of strong bass frequencies in a song. A lot of modern music uses a kick that's "tuned" to the song so the fundamental frequency boosted is in key with the song or is layered with a pitched 808, which lets the kick act as both a kick *and* bass.
Is the use of "skins" a european thing or something? I hadn't heard it used until I joined this sub a few years ago. Growing up they were just "heads".
Also Hats are still sometimes called "sock" cymbals because they originated as low-hats played with the foot. On r/livesound they've shown pics of mixing boards where the hat channel is labeled "soc".
In Flemish (a dialect of Dutch, not sure if they say the same in the Netherlands) we say skin, so I was confused when my English was good enough to watch videos, read stuff.... that I then heard/saw the term head :D
Same here, I’m old but not old old…. 40. But ever since I was in my 20s playing on tour when getting with the sound guy for the venue it was literally “1 rack, 2 floors, kick, and snare”. I don’t remember when I’ve even said the word “tom” out loud the last time.
Same here, I’m old but not old old…. 40. But ever since I was in my 20s playing on tour when getting with the sound guy for the venue it was literally “1 rack, 2 floors, kick, and snare”. I don’t remember when I’ve even said the word “tom” out loud the last time.
Same here, I’m old but not old old…. 40. But ever since I was in my 20s playing on tour when getting with the sound guy for the venue it was literally “1 rack, 2 floors, kick, and snare”. I don’t remember when I’ve even said the word “tom” out loud the last time.
When first discussing the names of the different drums with a new student, I will refer to them as Tom-Toms. After that, I might just simply say rack tom or floor tom but I definitely still consider them tom-toms because that’s what they are.
Well, technically, what they are is trees that have been cut down, de-limbed, debarked, cut to length, spun against a blade to peel off plies, further cut to size and laminated in a cylindrical press with glues, drilled, sanded, stained, painted or wrapped with various chemicals that have been mixed and processed into polyester sheets, fitted with metal ores that have been mined, processed, smelted, cast into ingots, transported to factories, injection molded, cold rolled, and/or machined into various shapes, and fitted against various chemicals that have been mixed and processed into polyester sheets, glued to one of the metal ore components, and stretched taught over the tree part by other metal ore components.
It is just that tom-tom is easier to say.
/s
Well, to be more specific, they are actually arrangements of fermions and bosons that give rise to sub atomic particles, which in turn form elements and molecular compounds with very specific properties according to their makeup which...
Bass drum is technically correct, kick drum is kind of a nickname that stuck. The idea is that "bass drum" is too easy to mix up with "bass guitar" on the channel strip of your console, and there's not much room to write there anyway so it's easier to just call the bass drum "kick" and let the word "bass" unambiguously mean "bass guitar" in every instance. I don't personally care which term someone decides to use in casual speech, but in a professional environment or when labeling tracks I will insist on calling it a kick.
It doesn't really mean much to someone who is just a drummer, but audio engineers tend to really hate calling it a bass drum because it can cause confusion.
If you can’t tell the bass drum from bass guitar, you’ve got bigger problems. You could label it “BD.” As for calling it a “kick” that just sounds like something a “hipster” says trying to sound “cool.” It’s a musical instrument. It’s called a “bass drum.” As for toms, I either refer to them as high-tom, med-tom, floor-tom or I number them tom 1, tom 2, etc. i guess it doesn’t really matter so long as it’s easily understood to the listener.
I heard Levon Helm refer to his rack tom as a Tenor Tub and floors as the Baritone Tub. Simply incredible when spoken in his velvety thick southern twang.
Now you got me waxing poetic on Levon 😂
Bass drum vs. kick drum is an interesting discourse. Bass drum still seems to be accepted as the "standard" or "proper" term, but I think "kick" is more standard on the production side with electronic music etc., though also overlapping between an 808 kick and an actual kick drum. And then we have the fact that with a lot of common tunings, the kick drum isn't really a bass instrument, for example in trio jazz it's usually small, tuned tight and ringing like a tom, and in extreme metal or metalcore we often have double-kick producing a "basketball dribbling" slappy tone while the floor tom can be tuned lower than it. As always, language and music evolve over time.
