Tomas Haake (born 13 July 1971) is a Swedish drummer and main songwriter of the experimental metal band Meshuggah. He is known for his polyrhythms and technical ability. In 2012, Haake was named the 5th best Modern Metal drummer by MetalSucks.net. In the July 2008 edition of Modern Drummer magazine, Haake was named the number one drummer in the "Metal" category, as decided upon in the magazine's Readers' Poll.
Haake writes the majority of Meshuggah lyrics and also contributes spoken vocals on several songs ("Choirs of Devastation" on the album Contradictions Collapse, "Inside What's Within Behind", "Suffer in Truth", and "Sublevels" on the album Destroy Erase Improve, "Sane", "The Exquisite Machinery of Torture" on the album Chaosphere, "Spasm" on the album Nothing, as well as on several tracks on the album Catch Thirtythree and on the song "Dancers to a Discordant System" from obZen).
Haake also provides spoken vocals on Meshuggah guitarist Fredrik Thordendal's solo album Sol Niger Within and vocals on the song "Futile Bread Machine (Campfire Version)" from The True Human Design.
Haake has cited musicians from heavy metal, jazz fusion and progressive rock as influences. He cites English bands such as Saxon, Iron Maiden and Black Sabbath, American bands such as Metallica, Slayer, Testament and Metal Church and Canadian band Rush. His favourite drummers include Sean Reinert (Cynic), Neil Peart (Rush), Ian Mosley (Marillion), Terry Bozzio (Missing Persons and Frank Zappa), Vinnie Colaiuta, Gary Husband and Dave Weckl.
Described by some as a “drumming ninja,” Chris Coleman has drummed for legends like Chaka Khan, New Kids on the Block, Prince, Babyface, Beck and Christina Aguilera, as well as participated in Drummers 4 Jesus. Christopher R. Coleman has been playing drums since the ripe old age of 2, sitting on his uncle's knee in church. He traveled with his father and uncles who performed together in a gospel ensemble. in his youth he practiced relentlessly with the aim of making it big as a drummer.
In 1999, Chris graduated with honors from the Drummer's Collective. He was offered a scholarship to Berklee School of Music, was accepted into Manhattan School of Music, and received a recommendation from Ed Soph to attend North Texas State. He opted instead to return to his hometown of Saginaw, Michigan to start full-time ministry and ATW Global. He moved briefly to Cleveland to join the instructional staff at Christian Music Academy.
December 8, 2001, Chris was honored to win 1st place in DRum-Off Guitar Center.
In terms of the versatility and absolute joy of being a music fan and genius, Chris Coleman continues to inspire, and be inspired, by the various artists he works with. As a down-to-earth musician who enjoys the challenges and accolades of the music industry, Coleman’s career will, without doubt, continue to grow and evolve, bringing the talent, love and dedication of an extreme drummer into the lives of all he touches.
Anika debuted online 2013 on her youtube channel by releasing videos with her unique compositions and playing style. She built up a name for herself over the last seven years, boasting nearly 23 million views on her videos and touring all over the world as a well known clinician. Anika's playing style is distinguished by her strong groove, her finesse in technique, her unique sound and her ability how to use odd rhythms to make them sounding easy! Her use of the drum set as an expressive instrument rather than just a rhythm keeper allows for some extravagant playing without stealing the focus away from the music. Anika inspires drummers and musicians world wide to develope their skills and create their own music.
Anika won the 'Modern Drummer Readers Poll' for 'Up And Coming Artist' as well as '#1 Rising Star' in “DRUM!” Magazine in 2015 and 2016 as well as being voted to `#3 for best educator`on UK drummies awards in 2017 and ‚#1 for best clinician’ on UK musicradar in 2018 an #3 in 2019.
Musician. Arts Educator. Edupreneur.
Shawn Kok , also known as “turbochicken”, is a Singaporean drummer, sound designer, lecturer, and edupreneur. Having marinated in the music and entertainment industries in various capacities for over two decades, and trained in media, Shawn is known as a bilingual, comb-shaped arts practitioner and educator whose expertise maps reliably across music performance and education, music and audio technology, digital media, and higher education.
Shawn is an adjunct faculty member with Lasalle College of the Arts, Republic Polytechnic, Singapore Media Academy, and the National Institute of Education Singapore. He is also an Associate Adult Educator with the Institute for Adult Learning and a qualified Continuing Education and Training (CET) Trainer and Work Skills Qualification (WSQ) courseware developer.
Shawn began his professional practice as a drummer in 1999, and has performed at APEC 2009, SG50 Singalong, SPOP 2018 finals, and Marina Barrage’s 10th anniversary celebration. He has recorded percussion for Mediacorp drama serials and films, including the theme song for “When Ghost Meets Zombie” starring Nathan Hartono. Shawn is a Tycoon percussion artist and plays his own signature cajón by BH percussion from Tianjin (China). He is the principal pop percussion instructor for LOPSCA Studios (Shanghai, China) and a curriculum consultant for 鹏客音乐 (Zhangzhou, China).
Shawn began teaching online in 2008, when his Youtube videos gained traction. Garnering over millions of views globally for his Western-adapted hand drum methods on the djembe and cajon, Shawn is one of the Internet’s most recognisable contemporary percussion teachers today. His main influence is in Europe, the U.S.A, South Korea, Myanmar, Vietnam, and more recently China.
In 2018, he started his own contemporary percussion online school 肖恩流行打击乐 in China, teaching classes averaging at 100 participants per class, with the largest being 945 participants. Shawn has since taught over 3,000 people in this format.
“Carter McLean is what sports writers call a 'multi-threat'. Along with playing some serious drums, he also plays tabla, guitar, bass and piano. In addition, he’s a composer, arranger and synth programmer."
Modern Drummer Magazine
Carter was born in San Francisco and shortly thereafter moved to Connecticut. This is where McLean listened to and fell in love with music and especially the drums. At age 10, he started his journey as a musician. Broadway wasn’t even on his radar when he started working at Manny’s Music in Manhattan just prior to 9/11. The self-taught musician had just wrapped up his studies at University of Colorado, Boulder and was hoping to land a gig with someone like Sting, Peter Gabriel or Paul Simon. But then, while working his shift and playing at the store, he got noticed by a vet of Stevie Wonder’s band Dennis Davis and got invited to play with legendary musician Roy Ayers in Harlem. While touring with Melvin Sparks in 2002 McLean was approached to be a sub at The Lion King in NYC. This eventually lead to McLean taking over the chair at the hit show in 2011.
From Charlie Hunter to the Lion King on Broadway, McLean has been busy touring and doing studio work as well as having a busy teaching schedule. In addition McLean has shared the stage or recorded with Jamie McLean, Greg Holden, Charlie Hunter, Victor Wooten, Anthony Hamilton, Bernie Worrell (Parlament Funkadelic), Fred Wesley (James Brown), Shelby Johnson (Prince), Melanie Gabriel (Peter Gabriel) Leni Stern, Matt Duke and many others.
