New ad rates announcement. NSMD doesn’t have a lot of advertisers, though Sonor and Slingerland just bought ads. A while back I raised ad rates to keep up with inflation and the price of eggs: A three for one ad on the website, in the monthly emailed issue and on DrumSellers.com is now $200. Any one of those ad placements is $75. An exclusive email blast to the 43,000 + email subscribers is $400. Reviews of products are free to advertisers.
My favorite things:
I am using a set of the new Yamaha Crosstown lightweight aluminum stands. The set comes with two straight cymbal stands, snare stand, and hi hat stand and a hardware bag. In the hardware bag that comes with the set, they weigh only 17 pounds total! I consider that one of the few innovations in hardware over the last few decades. They are made mostly of aluminum and are so light that you can lift each of them with one finger, seriously. The legs are U shaped channels, better than double braced; triple braced! The finish is an anodized silver satin finish that is fingerprint and scuff-resistant and will never oxidize. They are very sturdy. The feet on the stands and the snare stand arm sleeves are heavy duty. Maybe a heavy rocker who breaks cymbals could knock these over, but for those of us that are playing with a more controlled traditional technique, they don’t move and they don’t sway. I would not advise clamping anything like tom holders, etc. to the cymbal since they are aluminum tubes and could bend .
I’ve used lightweight single braced stands for decades. I don’t play hard, but I am LOUD! (good and loud). :-) Over the last thirty years I went from vintage Ludwig flat base cymbals stands, to the similar Tama Classic stands, and now these. They are extremely simple. If you are a “tweaker”, they may not work for you – no hi hat spring tension control, no memory locks, no booms, nothing to play with. The tension on the hi hat spring is set at what I would call a medium tension. I haven’t used boom stands in years and I don’t use memory locks so no problem there. I’ve just never been OCD about my set up. I’ve played so many rental kits that I quit worrying about trying to reset spring tensions, tom angles, cymbal angles, etc. to an exact degree. Like a golfer, I’ll “play it where it lies”.
This is a game changer – the most obvious advancement being the drastically reduced weight. I also pack an extra Tama classic cymbal stand and my throne base in the hardware bag –total weight maybe 25 pounds. This is not an advertisement by the way. I just like turning other drummers on to new gear that makes life easier.