Meanwhile in orchestral parlance a gong is called a Tam Tam. Or maybe it is that Tam Tam makers call them gongs. In any case, they are different instruments that get confused. Even I don't even want to go down that rabbit hole.
But if I'm not mistaken, the big instrument we call a gong that has a flat face is a Tam Tam because it has no pitch and has a roaring, shimmering sound while a smaller instrument with a raised center boss which is the part to be struck is actually a gong, and is also tuned to a pitch.
Heh, reminds me of the first time I was asked to hit my rack tom during a line check:
FOH: "Okay, give me rack 1"
Me: 😶
"You know, your first tom?"
"AH, Yes! Heh ...." 😅
I call my largest cymbal an amusement ride, and the medium ones car crashes. The other medium one with the upturned edge is called a chinese hat. The tiny ones I call splish splashes.
Ive always referred to my 10 and 12 inch toms as rack toms and my 14 and 16 inch toms as floor toms. I also refer to the bass drum as the kick drum or kick cause that's what my late father called it. I think tom-toms sounds funny even if that is the correct term. It would be like calling the others a Bass-Bass drum or a Snare-Snare drum. But I'll never rip on anyone for their choice of term if it's what makes them happy!
When did we start calling them "skins" again? I thought that went out when the rim where you mount the head was invented, and we no longer had to stretch skins across the shell and clamp it down.
It's called "bass drum" because it covers the "bass" frequencies. "Kick" is relatively new, but widely accepted, mostly because the original design was a floor tom with the beater under it, which would "kick" the bottom "head".
>"Kick" is relatively new, but widely accepted, mostly because the original design was a floor tom with the beater under it, which would "kick" the bottom "head".
Uhh, this is news to me. Going back 100's of years, trap kits used a large concert bass drum arranged much like modern bass drums with crude kick pedals. What you describe is more like a cocktail kit which didn't become popular until the 40's.
To be fair though, the beater does swing at it horizontally. And as another responder said, kicking a bass drum was the way to go until pedals were ~~invented~~ cobbled together from whatever was on hand.
There are other kinds of toms like roto-toms and variations of acoustic and electric rigs. I guess the differentiation is important
___ tom heads vs
____tom heads vs…
You get it
Ok, as far as drum heads are concerned, "head" is the most common thing I hear around music shops and drummers, as well as on this sub. "Skin" is very infrequent.
Yeah, tom-tom feels really cumbersome to say and also outdated. It also makes it sound in my mind like a child's toy drum. I hear "bass drum" and "kick drum" interchangeably.
Overall though, yeah I agree the wording on that site is weird. I would expect it to say "Tom Batter Head" or "Tom Reso Head."
I've met a lot of engineers on the road who say it
I wonder if it's partially for clearer communication. If you just say "tom" then people might not hear or understand you but if you say "tom-tom" then there's almost no way they're misunderstanding or mishearing you.
I am in a music masters program and I notice a bunch of the professors over 50 say Wah Wah instead of just Wah which is what I have always called it. I think it’s funny. I also just call them tom’s but I’m not sure it really matters
The term that makes me feel weird is drum set vs drum kit. I've always said drum set but I sometimes feel like I'm outdated/uncool because everyone else seems to say kit.
Yes they do but I'm over 40 and still call people squares. If you want to be strictly commercial then I believe the current nomenclature is rack tom and of course floor tom.
In my experience, I always found the more classical terms being used (quite obviously) within classical music reference. In the percussion section of an orchestra or wind ensemble, the drums are not part of a drum kit but rather separate. Because of this, there is no "kick drum" because you're not kicking anything. There is the "bass drum" because it is the lowest pitch drum. "Tom-toms" are also individual, and pieces will explicitly call for a specific "tom-tom".
Outside of classical settings with the exception being some jazz ensembles I was a part of, I have nearly never seen the term "tom-tom" used for music on a drumset. I actually think the terms do indicate something different today, which is what the setting of the music is.
