Abe Cunningham of the Deftones: By Matt Peiken. Of Heavy music were like fine wine, 1997 would go down as a sweet vintage. Let's take an inventory: Metallica "Re-loaded", Pantera kicked out live brutality, Korn and Tool headlined Lollopalooza, and the Ozzfesttour pushed up & comers like Coal Chamber, Powerman 5000, and Machine Head into the main stream. On the down side, however, all this activity overshadowed the best thing to happen all year to hard music: AROUND THE FUR from the DEFTONES. Around the fur is an amazing record built on crushing instrumentals lines, schizophrenic vocals, and lush, bottom-heavy rhythms. Reflecting on the making of the album (the bands 2nd), Drummer Abe Cunningham says he contributed as much with notes he didn't play as with those he did. But before you banish him into the less-in-more department, consider his upbringing: Drum corps, school jazz band, and a lineage of musicians. While most touring drummers have ritten off home practice, Cunningham still relishes the woodshed. And at 24, he's already learned that strong musicianship has nothing to do with showing off the masses. As the Deftones continued their international sonic assault, Cunningham broke away to talk about his of drumming, his passion for learning, and what you can and can't hear on Around the fur. -------- Mp: Sacramento, California has had its success stories here and there, but it's not like there a lot of places there to play and grow as an artist. Did you guys set out to break away from Sacramento as quickly as possible, or did you have more humble goals? AC: People think we're this new band, but we've been around almost ten years now. I went to school w/ our singer, Chino, and he grew up in the same neiborhood as our guiterrist, Stefan. Skateboarding was kind of our common bond, but after a while we all started jamming in Stefen's garage. It was just the basic garage band thing, just friends having fun. We started playing around Sacramento, which as his ups and downs, i guess. It's true, there arenīt a whole lot of bands either. We used to play cover tunes in the garage just because it was fun. But way early on we started writting our own music. You used to be able to see the same bands playing in the same places, so any band that really wanted to branch out had to go to the Bay Area. So thatīs what we did, Berkeley Square, the Omni, the Stone. The whole Bay Area trash metal scene was very big then. We were heavely influenced and inspired by that. MP: Were you a metal-head, yourself? AC: I donīt know if iīd say that. Iīve always licked heavy music, but i have a real different background than that. My dad was a bass player and my step-dad was a drummer. My first memories of being around music are from watching my dad play blues gigs. When i started to play at around seven or eight years, i dug out my parents music, like Beatles records and hendrix albums, Mitch Mitchell is a great influence of mine, and i play along those. My mom was into things like the Police. All of that probably influenced me as a drummer more than metal drummer. Around the time i started playing, my dad sort of got away of the drums, i just sort of took over is kit. I was so fascinated with it that iīīd just take it apart and put it back together again. Then in High-school , i was in marching band and jazz band. I tried taking lessons for about a month, but the teacher was a real jerk, and and that kind of gave me a bad taste for normal lessons. But i used to come home after school and just jam for hours. And that still something i crave a lot: just playing on my own. I miss it when weīre om the road. MP:Iīve interviewed some drummers who say that they hate playing on their own, that they get all the practice they need playing night after nigth on the road. AC: Well that is a form of practice. What youīre doing is getting really good at playing those same songs, and thereīs a lot to be said on that. Iīm sure my playing is tighter and more fluid on our songs now then that when i first recorded them, mainly because iīve had more time with them and had time to experiment with other ways of doing things. But that doesnīt necesserily makes me a better Drummer. When youīre out on the road, you really donīt have time to sit down and work out some things oyuīve like to try. You basically have soundcheck and the show. So when iīm home and have some time, one of the things i crave most is woodshedding bymysilf and trying to keep up my chops. MP: Do you try to work out specific patterns or develop a specific part of your playing, or do you just like playing what comes to mind? AC: Itīs really all off that. I go a lot on inspiration, even if its another drummerīs lick, something i heard on a record or saw a nother drummer do, i might go home and pick it apart to see if i can figure it out. Maybe itīs something iīm frustrated with and i just wont to work on untill i nailed it. But now i pretty much go in and play whatīs on the top of my head. itīs just nice sometimes to in a room by myself and just play. MP: Are there any drum parts on Around the fur that came directly from your woodshedding? AC: You know, this really sounds cliché, because you always read interviews where Drummers say there just playing for the songs, thats theyīre more mature now or whatever. But really has as lot to do with were iīm coming from now, and definitely where where i was coming from with this record. At the time we did the first record, wich i really like and think is good, you can tell the band was really young. weīd been playing most of the songs for quite a while, and we were just so happy to be making a record that we didnīt really think a whole lot about making the song better. I think maturity is the biggest siferrence between the two records. Weīd been on the constantky for two years we started the second record, so we where a lot more at ease in the studio. I think that allowed us to look a little deeper into whate we wanted to do. What came out of that is that we simplified things. For me, I think it was just playing with more confidence, and not feeling like i had to fill up all empty spaces. As a drummer, i wanted the songs to come through. Thereīs a diference between playing whatīs right for the song and the song dictating whatīs right for it self, and i think we let the song have theire way a lot more this time. The difference as really started to come out now that were on the road, because iīm really playing some things differently that i did on the record. Not itīs better or worse, itīs just different now that