Outlaw Drums: Heart Pine Reborn

Anytime I come across an early American drum, I’m interested.  When the drum in question can be somehow identified, I’m really interested.  But how often do you come across a drum maker that identifies the origins of his drum making story to a civil war soldier and his house?  Now you have my attention.  Michael Outlaw attributes the origins of the drums he builds to an old dilapidated building he saw on the verge of being torn down and destroyed back in 2006.  Looking for something different to build with, he asked for some of the wood from the house and took a load of it away to his shop.

The wood came from the former home of Charles Edward Wilder, who as a youth in the 1860’s, enlisted in the 17th Georgia (GA) Infantry as a private.  A large portion of the 17th GA’s service was as part of Benning’s GA Brigade in Hood’s Division, Longstreet’s Corps, operating in the Army of Northern Virginia.  Wilder fought in many of the Civil War’s most notable battles in both the Eastern and Western Theaters.  Surviving the War, Wilder received 10 acres near Albany, GA from the State for his service as that was about all that was available to the returning veterans for any means of compensation.  The land was rich with virgin long leaf pine trees suitable for building.  Charles Wilder built the house from the wood of those trees in the 1880’s; the very same house Michael Outlaw procured wood from to build the first Outlaw Drums well over 100 years later.

Why is the wood so special?  Most of it dates back toward the 1600’s.  These trees grew at an exceptionally slow rate of growth.  They were virgin American trees that typically lived over 300 years and could grow to over 150 feet high.  The resin in the wood was thick and the grow rings tight.  Harvested from houses, mills, and barns built before 1900, the wood has had plenty of time to age and dry naturally.  This results in very special sound quality characteristics that new growth wood just doesn’t seem to have.

Hailing from Sylvester, Georgia, Michael Outlaw, the master wood craftsman behind Outlaw Drums, combines his skills as an accomplished furniture maker with the drummer within him.  I’ve found in researching the company that Michael has done a fine job in marketing the brand, so I’ll try not to be too redundant in what he has already made available.  His presence on the web is solid and informative.  He includes the history, current reviews, process, galleries, sound bites and videos.

I first ran into Outlaw drums at the 2014 Nashville Drum Show.  The display was very eye-catching, built to resemble the old shacks the wood for his drums originated from.  But it was the drums within the booth that weren't something I could just walk away from.  They were beautiful!  Something I don’t think I’ve seen before was the textured wood on the outside of the shell.  After taking a good look I started tapping.  They sounded as good as they looked.  By the end of the show, Michael ended up sending a drum and a wooden bass drum beater home with me to review for Not So Modern Drummer Magazine.

The drum I picked was one from the Heart Pine Reborn group; a stave construction combination of new growth maple and old growth heart pine. The shell measures 5”x 14” with 24 half inch thick staves of pine and maple equally alternating.  The combination of the two woods made a great sound; lively and solid no matter how I tuned it.  It also contained that “thump” I’ve come to love in those old growth, stave constructed drums that makes them sound like much beefier tubs.

The sensitivity and snare response was also incredible.  Everything from a hard hitting backbeat to ghost notes came out crystal clear regardless of tuning.  Cranking it up brought out very crisp, solid notes.  Low-end tuning brought out even fatter sound qualities.  Very quiet playing still netted great snare response, again, regardless of the tuning pitch.  No matter how hard I hit the drum, I couldn’t get it to choke; performing very well in the big rooms and outside situations.  With snares off, the drum has a great sound, full and clean.  The lively-ness of the drum without the snares on sounded great with Latin tunes.  My personal opinion is that this is a top-notch, all-around “go-to” drum

Since the overall vibe of Outlaw drums tends to pull on the heart-chains of my American history “Jones,” the notion to try a calf skin head naturally came to mind.  I generally keep a few mounted skins in my shop that I receive from CT Pro Percussion for just this purpose.  The sound of calf skin on this drum was truly exceptional.  Very warm and responsive, the drum took on the tone of a much older sounding instrument while remaining quite sensitive and crisp over-all.

This particular model came with chrome plated hardware including triple-flanged hoops, tube lugs, vent grommet, and a George Way “beer tap” throw off by Gibraltar.  Top and bottom feature Evans Level 360 heads along with sixteen-strand Puresound snares.  The Outlaw Drum badge is solid brass and made to reflect the U.S. Forestry Service badges in honor of the history and repurposing of this native American wood.  The bearing edges are a double 45 degree design.

Each Outlaw drum I played had a uniquely individual sound quality.  This is in part to the actual lumber used as well as the combinations of wood, dimensions, heads, and hardware selected.  Wood choices include, but are not limited to, White Pine, Maple, Oak, Vintage Cypress and Fur, Sapele, Lyptus, Southern Yellow Pine, and of course…..Heart Pine.  There is a full and ever-changing selection of wood and hardware finishes also available for your choosing.

Complete stave constructed drum kits are available in a variety of sizes and finishes to match any snare they make.   There is also a line of kick drum beaters affectionately known as the “Hammer.”  This wooden beater will bring exceptional power and massive thump out of your kick with its incredibly dense wood, each with three angled impact choices.