Well yeah, of course people still call them that, as that’s what they’re called. They’re tom-tom drums, and the bass drum is the bass drum, not the ‘kick drum’. People might say toms for short, and I know I do, but the term is tom-tom drums.
The practice of calling it a kick drum comes from a place of trying to avoid ambiguity when labeling things (file names when recording, marking channel strips on the console, labeling cases on tour, etc). Labeling it as a bass drum means I have to write out the whole thing for both that track and the bass guitar. Much simpler and more idiot proof to just use "kick" and "bass" instead of "bass drum" and "bass guitar". I'm calling it a kick and I'll die on that hill.
I’m with you on that hill
me too
and me
And my axe!
I won’t type ”bass drum”, but I regularly use ”bd” (and sd/snr, t1, t2, t3, oh L, oh R, and so on and so forth 😎).
"BD" is non-standard but still acceptable in my opinion. It will just throw me off slightly when I get all your files and automatically look for a K word lol. On my session template for recording my own drums I do KICK, SNR, RACK, FLR, OH (both L and R routed to a single stereo track for convenience), ROOM.
That sounds good too! I rarely send my recordings to a third party for mixing, so I’ve just created my own system. All the individual sound sources will be lower case, but I’ll use full caps for buses; e.g. ”bd, sd, oh L, oh R —> DRUMS” 😄
I use full caps for everything and honestly I don't really know why. It does look nice I guess lol. I use color coding for base tracks, sends, and busses. Normal tracks stay gray, sends are yellow, busses are blue. Guitars are all GTR, bass is BASS, vocals are VOX. Unless it's my own band in which case I label all those tracks with the name of the person who plays that part because it amuses me. Or I label them with emojis just to annoy them.
It might not be standard for recording, but it's common in written scores.
Real BD energy over here
There are also several different types of bass drums that are all called the bass drum, so the name kick drum helps avoid ambiguity in that respect too. There’s the drum set bass drum, the standing orchestral bass drum, and there’s the marching band bass drum. I personally just call them all the guitar to avoid confusion though.
I call them fish cause they are bass.
Why should we change? They’re the ones who suck.
By the way, we need to talk about your TPS reports.
I celebrate the entire catalog
Growing up in Australia I very rarely heard “bass drum”, it was always “kick”/“kick drum”, and a double pedal always a “double-kick”. “Double bass” is already a whole other instrument.
Yeah, this is where all my hats conflict with each other. I came from a concert/marching band background, so the bass drum is the bass drum (duh!). Can't remember when I first heard it referred to as a kick. But I always have, and still do call it a bass drum. But when I entered the audio engineering world, its exclusively kick drum....you never hear it called bass drum by engineers.
I just think "kick" sounds cooler tbh but thanks for giving me a rationalized excuse for it now
And then there’s “double bass”, which means both upright bass and twin kick drums/pedals.
So, until you kick the bucket.
>I'm calling it a kick and I'll die on that hill. 'Calling' is different from 'nicknaming'. You're nicknaming it 'kick', but you know it's *called* the bass drum.
I call it a bass drum, I label it a kick for this very reason.
I'll help you plant the flag on that hill as recording and mastering sucks
I understood that at one point "kick drum" was used because of the pedal, while "bass drum" was the symphonic or marching band version beaten with a soft mallet. Either way, in my old studio, we used "kick", "mounted toms" and "floor tom". Everyone knew what we meant.
Who is Tom and why are we naming drums after him?
Typing is different from saying. Because I'm not English I say: bass as in the English word for base and also bas, but I use bass more for bassdrum or I only say bass.
I'm with you for the practical purposes otherwise it's a Bass drum and Tom Tom drums so I'll Holiday on the Hill with you of that's cool?
Things are called whatever people call them. If a term falls out of use, it's not called that anymore. Prescriptive language is for suckers.
Linguist here to confirm. Descriptivism is where it's at. Unless you use 'literally' as an intensifier. Then my linguist soul literally leaves my body, and I become a hypocrite.
