Can you do Heel Toe?

[MH400]

Heel Toe seems to be the equivalent of Sweeping for the Drum world - most that know about it want to do it, but not many people can do it perfectly.

Can you do it? If you can, how did you learn? Was it via tutorials online? Did you have lessons?

Poll coming, yo.

[CreepingDeath13]

nah, my pedal isnt long enough. Chris adler does it. Search "chris adler bass drum technique" on you tube and he explains how to do it.

[funkbass369]

my brother can do it perfectly. but he had to practice it more since he can't do double bass. He has one hand so he uses his left foot for a pedal that hits a snare placed on the ground.

[adstr123]

Yes, I can do it, sounds pretty awesome and is really satisfying once you nail it :)

I was self-taught actually so didn't use any of those materials. I asked a friend to show me one time, then I just tried to mimic his actions. You need to know that there are probably better ways to learn; the way I did it took A LOT of trial, error and repetition as well as pain. I just sat there constantly trying to do the movement. I got it by accident, then just tried to replicate that. I got it again, and again.... Until I worked my way up from doing it one in ten attempts to all the time.

As with most aspects of playing instruments, practice is the key, bro. Just keep practicing, looking at the technique and you'll get there eventually. Prepare for pain: you're going to bash your foot on the sharp metal chain freaking loads. :haha:

[Doodleface]

nah, my pedal isnt long enough. Chris adler does it. Search "chris adler bass drum technique" on you tube and he explains how to do it.

You don't need long board pedals for it. Chris Adler has a slightly different way of doing it. His technique requires more physical work but he prefers it like that so he can keep control better when playing shows and can burn off his adrenaline.

[Steve08]

nah, my pedal isnt long enough. Chris adler does it. Search "chris adler bass drum technique" on you tube and he explains how to do it.^Actually, you probably don't know how to do it right, Chris' technique isn't the traditional method of doing it anyway. Heel toe in reality doesn't have any "heel", all you do is hit the pedal with a regular heel up stroke and then hit another tap once again with your ankle muscles once you've completed the first stroke. There are in fact almost no pedals that would facilitate a stroke with the heel, including Axis and Trick pedals, unless you had VERY small feet, and there are tons of people who use those pedals and that use heel toe-- John Longstreth, Alex Micklewright and Tomas Haake being examples.

As for the poll, yes, I use it quite a lot whether it be for quick double strokes on the feet (two 16ths on one foot, from 140-240 bpm usually) or steady double bass. For the latter, I use heel toe but not as doubles, for that I use two heel up strokes, one on either foot, and then the next two hits are heel down strokes, which brings my feet back into the position for the next two heel up strokes. Very efficient technique, a lot more economical than traditional single strokes though it requires more development of the heel down muscles than many are used to. Also, I use it for stuff like one footed blasts and can push 8th notes at 240 via that method.

As for how I learned it, I pretty much just picked it up with my own observations/watching videos.

[skylerjames13]

Someone care to explain what Heel Toe is in simple words?

[MH400]

Kind of sums it up http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eyGhQAcZZYw

Obviously, its the fast parts.

[Steve08]

Someone care to explain what Heel Toe is in simple words?It's a method of playing double strokes on the feet (RRLLRRLL etc...), generally two 16ths on one foot, for single pedal, but you can also do it on two pedals for double stroke rolls, basically. John Longstreth from Origin uses heel toe doubles at 260-270 bpm, haha.

The motion for it is basically a heel up stroke, and then once your foot is on the pedal and you've completed the first stroke, you hit another stroke with your ankle muscles. So it's like a heel up stroke and then a heel down stroke, although depending on how you execute it your foot might just be hanging in the air and you use only ankles. It doesn't really matter. But yeah, that's what heel toe is.

[skylerjames13]

Holy shit****. I want to learn.

That sounds kind of complicated. :p: Is it hard to do?

[Steve08]

Well, not really. It's pretty easy, actually, just requires some knowledge of all the different bass drum "motions" I guess. Like with anything else though, you need to develop it and you're not going to be doing anything really fast at first but just work on it for a couple minutes a day, maybe try and incorporate the motion into some beats and get it natural and stuff.

[trashedlostfdup]

i really haven't drummed that long, but i can do it about 80% with my right foot, but i have been working on it a lot, and i only drum barefoot... lol. i just thought i would add that in there.

[Steve08]

It doesn't reaaaaaaaally matter if you wear shoes or if you don't, I usually play in socks myself for comfort reasons, but I could probably still do it in snowboarding boots if I felt like it, though it'd obviously be a bit different haha.

[guitarsXdrums]

I've been able to do heel-toe for over a year now i just remember looking at it on youtube and just practising thats the ony secret to it, it's very useful for quick blasts on double bass pedal but i can't do it constently oh well again pratise makes perfect

[Alex Vik]

I think I can if I'm understanding it right. I didn't know it had a name.

[Steve08]

Yeah, all it is would be a regular heel up stroke (with your leg) and then another one right after with a heel down stroke basically. It's also important to note that you can use more or less for the same technique, but with single strokes, which is generally called the constant release method. For double strokes it's just a faster whipping motion.

[Turnitdown]

Oddly, it was one of the first things my drum teacher taught me. I'd been playing for a while before I got lessons though so I could sorta do it straight away.
I do it all the time now, although I only have a single pedal and I can't really use it to play a double kick beat so I only use to add the odd double kick accent to my playing, at the end of a fill before hitting the snare and crash together for example :)

[Turnitdown]

Also, I don't use my heel at all. It's more of a slide forward of my foot so the one motion creates two "kicks" if you like :)

[Steve08]

Yeah, that's the slide technique you're talking about if I read right, which isn't heel toe, but ultimately they're both just two different ways to accomplish the same thing (double strokes on the feet).

[Alex Vik]

Is this heel toe?

https://dl-web.dropbox.com/get/Public/heeltoe.mp3?w=2a071b5d

On an semi-related note, my kick pedal broke :sad: Stupid cheap pdp shit.

[Steve08]

Is this heel toe?

https://dl-web.dropbox.com/get/Public/heeltoe.mp3?w=2a071b5d

On an semi-related note, my kick pedal broke :sad: Stupid cheap pdp shit.Can't see that (got an error 403) and I'm already logged in?

[whatadrag]

I'm gonna introduce myself here, because I just want to say I'm a guitarist, not a drummer. I don't own a drum set, although I love playing drums as much as guitar.

My buddy is a really good drummer and he has the Pearl Demon Drive single pedal. He is an absolute beast when it comes to heel toe. He taught me how to do it, and with that pedal, it's an absolute breeze.

[Speedingfish]

On an semi-related note, my kick pedal broke :sad: Stupid cheap pdp shit.

Damn, I've had my PDP double pedal for almost 6 years now, and the only thing that's broken was a spring.

[eddiehimself]

I can do heel-toe with both feet. I'm using pretty much the "standard" DW5002 with the constant velocity cams. And NO LONGBOARDS.

nah, my pedal isnt long enough.

A bad workman always blames his tools. You don't need a longboard pedal to play heel-toe with. You just need to practice :)

[Alex Vik]

Damn, I've had my PDP double pedal for almost 6 years now, and the only thing that's broken was a spring.
That was what broke. My friend gave me one of the springs off his kick pedal since "he likes mine better anyway", so I'm set for now.

Edit:

Can't see that (got an error 403) and I'm already logged in?
Weird. Try this.

https://dl-web.dropbox.com/get/Public/heeltoe.mp3?w=2a071b5d