What's in the Bag?: My Stick Bag

I try to keep a decent variety of tools in my stick bag, while keeping the bulk and quantity to an absolute minimum.

I'm no pro drummer, I wouldn't really call me a "drummer" at all, so I don't need 68 pairs of sticks on my hip every day. However, I do keep a decent variety with me, and enough to keep me moving even if something fails or breaks.

All this goes into a Zildjian Stick Bag that I think costs about $12. Nothing flashy, in fact I got mine for free or I wouldn't have bothered with the thing. Before this bag came along, I rolled all my sticks up in a towel, and that worked just fine. Plus, then I had a towel.

OK, first of all, the outer, smaller pocket. I keep a few basic items in here, that are fairly standard tools of the trade.

Gibraltar Extended Drum Key
Jim Dunlop Egg Shaker
Standard Drum Key (Earplug wrap)
5ft Measuring Tape
Black Sharpie (another Earplug wrapper)

That Gibraltar key is nice for getting more exact tuning. The JD shaker is the best sounding shaker I've found to date. If I ever find a better one, I'll spend the $1.85 on it and do a post so you can too. Then I've got the standard key for tight places, with my primary ear plugs wrapped around it. With both plugs in, the weight of the key keeps the line in between the ears tight and dropped behind my neck. The measuring tape is for when I say "dang, I like this snare, I wonder how deep it is?" Because I'm not really good enough to eye ball it yet, and I'm snare shopping. And finally, that sharpie does the same things as the spare key, only it's nice to have something to write with too.

Let's go inside (all sticks hyperlinked).

Left to Right:
Zildjian DIP 7A
Zildjian DIP 7AN
Vic Firth HB Brushes
Vic Firth SD10 Swingers
Vic Firth T1 General Mallets
Cameron Magee 7B Multi-Rods
Pro*Mark Stealth Rods
Cameron Magee 3B Multi-Rods

Standard (Left) Section:
I like to play with those 7A's because of how light they are, and they don't have the extra loudness of a 5A. I use these 50% of the time, and a combination of everything else in the bag the other 50%. Same story with the 7A Nylons, I just keep a Nylon pair to avoid redundancy.

Specialty (Center) Section:
Those Brushes are pretty cool, but are usually too quiet unless the entire kit is mic'd up. The SD10 Swingers are the loudest sticks I own, so naturally, I use them as little as possible. The Mallets are nice for cymbal rolls, on intro's and outro's of a lot of the worship music I like to play.

Quiet (Right) Section:
If you missed the post, I like to make my own multi-rods (click the link to read the story). I use what I think is 3/16" dowel rods, and make different sizes, with this size being my primary. The Pro*Mark Stealth Rods are the most impressive set of sticks I've ever gotten to mess with. They are crazy unique, and out of all the sticks in here, are the only pair that I would suggest running out to buy (unless you want a pair of Cameron Magee Multi-Rods, that is!) They are nice and bouncy, not too loud, and give to the Toms what the CM Multi's can't. The far right and last set is a set of CM 3B's, the little babies of the bag. Nice and quiet, while maintaining a beautiful snare crack sound.

That's the bag. It gets me through just about anything in the worship drumming world. I'd suggest running to Guitar Center and picking up a pair of those Stealth Rods if you can, they are really something. Oh, and emailing me to order a pair of Custom CM Multi-Rods, too, of course!

as always, you can see more photos from this post by visiting my Flickr at: http://www.Flickr.com/CameronMagee

thanks for reading all this stuff I type up. Feel free to comment and let me know how to type better stuff.