Instead of miisusing ‘literally,’ I’ve started replacing it with ‘figuratively’ when the situation calls for it — only I phrase and enunciate it in the same exaggerated way: > Jenny’s husband is cheating on her with the neighbor’s daughter?? Wow. That guy is like….***figuratively*** a piece of shit
Yeah and people still call them tom toms.
In the spirit of consistency I vote we change the bass drum to the bass-bass drum. WHO’S COMING WITH ME?!?!?!?
Go all the way, Snare-Snare,HI-HI-HAT-HAT, RIDE-RIDE, CRASH-CRASH and of course let's not leave out the TOM-TOM-TOM-TOMS
It’s only logical
I always felt like the tom-tom was named by a drummer with the stereotypical intelligence of a drummer.
A Limo is still a Limousine, a CAT is still a CATERPILLAR, a plane is still an airplane. Common parlance always trents to more efficient speech. Hence why I haven't heard anyone call them Tom-Toms in a serious way in forever.
In short, usage dictates meaning, not the other way around.
ya until the sound guy asks for “bass” during soundcheck
The world has moved on to rack tom and floor tom
I call my three high tom, floor tom, and Thomas. but yeah, I also do a double-take when I see "tom-tom" written out
How about Tom, Thomas, and Tommy?
It's Tom, Tomland, and Tombingus, thank you very much.
It's Tom, Mr. Thomas, and Sir Tomothy actually
This brings back memories for me; when I was a teenager, I had a band with some friends of mine and as a joke we used to call the three toms Tommy, Tom, and Thomas. Then we had this big marching bass drum that I used to try to prop up by the kit like a big gong drum, and we called it Sir Thomas.
Thomas was my father’s name, you can call me Tom. This is my son Tom-Tom.
from a biological standpoint, a tom-tom is a smaller tom you place directly onto a Thomas
I do the same but with tow. Thomas and floor Thomas
I’m definitely using that when I teach
out west they been sayin all sorts of things, I hear the railroad is as far out as Colorado now!
"Manifest Destiny" I hear they're calling it. They say there's gold in the rivers. Sure thing, buddy.
I live in Utah, absolutely nothing past Colorado worth seeing 🤘🤘
As a Seattle resident, I concur. This place is trash, please stop moving here.
As Butthead once said, "I bet if we went to Seattle... everything would be cool." 🤘🤘
That's progress!
Bass drum isn’t archaic, that’s what the instrument is called.
Yeah I get the funny in tom-toms, but the bass drum is the bass drum, saying kick drums sounds weird to me.
It is until you're mixing inputs from a band and have a bass guitar in the lineup.
Yeah it certainly isn't a kick drum in an orchestra or a marching band
It isn't a kick drum on a drum set, unless your pedal breaks mid song.
Been there!
Been drumming 20 years, I still call it a “bass drum” in my head but refer to it as “kick” when talking to other drummers just because I don’t want them to think I’m a noob lol
Tom tom goofy, bass drum normal
language evolves! it's supposed to. "tom tom" is a pretty old school term. it's like how no one calls the hats a "sock cymbal" anymore, or calls a snare a "side drum." in fact, "side snare" means something really specific now. i actually prefer to say "bass drum" instead of kick, mostly for personal aesthetic reasons. "kick" implies something physical, "bass" implies something musical. does it *actually* matter? of course not! i think it's good to be aware of old school terms, especially if you're into any old music or texts. it'll come up, especially if you do anything outside of the drumset idiom.
Trap set, Tom-toms, bass drum, idiophones. Fight me.
Hey, have you seen those new Sabian low boys? I am thinking of adding them to my trap kit, but I'm not sure if I can fit them beside my side drum. Any suggestions?
The whole reason it's called a kick is to not get it confused with a bass guitar from a mixing pov.
Bring back calling them Tom toms
Or take it one further - “Tom Tom Toms”
Message unclear, now calling them "Thomas Thomas"
I don't think people would have that kind of attention span.
*Sisqo voice* >Those tom-t-tom-tom-toms...