Michael Outlaw has hit a complete home run as a drum builder, all while managing to bring the history of the wood that has touched countless lives in countless ways back to life in the voice of a drum.  From out of the Southland, these drums look good enough to be thought of as fine American furniture.  There is even a hand-cut nail still attached in the wood shell from when it was part of a building.  Closer inspection of the interior found an old nail hole still present in the old wood.  If the history is still with the wood when comes into the shop, there’s good chance it will still be attached when it leaves the Outlaw Drum Shop as a drum.  All-in-all….this drum just sounds great!

 From Lancaster County, PA…....Thoughts from the shop. Brian Hill

 

Why does custom take so darned long?

One thing that’s common with today’s consumers is that when they want something, they want it now. I blame technology – buy an item on-line and it’ll usually be pulled from stock, packaged up, and started in the shipping process within hours. That new norm has changed our expectations enormously.

The same thing holds true when you’re buying drums.  Buy from a brick-and-mortar store and you take them home with you. Buy on-line and you have them within a few days. If they’re not in stock, the retailer can usually special order from the manufacturer and get them to you in a few days or a few weeks.

But order something from a custom builder and it can seem like someone slams on the brakes. Suddenly you’re talking about anywhere from several weeks to several months, and you feel like the kid in the back seat of the car – are we there yet, are we there yet?

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Frustrating, for sure. But knowing what to expect and how to participate in the process can help a lot.

Understand that drum building is not an industry of enormous factories and many thousands of workers.  It’s mostly a community of very small shops and tiny staffs. Even many of the well-known builders are much smaller operations than you’d think. That means that if someone’s out sick or there’s a personnel change, it can affect the production schedule. Major weather problems can affect the production schedule. Specialized tools and their maintenance can affect the production schedule. Material shortages or subcontractor delays can affect the production schedule.

So, really, why does it take so long? Most of those how-it’s-done videos seem to have the drum finished in a matter of hours, if not minutes. Maybe, you wonder, the builder isn’t organized, or doesn’t want to work hard, or isn’t a stable business, or just doesn’t care.  But, overall, the reality is that the custom build is a very different process from mass production.

Bear in mind that with mass production there are routine materials, sizes, components, and processes – a lot gets done with programmed machinery, templates, and assembly-line setups. But when you’re talking about custom, made-to-order work, it’s difficult to standardize production because of the frequent need to modify setups and processes.

For example, mass production of wood shells usually involves only a few species to choose from. But if you decide you want something different, a custom builder is going to have to source raw materials especially for your order. Specific dimensional requirements (and appearance, for anything that’s not covered by wrap, paint, or veneer) mean it’s not just a matter of popping out to the nearest home improvement center.

And actually making a shell can be a long process as well. If you want something that’s bent, glued, or molded, the material has to be shaped, sized, and fine-tuned to be within specifications. If it’s solid wood, it may need to stabilize for days at a time, or have moisture content slowly altered at certain stages. Occasionally, there can even be a failure – imperfections or weak spots inside the material that didn’t show on the outside, stresses during the process that damage the material, or sections that aren’t stable until fully assembled.

Your order might require special wraps, designs, artwork, etc., that can take time – sometimes a little, sometimes a lot – or specialized hardware that has to be fabricated. Even with mass-produced, relatively standard parts there’s always the possibility of a back order or limited availability. And pulling together all the materials and components for your project could involve a fair amount of shipping time in addition to fabrication time.

Then you may want special fittings, such as reinforcement rings, inlays, decorations, and so forth. Some of these take only an hour or so to install, others can take days to complete. And any custom parts usually mean there’s custom layout and drilling involved as well. Simple wraps can be installed quickly, but some finishes involve mixed materials, custom-blended tints, multiple applications, or lengthy curing times.

So it’s sounding like there are no reasonable limits on how long a custom order can take, right? Well, there are a few things you can do to help this process along and make it more comfortable and enjoyable for you. After all, it’s not just the builder’s project; it’s yours, too.

  • You probably asked at the beginning for a rough estimate of how long an order would take. But once all of the final specs are agreed on, ask whether anything has altered that projection.
  • If the adjusted timeline sounds longer than you’re comfortable with, check to see if any changes in the design might speed up the process.
  • Once things are underway, don’t hesitate to ask for updates on progress (within reason, of course). Sometimes a normally slight delay turns out to be longer than expected, and you’re entitled to know what’s going on. If there’s a roadblock, the builder should be willing to tell you what it is and what solutions he’s pursuing. (And, yes, there are such things as unreasonable or avoidable delays that you shouldn’t have to accept.)
  • Lastly, do your part to keep things in motion: respond to questions, raise concerns, don’t keep rethinking your plan once it’s underway, ask for information when you need it. A custom drum project should be a collaborative partnership between artist and artisan – and that’s an approach that can give you a great experience as well as a fine instrument.

Is it custom? Is it boutique? Does it make a difference?

I live in an area that has a lot of local breweries, and people around here talk and write about beer a lot.  So recently, when I saw an article about the blurring of lines as to what’s considered a “craft brewery” and what isn’t, I realized that there’s a connection between drums and beer that I hadn’t considered: confusion about industry categories and how to describe them.

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