Drummers and injuries

There is one thing that worries most serious musicians, more than a brief dry spell of work or a chip to their beloved instrument, and that is - INJURIES.

Sprains, RSI, broken bones, torn ligaments, carpal tunnel – any can affect your ability to play your instrument from anything from a few weeks to years, and sometimes, you can never play the same again.

Unfortunately, drummers seem to suffer more than most when it comes to sustaining an injury – first and foremost being that drums are such a physical instrument. All four limbs are required, wrist injuries are common, shin splints can play up in your right leg, even cases of back pains due to bad posture sitting at the kit. Theres little injuries too. How many drummers out there have smashed themselves in the face with the drumstick when playing with a little too much flair? Or smacked their hand on the side of the snare whilst rim-shotting, and sliced your hand on the cymbal going in for the choke? Then there’s blisters… exploding all over the kit mid-set, leaving your hands slippery and the stick digging into raw open wounds on your hands. Nice.

The worst thing is - I don’t think the most dangerous injuries that a drummer can sustain come when playing the drums. Oh no. It’s the ‘live fast’ attitude that I would say a majority of drummers seem to display is what gets us in the most trouble. Singers, yes, they are stupid too, but they only have their vocal chords to protect and egos to hurt, and the latter often restrains them from doing anything that might be detrimental to their health or Image.

Drummers are stuck at the back of the stage during the show – so when it comes to getting attention, almost ANY challenge will be accepted… and if there is not a challenge or dare? They will get into some crazy trouble anyway. Here are some examples:

Travis Barker – broke a bunch of bones skateboarding. Was one of 2 only survivors in a major plane crash. Biggest injuries: broken bones, and major burns.

Keith Moon – drove a Rolls Royce into a swimming pool, smashed up many hotels rooms and was a general lunatic. His injury list: two broken ankles, split teeth, a cracked collarbone, and countless bumps and bruises!

John Bonham – drank more than twice his own body weight in booze, got into fights regularly. Biggest injury: death

Those are 3 of the biggest drummers of our time, but if you type ‘drummer injured’ into google you will see countless other examples of drummers hurting themselves due to the ‘live fast’ mentality!

I myself have been the victim of a few injuries. A couple of years back when holidaying in Australia, I drunkenly climbed a tree and thought it would be a great idea to attempt jumping from branch to branch. The result? A fractured wrist. Luckily it had time to heal before I went back to England so my bandmates didn’t kill me. It did make me acutely more aware however of my mortality and fragile body structure.

Fast forward a few years later and I’m in Israel, on tour with my new band Pettybone. More careful this time was I with risk-taking, yet still managed to strain my wrist very badly doing the lamest thing: trying to open a bottle of water. I played the remaining shows with my wrist strapped up tightly and through a haze of painkillers and booze. I don’t advise it in the slightest, but it was the only way I could still play and not cancel any of the gigs. When I got back the doctor advised one thing: rest.

In all seriousness, injuries can be a nightmare for the touring drummer, and in most cases all the experts will just advise you to rest - healing takes time. Here are a few ways in which you can prevent injuries, and also a few ways to work around any injuries you might already have:

1.     Warm up! Drumming is very physical - it’s like a sport. You need to stretch your muscles out and warm up your wrists and hands before going onstage. Even if you just spend ten minutes going through single and double stroke rolls then stretch your wrists and arms out, trust me, you will see the difference. Cramps, and a variety of tendon and nerve problems can be avoided by doing simple warm-ups… there will be more in depth info on warm ups in my next article.

2.     Keep fit! Endurance is important for high-energy drummers and also those who have to play long sets. The fitter you are, the easier your drumming will become. Even if you have a wrist injury, jogging is something that you can do to keep your endurance up.

3.     If you feel a twinge, stop! Don’t keep drumming unnecessarily if you think you may be injured. Take a break and go back to drumming in a few days (making sure that you warm up first) if you still feel the twinge – go get it checked out. The chances are your rest time will be a lot shorter if you catch the injury before it gets too bad.

4.     Practice with the limbs that aren’t damaged! If you hurt your right hand, it’s the perfect excuse to get that lagging left hand up to speed, (and vice versa for lefties) also, don’t forget about your feet! You might not be able to get up to the double pedal speed of Dave Lombardo in the time it takes for your injury to heal, but you can damn well give it a try.

5.     Get creative! There you are whining about a little sprain, while the drummer from Def Leppard gets up onstage and kills it night after night with only one arm!  Travis Barker too - when he broke his left wrist he re-learnt the songs with triggers on his left foot, changed the way he played the songs slightly and still went on tour. Figure out how to play songs without the use of your damaged hand, play around with using triggers on your left foot – be creative and don’t let your injury hold you back from doing something that you love.