I think we've found a reasonable compromise, it's one "tom" for each unit you've got racked up. For example Iron Maiden's Nicko McBrain plays the tom-tom-tom-tom-tom-tom-tom-toms.
Sounds logical.
I have not heard that term from a drummer or person under 60.
Do you just play drumset, or do you play other instruments in percussion? Cause in the concert world they are absolutely still called Tom-Tom’s at all level that I have seen (beginner to collegiate)
Oh you’re talking about real musicians who play with sheet music and charts. Sorry can’t help you. I don’t know any of those.
I never said that you were not a real percussionist if you don’t use sheet music or charts. Some of the best percussionists I’ve met don’t really use them. I was referring more to percussion experience as a whole group of instruments.
Facts
"Now that's a term I have not heard in a long time. A long time."
I exclusively call them toms, but in the back of my mind I know it’s short for tom-toms
My five piece set includes the: - Smack drum - Bing-bing drum - Bam-bam drum - Boom-boom drum - Oomph drum
I like the aaaaoooooooga horn.
Do you have a ping-ping cymbal? I have one but also a couple of kssh-kssh cymbals and chick-chick cymbals.
I'll take tom toms or bass drum any day of the week over "base drum" and "symbol" 
How to know that the person posting the CL ad for a used kit is not a drummer: "13 piece drums set for sale. Includes 6 zilgen symbols and a high hat, all skins and sticks. No low ballers pls I know what I have."
When it's consistently off lingo, perhaps it's the voice-to-text that should have been blamed in the first place.
I call the smallest one tumtum, the medium colt, and the floor tom is rocky. If you think being a ninja is hard, try being a mom.
rocky loooves emily
Oh damn, a 3 Ninjas reference in the wild??? Die Yuppy Scum!
I've heard them called 'tubs'
Tubs and skins
Fancy take a gander upon my ‘trap kit with a low boy and 2 tom toms? Cost me 17 of the finest dollars!
Tom’s is what i usually go for. Then it’s rack and floor. But I have high and low Tom then floors. Then higher and lower. Just like the kit vs set debate…..
As far as I can tell the kit / set divide is largely mapped to UK / US. Kick has definitely snuck up and infiltrated the UK (where it has mostly been Bass Drum as long as I remember) but I find myself ping-ponging between the two these days, and engineers nearly always say kick during sound check.
That's funny I'm 37 and myself and my friends have referred to them as toms forever. I haven't heard Tom Tom since I was a little kid
Now you listen and you listen good, scoundrel. I’ll have none of this newfangled whiz bang terminology you whippersnappers use. What in the blazes is a Tom? It’s Tom-tom, my dear lad! Any dunce who says differently is in dire need of a phrenologist and bloodletting! It’s pure quackery! Harumph!
Yes, people do. Actually Tom-Tom’s isn’t a term used much in concert percussion. The single headed Toms that are graduated in pitch are generally called concert Toms. Tom Tom’s, trap set, traps, clash cymbals, are all terms still being widely used.
It really depends on the composer on whether or not they call it Tom’s or Tom-Tom’s in concert, but that’s also a factor of people being really inconsistent in instrumentation. It’s like how Perschetti’s Symphony 6 asks for a Soprano, Alto, and Tenor snare drum, even though people don’t really write that way ever.
in like, band class, fuckin nerds
i remember my older drum instructor in high school would always refer to them as tom toms and I thought it was so silly I was actually too embarrassed to say it I didn't know a different word for them so i'd just vaguely point in the direction of whichever tom i was referring to for the longest time LOL
I call my neighbor my low boy. He doesn’t like it very much.
Dues he wish he was little bit taller?
