Brighton musicians attend exclusive drum clinic with Eddy Thrower

The anticipated night was all things drums and included performances, demos, and exclusive insights into carving a career as a drummer in today’s music industry.

Eddy talked about his past experiences as drummer with Lower Than Atlantis and working with Blink182, Linkin Park, One Direction, 5 Seconds of Summer, and Busted. The evening was packed with lively discussion where WaterBear student drummers had the chance to ask Eddy burning questions about working within the industry.

Brighton WaterBear MA student Dan Haysom opened the night with an incredible technical demonstration and performance. Dan drums and leads the pre-production for Mission Creep who recently toured in Germany and played at the ArcTanGent Festival (@missioncreepofficial).

He shared his main takeaways from the event and said: “The experience was great. To meet an industry professional of this standard was very insightful and made for a fulfilling masterclass experience. To get an idea of how he views practice and the ethos and concepts we share piqued my curiosity and was very interesting to hear similarities and differences in our methods.

“The main takeaways I had from the session was his approach to practice and networking. His laid back but still intentional practice method interested me as I lean more towards very focused, robotic methods of practice, whereas he practices ideas / concepts to songs or "context", giving him a more musical perspective on what it is he's playing. This could be grooves, fills and anything in between, the point being that it's practiced to context. His perspective on network was also valuable, quote "Your network is your net-worth" was a good quote that stood out to me and gave me a refreshed perspective on things to focus on when thinking about getting session work with others.

“I feel these masterclasses are very beneficial to people who want to gain some industry knowledge and experience from these individuals, as really, they're the best people to go to. No one can give you real world advice like the people that are working professionally within the industry you want to be a part of, and no one's advice / guidance could be more relevant”.

Significantly, many talented drummers studying at WaterBear have secured vast experience working within the industry.

Jay Hargreaves, a BA (Hons) Professional Music Performance student and drummer studying at WaterBear Sheffieldcommented on his experiences and said: “I’ve had so many opportunities through WaterBear, I wish I could go through them all. I'm currently in three original bands - Taking Back Tomorrow, Yoodoo Voodoo which is a funk band, and I'm playing drums for Liz Mann who's a solo artist from Manchester. I've also started my own student night in Sheffield at the Dorothy Pax alongside drum lecturing and tutoring thanks to the support of my tutors.

“Collaboration wise there are so many people I’ve had the chance to play live and record with. In the future I’d like to host my own events, play live as a drummer and record alongside tutoring. I know the pathway I want to take to become a successful musician and I've got the right tools to do it.”

Finn Anderson, a drummer and WaterBear Brighton Alumni added: “Since graduating from WaterBear in 2023 I have been doing session work, recently toured with Bug Eyed and have performed with Lilly Knott and Formz in Manchester. I also regularly do session work at South Lanes Studios. At WaterBear I established a network of not only friends but industry friends as well. Those connections have stood me in good stead on graduation, starting in industry outside of university. Networking at WaterBear comes very easy being in a close-knit community as you get to know everyone and feed off each other’s passion to make it in industry.

“My most memorable thing at WaterBear was playing The Great Escape Festival in Brighton in 2022 with Call me Franco, through an audition with WaterBear. It was a great gig and great weekend. This summer I will be going on a European tour with Bug Eyed, supporting Lola Young, a bucket list item for me. I will also be carrying out further live and session work including several festivals performances.”

Andy Maclure, Careers and Industry Director at WaterBear and drummer/songwriter with 90s Britpop band Sleeper commented: “To help students develop their technique drummers are tutored in small groups by professional drummers within dedicated drum rooms on professional-standard acoustic kits. To further support their learning, we also run exclusive masterclasses and events like these to give students further insights and advice to help them navigate their own careers.

“To become a professional drummer within the music industry alongside other musicians and creatives, drummers can build an independent sustainable career in music though developing transferable skills and knowledge such as learning about the music business and building skills in production, events, songwriting, marketing, and teaching for example. Ultimately working with different artists and bands, and building that all important network.”

WaterBear offers BA (Hons) degree and master’s courses made for today’s musicians, artists and industry professionals. Its colleges are based in the heart of Brighton and Sheffield, two amazing UK cities with incredible musical roots and heritage. The college also has a range of online distance learning courses.

WaterBear is a College of Falmouth University, a pioneer in creative industries education, entrepreneurship and innovation. Run by musicians for musicians WaterBear is about smaller class sizes, flexible course delivery, bespoke one-to-one mentoring and exclusive work experience and career development opportunities.

www.waterbear.org.uk