DRUM! Magazine – Issue 15-2, Pg. 110-111

Now that I have been muted at practice and my neighbors can sleep, my volume battle has taken a new center stage. Recently, my female lead singer has started to suggest that I tend to play just a smidge too loudly during live performances. I’m trying to lower my volume, really. I swear. I’ve already weaned myself off the 2Bs, but I’m built like a hockey player and I naturally hit like I’m auditioning for Chimaira. Occasionally, I have been known to drown out my singer’s delicate voice.

In my attempt to appease her, I’ve changed heads, begun to hit softer, and adopted some muffling magic, but I’m not at her desired sound level yet. My heavy cymbals still weigh on her. It turns out that big, beefy crashes tend to be  quite loud. I only wish someone had told me this before. Though I could ask her to sing louder, which is a terrible idea because she slaps quite hard, I began to think about purchasing smaller, thinner crashes. In an amazing, once-in-a-lifetime coincidence, Zildjian shipped a brand-new set of A Fast crashes and splashes for my reviewing pleasure. Decked out in a subdued traditional finish and that classic Zildjian aura, the new cymbals look very nice. But who cares? Let’s bash these babies!

Fast Crashes. My band knew something was up when I arrived to practice early for the first time in about, oh, ever. The big package tucked under my arm gave it away. As soon as I cracked open the box, I looked for my preferred sizes – 16″, 17″, and 18″. Light and thin like great pastrami, the cymbals seemed at first almost shy, so I introduced myself by smashing the 18″ crash with much more power than it required. I’ll tell you this – these cymbals aren’t made to be pounded. Hitting through the cymbal overpowers its delicateness. Once the band and I started playing, I was instantly surprised at how loud these paper-thin crashes get. They are certainly not the loudest cymbals I have tried, but they project very well considering their thinness. Their volume and weight allowed me to play more delicately and with more control. Playing the surface produced a bright tone that serves well for quick accents.

Petite Pies. Until this point, 14″ crashes always seemed to me like overgrown splashes, and I’m not positive that I had seen one in person until I took this one out of the box. Quite tiny and cute, this lil’ lad did not have the lion’s growl that I love. On the contrary, it whimpered like a four-week-old puppy. I do like puppies, but “puppy-like” is not a way I wish to describe my ideal cymbal. The 15″ crash yelped like a slightly older, bigger puppy. It lacked power and volume, and I certainly didn’t want to play with the whelps. Or so I thought.

My singer and band liked them, so perhaps they were on to something. Nevertheless, I held my ground and a war quickly ensued. The band felt that the pair of smaller crashes fit perfectly into our more laid-back songs. I still didn’t like the pies much. They said that the crashes helped keep my volume in check. Ouch… And I still didn’t like them much. Then they said I could set up all the crashes – 14″, 15″, 16″, 17″, 18″ – and I’d have a versatile crash rig that would complement all our songs and not drown out the vocals. Geniuses. Plus, having all those cymbals around my drums looks really cool. I scrounged up extra stands and set up all five crashes at the same time. We jammed on a few tunes, and they were right. The cymbals didn’t overpower our singer. Truth be told, in the context of our music, they probably sounded better than my beefy crashes. Maybe, just maybe, I don’t know everything.

Fast Splashes. Skipping all the unnecessary Stewart Copeland references, I will tell you that the 8″, 10″, and 12″ splashes were absolutely adorable. The thin weight made them extra splashy and bright. Though the 8″ teetered on the edge of sounding toy-like, the 10″ and 12″ were great. True to their name, they were fast and attacked sharply with almost no sustain. I enjoyed playing the little cymbals, even though my singer felt that punctuating every third word with a splash was a trifle unnecessary.

Personally, I found that inverting and stacking the 10″ and 12″ splashes on the 14″ and 15″ crashes provided a better sound palette for my tastes. Each cymbal can be played independently, but they can also be crashed together for a slightly trashy sound.

Verdict. Though the metal-head in me will never give up his big, bad, and brawny crashes, there is always room in my cymbal bag for more stuff. The Zildjian A Fast crashes and splashes sing beautifully – individually and with each other. They provide a lighter, brighter sound selection that works well with a variety of music and controlled volumes. I have decided that I am going to keep these cymbals for my own use and will not give them back. In fact, I’m going to hide these under my bed so no one will know I have them. Maybe I shouldn’t have put that in print.