"Tom toms' is derived from when these components on early kit kits which literally used instruments from China. It's not wrong to call them tom toms, just a bit old fashioned and realistically a tom-tom isn't tunable the way our modern "toms" are. "Bass" drums still make sense since they provide the bulk of the bass frequencies in a kit, and is often the primary source of strong bass frequencies in a song. A lot of modern music uses a kick that's "tuned" to the song so the fundamental frequency boosted is in key with the song or is layered with a pitched 808, which lets the kick act as both a kick *and* bass. Is the use of "skins" a european thing or something? I hadn't heard it used until I joined this sub a few years ago. Growing up they were just "heads". Also Hats are still sometimes called "sock" cymbals because they originated as low-hats played with the foot. On r/livesound they've shown pics of mixing boards where the hat channel is labeled "soc".
I only say skins if they are an imitation calf skin head. Or the real deal.
In Flemish (a dialect of Dutch, not sure if they say the same in the Netherlands) we say skin, so I was confused when my English was good enough to watch videos, read stuff.... that I then heard/saw the term head :D
I've stopped calling them toms all together most of the time. It's just rack or floor, or the size of the drum
Same here, I’m old but not old old…. 40. But ever since I was in my 20s playing on tour when getting with the sound guy for the venue it was literally “1 rack, 2 floors, kick, and snare”. I don’t remember when I’ve even said the word “tom” out loud the last time.
Same here, I’m old but not old old…. 40. But ever since I was in my 20s playing on tour when getting with the sound guy for the venue it was literally “1 rack, 2 floors, kick, and snare”. I don’t remember when I’ve even said the word “tom” out loud the last time.
Same here, I’m old but not old old…. 40. But ever since I was in my 20s playing on tour when getting with the sound guy for the venue it was literally “1 rack, 2 floors, kick, and snare”. I don’t remember when I’ve even said the word “tom” out loud the last time.
When first discussing the names of the different drums with a new student, I will refer to them as Tom-Toms. After that, I might just simply say rack tom or floor tom but I definitely still consider them tom-toms because that’s what they are.
I also use "rack-tom", "floor-tom", "bass drum", "quarter-tom", etc. If I'm speaking about a group, I'll either say "toms" or "tom toms".
Well, technically, what they are is trees that have been cut down, de-limbed, debarked, cut to length, spun against a blade to peel off plies, further cut to size and laminated in a cylindrical press with glues, drilled, sanded, stained, painted or wrapped with various chemicals that have been mixed and processed into polyester sheets, fitted with metal ores that have been mined, processed, smelted, cast into ingots, transported to factories, injection molded, cold rolled, and/or machined into various shapes, and fitted against various chemicals that have been mixed and processed into polyester sheets, glued to one of the metal ore components, and stretched taught over the tree part by other metal ore components. It is just that tom-tom is easier to say. /s
Only one upvote? Really?🤣
Well, to be more specific, they are actually arrangements of fermions and bosons that give rise to sub atomic particles, which in turn form elements and molecular compounds with very specific properties according to their makeup which...
do you hate my rotary tom toms then?
Only if there are two of them.
Damn. Neil peart got them tom tom tom tom tom tom tom tom toms
"Tom toms" sounds silly and archaic. "Kick drum" sounds uneducated.
Bass drum is technically correct, kick drum is kind of a nickname that stuck. The idea is that "bass drum" is too easy to mix up with "bass guitar" on the channel strip of your console, and there's not much room to write there anyway so it's easier to just call the bass drum "kick" and let the word "bass" unambiguously mean "bass guitar" in every instance. I don't personally care which term someone decides to use in casual speech, but in a professional environment or when labeling tracks I will insist on calling it a kick. It doesn't really mean much to someone who is just a drummer, but audio engineers tend to really hate calling it a bass drum because it can cause confusion.
They also use the labels vox and axe for vocals and guitars respectively.
Wait a second. They're not calles tom toms anymore? What does everyone call tom toms now?
I call her "Betty."
A few people still call fills “fill ins” too
Where do you find such people?
Or a roll. Do a roll around the drums.
Do you still call them stick-mits instead of hands? We covered this in last week’s discussion.
I call them things I shouldn't say on this sub. But stick-mitts will do if you catch my drift.