iīve lived with the song for a while. MP: What were some of the main challenges in simplifying your playing in the studio? Did you consciously hold yourself back from the embellishing certain parts, or was it very natural for you to lay low? AC: Any drummer would just love to open up when he can, so it was a conscious thing to pull back. But itīs just that needed to happen And itīs not that difficult when youīre thinking of the song first and foremost. With the kind of music we play, the guitars are relly heavy and powerful, so it didnīt make a lot of sense to try to compete with that. It also doesnīt leave room for me to put in all the ghost notes and grace notes i usually like to play. I did a lot more ghosting on the first record. But you canīt hear them, anyway, so i really just had to play solid and heavy. I wanted the notes i do play to matter and help create a fell. MP: You can definitely hear the difference in production between your first and second record. The drum sound and the whole band now sounds a lot more thick and lush. AC: Yeah, we spend a lot more time now thinking about those things and talking with the producer Terry Date about different things we wanted to hear. Terry as just so much experince to offer us, too. When he did our first record, he had just come from doing a White Zombie album for the previous six months, and he was a bit burned out. This time, he took almost a year off before he went to work with us. It was so nice because everyone was ready to do it, and Terry knew exactly what would be right for what we wanted.He really it all together for us. MP: Did you use a lot of different drums to get the sounds you wanted, or was it more combination of micīs in the room? AC: We used the same kit throughout tha whole record, but i swapped different snares around for practically every song. I think iīve sort of rifened what i want in a snare sound now. I always liked getting a nice crack, but the older iīm getting, the more iīm getting into that fatter sound. Sometimes i like really loose snares. Iīm always adjusting my snare tension, just to try to blend that crack with the fat sound. I used to like piccolo snares a lot, but now i mainly use a 6x14 snare thatīs a 20-ply maple with die-cast rims and four 1" holes drilled into the sheel. itīs become my main snare now because itīs sort of the best between the both worlds for me. But iīm really happy with the whole kit. My drums come from Orange County Drum & Percussion. Theyīre really well made, and theyīve got great tone. We did a cool experiment with one song that didnīt make it on the album. we set two kits up, one of them upstairs in the balcony of the studio and one below. I played the main track on the kit downstairs, then went upstairs and played that kit, but still recording it with the room micīs from downstairs. I used two 19ī crashes for a hi-hat. It was just a really bizarre experiment, but it was toward the end of our time in the studio and we didnīt had a lot of time to play with it. It came out okay, though, and the song might make it onto B-side or something. MP: Did you play to a click? Iīm asking because your timing seems really tight. AC: No, i donīt use a click, I can; I donīt have a problem with it. We tried once, i think, but we didnīt really need it. I donīt know if good timings come naturally to me or not, but i think i trained myself for that without even realizing it. It starts by playing to records with these bad-ass studio drummers on them, like Steely Dan records with guys like Jeff Porcaro. I donīt know if they used clix or not, but their timming is right on, an i guess playing along to them sort of taught me to be a stronger time keeper. MP: Like training wheels on a bicycle. AC: Tottaly. After you ride with training wheels, you take īem of and you can ride on your own. MP: Do you read music at all? AC: A little, yeah. I used to be more into it during High-School, with marching band and reading jazz charts. I have to admit iīve pretty much slacked on that, but iīd love to get back to it. I really want to , because it would be great to be able to work on some drum books when iīm woodshedding at home. I think getting more into reading would really open up a lot of worlds for me. MP: You played in a few different musical settings before the Deftones. Did you particularly want to play in a heavy band, or where you just happy to in any band? AC: At the time, to go out and play our instruments hard, but i was mainly to be playing with my friends. Threre was about a year an a half where i left the Deftones to play in another local band, Phallucy. They were like the really big band in Sacramento. And they were a lot older than me, i was maybe only sixteen at the time, so it was really cool. But was really good friends with the guys in the Deftones. They they tried all these different drummers, and every time someone woulnīt work out, iīd always go back to play with them. And weīd just have so much fun together. It was something weīd all created together, and it was always a blast going back. They finally said: "hey, weīre great together, you have to come back". So i did, and itīs been that way ever since. Our focus back then was on the energy and having a good time. Thatīs what it is even now. And weīre colectively into many different styles of music, we really donīt even really listen to much heavy music, so who knows what our next record will be like. MP: Did you ever play double bass? AC: I tried to, but i just canīt do it. I use a double bass pedal, but itīs more for emphasis, like a flam or a ruff, not hammer out 16th notes. I used to have a big kit, i used to hate lugging it around, and itīs became sort of silly. So i got the double pedal, which has actually been part of my setup for a long time now. I a way, i alomost regret it, because i grew up playing on a single pedal and i used to have a really fast foot. Now i rely a lot more on the double pedal. I just always know itīs there, so itīs a peace of mind thing. MP: What are some things youīd like to do musically that have nothing to do with the deftones? AC: I havenīt really thought that far ahead. Iīd love to jam with different people. I play a little guitar, too, and iīd like to explorethat some more. But more than anything, Iīd love to take drum lessons from somebody. Not out of a music store like i tried last time, but maybe from a friend whoīs a bad-ass player, like the tutor-and-mentor situation, who i could just sit down with sometimes and pick things up from. No matter what, i never want to stop learning.