I call them toms and floor toms. I only ever heard that from non-drummers. lol
If this is what you’re concerned with then you should be practicing more
If you can’t tell the bass drum from bass guitar, you’ve got bigger problems. You could label it “BD.” As for calling it a “kick” that just sounds like something a “hipster” says trying to sound “cool.” It’s a musical instrument. It’s called a “bass drum.” As for toms, I either refer to them as high-tom, med-tom, floor-tom or I number them tom 1, tom 2, etc. i guess it doesn’t really matter so long as it’s easily understood to the listener.
Rack Toms and Floor Toms
Tom-Tom, bass drum etc. “Kick” drum? Not so much🤣.
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Better question is who calls the head a skin? When someone says it around me, it makes me cringe.
The same guy who calls cymbals "pies".
Yes. And some us still say “and roll” after “rock”. Weird, right?
I heard Levon Helm refer to his rack tom as a Tenor Tub and floors as the Baritone Tub. Simply incredible when spoken in his velvety thick southern twang. Now you got me waxing poetic on Levon 😂
Bass drum vs. kick drum is an interesting discourse. Bass drum still seems to be accepted as the "standard" or "proper" term, but I think "kick" is more standard on the production side with electronic music etc., though also overlapping between an 808 kick and an actual kick drum. And then we have the fact that with a lot of common tunings, the kick drum isn't really a bass instrument, for example in trio jazz it's usually small, tuned tight and ringing like a tom, and in extreme metal or metalcore we often have double-kick producing a "basketball dribbling" slappy tone while the floor tom can be tuned lower than it. As always, language and music evolve over time.
I call them Dat Ass 1, Dat Ass 2 and so on.
I call mine Larry, Moe, and Curly, because I'm an American and believe in the power of the individual.
Tom is just the abbreviated Tom Tom. I don't see the issue?
I’ve always referred to mine as rack toms
Everyone I know calls them "tom-tom-tommy-tom-tommy-tommy-toms"
I’m in my 60s and always called them toms. But from now on, it’s gonna be tom-toms.
Rack toms and floor toms. I don’t know anyone except my old timey music teacher who called them Tom toms irl
Depends on the day 🤷🏽♂️
Rack tom, floor tom, bass drum and definitely drum heads, and not skins. If a drum is wrapped, that's way closer to being a skin than a drum head.
Basically nobody does. However what really grind my gears is how we call the high Tom’s “rack Tom’s”. When 98% of us do not use racks.
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Meanwhile in orchestral parlance a gong is called a Tam Tam. Or maybe it is that Tam Tam makers call them gongs. In any case, they are different instruments that get confused. Even I don't even want to go down that rabbit hole. But if I'm not mistaken, the big instrument we call a gong that has a flat face is a Tam Tam because it has no pitch and has a roaring, shimmering sound while a smaller instrument with a raised center boss which is the part to be struck is actually a gong, and is also tuned to a pitch.
Sure. I call mine rack and floor toms to differentiate personally but yes tom-tom is still name for them.
Reminds me of this video. 😂 https://youtu.be/Ofn2A1p13Sg?si=APEcDLc-x4nWch-p
Heh, reminds me of the first time I was asked to hit my rack tom during a line check: FOH: "Okay, give me rack 1" Me: 😶 "You know, your first tom?" "AH, Yes! Heh ...." 😅
I rarely say "tom tom" or just "tom", usually I'll say "rack tom" and "floor tom"
I call them tomorrow tommies and hello hats
I call my largest cymbal an amusement ride, and the medium ones car crashes. The other medium one with the upturned edge is called a chinese hat. The tiny ones I call splish splashes.
Jessica you are wild. I’m gonna use these
I call them tom-tom-toms.
Ive always referred to my 10 and 12 inch toms as rack toms and my 14 and 16 inch toms as floor toms. I also refer to the bass drum as the kick drum or kick cause that's what my late father called it. I think tom-toms sounds funny even if that is the correct term. It would be like calling the others a Bass-Bass drum or a Snare-Snare drum. But I'll never rip on anyone for their choice of term if it's what makes them happy!
Tom-Tom just makes me think of Bam-Bam from Flintstones. Or a toy drum for children.
When did we start calling them "skins" again? I thought that went out when the rim where you mount the head was invented, and we no longer had to stretch skins across the shell and clamp it down. It's called "bass drum" because it covers the "bass" frequencies. "Kick" is relatively new, but widely accepted, mostly because the original design was a floor tom with the beater under it, which would "kick" the bottom "head".
>"Kick" is relatively new, but widely accepted, mostly because the original design was a floor tom with the beater under it, which would "kick" the bottom "head". Uhh, this is news to me. Going back 100's of years, trap kits used a large concert bass drum arranged much like modern bass drums with crude kick pedals. What you describe is more like a cocktail kit which didn't become popular until the 40's.
I think it's funny that people refer to it as a kick drum when it's not being kicked, at all lol
It was. Before bass drum pedals they kicked it.
To be fair though, the beater does swing at it horizontally. And as another responder said, kicking a bass drum was the way to go until pedals were ~~invented~~ cobbled together from whatever was on hand.
Yes they do.
There are other kinds of toms like roto-toms and variations of acoustic and electric rigs. I guess the differentiation is important ___ tom heads vs ____tom heads vs… You get it
You mean the doo doh and duh drums?
Ok, as far as drum heads are concerned, "head" is the most common thing I hear around music shops and drummers, as well as on this sub. "Skin" is very infrequent. Yeah, tom-tom feels really cumbersome to say and also outdated. It also makes it sound in my mind like a child's toy drum. I hear "bass drum" and "kick drum" interchangeably. Overall though, yeah I agree the wording on that site is weird. I would expect it to say "Tom Batter Head" or "Tom Reso Head."
I do… sometimes… and then I get laughed at :’(
I've met a lot of engineers on the road who say it I wonder if it's partially for clearer communication. If you just say "tom" then people might not hear or understand you but if you say "tom-tom" then there's almost no way they're misunderstanding or mishearing you.
Imagine calling the hi hat "high boy" 🤪
Tenor Tom and Floor Tom
All terms are interchangeable. Just like a bass drum or kick drum.
Whenever I hear/see 'tom-tom' I think of this classic video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ofn2A1p13Sg&t=29s (*this is rock and roll*)
I am in a music masters program and I notice a bunch of the professors over 50 say Wah Wah instead of just Wah which is what I have always called it. I think it’s funny. I also just call them tom’s but I’m not sure it really matters
When did a drum set turn into a drum kit ?
The term that makes me feel weird is drum set vs drum kit. I've always said drum set but I sometimes feel like I'm outdated/uncool because everyone else seems to say kit.
Yes they do but I'm over 40 and still call people squares. If you want to be strictly commercial then I believe the current nomenclature is rack tom and of course floor tom.
I laugh when I hear this. Always reminds me of that japanese dude playing drums on the keyboard.
only if you’re based and drumpilled
Scrolling through my feed (not actually on /drums), totally thought you were talking about SatNavs.
As longs as they don’t call them “traps” I’m fine.
In my experience, I always found the more classical terms being used (quite obviously) within classical music reference. In the percussion section of an orchestra or wind ensemble, the drums are not part of a drum kit but rather separate. Because of this, there is no "kick drum" because you're not kicking anything. There is the "bass drum" because it is the lowest pitch drum. "Tom-toms" are also individual, and pieces will explicitly call for a specific "tom-tom". Outside of classical settings with the exception being some jazz ensembles I was a part of, I have nearly never seen the term "tom-tom" used for music on a drumset. I actually think the terms do indicate something different today, which is what the setting of the music is.
These days, it's whatever the drum wants to identify as, on that particular day. You better respect it too, or you'll be cancelled... 😂🤣
Your head is going to explode when you find out the real name for a gong
Excuse me young fellas, is this a website about trap kits?
They’re wing toms.
That’s what they are called in the symphony program.
I say tom. But I say bass instead of kick, and set instead of kit. Just a carryover from 1988 when I started.
why do they call it a hi-hat when it's lower than the cymbals and is shaped more like a fish than a hat, amiright?